What I have been saying forever if the Dems want to win Statewide in 2010.

From Bill Kinney of the Marietta Journal: If Democrat Roy Barnes of Marietta seeks political redemption next year in the race for governor, he had better find a way to win back votes he lost in rural Georgia in 2002 after his education reform package and state flag change caused many traditionally Democratic voters in rural counties to vote for Republican Sonny Perdue.

In 2002, Barnes ran slightly ahead of Perdue in metro Atlanta, then consisting of 20 counties (compared with 28 counties today) and overall ran about even with Perdue in the state's other metro areas, but lost badly in the state's rural areas.

Interestingly, Barnes's 2002 performance closely resembled Obama's showing in the Peach State last fall, with both Barnes and Obama losing their respective contests in Georgia by five percentage points, and both running about even with their GOP opponents in the state's metro areas while running poorly in rural areas such as the north Georgia mountains and southeast Georgia.

Though rural counties account for only a small proportion of the state's total voters, they serve as the "tiebreakers" if in an election the state's metro areas split about 50/50 between Dems and GOP candidates.

That's the argument democrats are going to have to realize. It's not enough to just get the votes in the urban areas & the cities. You need to get the rural vote because if you get a good number of rural votes, it'll become easier to win statewide. Relying on liberal voters is not enough. You need the conservative democrat vote, independents & moderate republicans to win. Had Jim Martin performed better in the rural areas of the state during the general election, he would be senator right now. That will be the key to Barnes if he does run agaain. Can he win back those rural votews that had been voting democrat for over 130+ years?

DuBose Porter won't have that problem because he hails from rural Georgia & knows what it takes to get those voters back into the democratic party. That's something Roy is going to have to consider if he runs again.

A must read: As numbers decline, rural lawmakers band together

March 20, 2009 —Last Tuesday, 41 members of the Congressional Rural Caucus sent President Obama a letter saying that if he’s going to have a White House Office of Urban Affairs, he should also have a White House Office of Rural Affairs.

Rural consciousness is rising at the state level as well. At the beginning of the year, Tennessee’s legislative rural caucus actually consisted only of a group of Democrats from West Tennessee. Since then, the Democrats have expanded to include members from the other two-thirds of the state in their rural caucus, and rural Republicans – some of whom differed with their urban counterparts over the ouster from the party of House Speaker Kent Williams, have formed their own caucus.

Like most political developments these days, much of what’s driving this is the worsening economy. State Rep. Charles Curtiss (D-Sparta), the chair of the Democratic Rural Caucus, said the unemployment rate in some rural Tennessee counties is now over 20 percent. In this climate, many rural lawmakers worry their concerns will be overlooked.

“There are so many issues that cut differently in rural American than urban America,” said Chuck Hassebrook, executive director of the Center for Rural Affairs.

The traditional conception of the country is that of a healthier alternative to cities, but with fewer hospitals, doctors and recreational facilities, Hassebrook said, “the reality is we’re less fit.”

Al Cross, director of the Institute http://www.ruraljournalism.org/ for Rural Journalism and Community Issues at the University of Kentucky, suggested rural politicians could also be looking at some other numbers.

“I think next year’s census will show a significant decline in the percentage of population that is rural, and the pols can sense it already,” he said.

Cross said a decline from 21 percent to 18 percent in the 2010 would be consistent with the percentage decline from 1990 to 2000. That could be enough to affect redistricting in the next decade and make it even harder for rural legislators to hold their own with urban and suburban lawmakers.