"Political Science"

[via NPR.org]

Radiolab's Robert Krulwich writes today in his science blog, Krulwich Wonders, about the hidden geological politics of the deep south:

"This, says marine biologist McClain, explains that odd stretch of Obama blue; it's African-Americans sitting on old soil from ancient organisms that turned sunshine into fertilizer. So plankton remain a force in Southern elections — though not always, not continuously. After the Civil War, when the South voted solidly Democratic and Jim Crow laws ruled, many blacks couldn't vote, so the pattern disappears. Voting rights laws hadn't been passed during the Goldwater-Johnson election of 1964, so in this map, the African-American difference is invisible." 

"Obama's Secret Weapon in the South: Small, Dead, But Still Kickin'"