On "significant" developments

A few days ago I posted (at Babalu) about a Herald article that left readers with the impression that some 4,000+ Republican voters in District 21 (represented by Lincoln Diaz-Balart) had gone independent.

Here's the relevant quote:

Generational change and the rise of independent voters will be tested in the 21st District, which stretches from Miramar and Pembroke Pines in Broward County to Miami Lakes, Hialeah, Doral and Kendall in Miami-Dade County. The district has 124,744 Republicans and 101,267 Democrats. The numbers reflect a decline of 4,558 Republicans and a gain of 111 Democrats since the 2006 election. More significant, perhaps, is an increase of unaffiliated voters to 71,208.

If you look closely there's a missing piece of information. What was the number of unaffiliated voters in the district in 2006? We can figure out the 2006 numbers for Republicans and Democrats but not for unaffiliated voters. Well I found the party affiliation statistics for the district in 2006 and it turns out that there were 70,927 unaffiliated voters in the 21st congressional district as of 2006. So the net gain in unaffiliated voters was 281. Is that the "significant" development that the Herald is referring to?

We're still no closer to knowing where the vast majority of the 4,558 Republican voters went but we know that they didn't join the Democrat party or go independent in any large numbers.

My guess is that it's a combination of voter roll purges and voters who moved out of the district and were replaced by non-registered residents.

And that "generational change", well the Herald has been reporting about that since at least the 1990s. Someday they are likely to be right about it. But I don't think 2008 is the year.