Posted on 07/12/2008 7:22:38 PM PDT by neverdem
New immigrants accounted for at least one-third of the increase in the number of New York City voters since 2004, while the number of Irish, Italian and Jewish voters, who together represent the traditional core of the city’s political establishment, decreased slightly, according to an analysis of voter registration records.
The transformation of the voter rolls portends a momentous shift in the ethnic makeup of the city’s electorate that threatens to upend the balance of power that has governed local politics for decades.
With so many seats coming open next year — term limits will force the mayor, comptroller, public advocate, four of the five borough presidents and two-thirds of the 51-member City Council to leave office — cultivating voters among the city’s various ethnic communities could prove both crucial and challenging for those seeking election.
“For 2009, you basically have to forget the old campaign model and go back to the drawing board to come up with a new strategy,” said Evan Stavisky, a political consultant who has worked on several state and local Democratic races, including the 2001 campaign of John C. Liu, the first Asian-American elected to the City Council.
The analysis was prepared by John H. Mollenkopf, director of the Center for Urban Research at the City University of New York Graduate Center. Voter registration forms do not require citizens to identify their countries of origin, so, in a project that took about eight years, Mr. Mollenkopf compiled volumes of surnames associated with specific ethnic groups, then categorized voters’ names.
While the study is not exact, it nonetheless offers a revealing snapshot of an increasingly diverse electorate.
More than 38,000 of the 110,000 voters added to registration rolls between 2004 and 2007 were identified as Russian, Korean, Chinese or Muslim — a group made up primarily...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The old New York political equation of the three Is (Ireland, Israel and Italy).
FReepmail me if you want on or off my New York ping list.
There will be NO change in the political structure in New York City.New York will remain one of the biggest liberal cities in the North Eastern United States.
Interesting how adherents to Islam are named as Muslims, not by their country of origin like all the others.
WTF should Italians/Poles, etc. be expected to stay in their old nabes with tiny houses anyway? Have certain folks ever heard of something called upward mobility. I would consider it an EMBARASSMENT if Italian Americans were still living in tenements in East Harlem or row houses in Gravesend.
The fact that there are really no truly Italian neighborhoods in New York city is testament to the American dream of upward mobility and prosperity. Many of the new immigrants (the Chinese, Koreans, even Arabs) don't even stay in the same neighborhood for more than one generation. They too move on as soon as they have money saved up for a bigger place out in suburbia.
Thanks for the ping!
With the exception of those who register after being duly nationalized at a Naturaliztion Office, with "Motor Voter" registration who can tell?
Another gift that keeps on giving thanks to the pubbies who wanted to teach G.H.W. Bush a lesson for not being a perfect pubbie. When I think about the bent one, I want to throttle those who say they won't vote for McCain.
With the energy mess there's a good chance to take back Congress, despite all the conventional wisdom. Independents are really P.O. at Congress in the latest Rasmussen Poll. Other polls say 3/4 want to drill for oil.
Sorry, but no. New Yorkers, by and large, are not assimilated in the traditional American core. They exist as disparate ethnic groups, derascinated liberals, a guilt ridden WASP and Reform-Jewish elite, and transients from the rest of the country or the world. Hence, Demoicrat politics are based on race/religion, social grievences, and the politics of greed. And I hate to say it, but it looks like the future of America.
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