Adelson improved vote share in Senate 33

There's a lot of analysis yet to be done on this election, but here's one bit of data that's somewhat interesting.

Tom Adelson's share of the vote in State Senate district 33 may be one of the few positives in last Tuesday's results for the Democratic mayoral nominee. In 2004, Adelson beat Republican Mayor-elect Dewey Bartlett Jr for the open seat with 51.5% of the vote in a race with only two choices. In the 2009 mayoral election, the precincts in SD 33 gave Bartlett Jr 35.9%, Adelson 43.4%, Perkins 19.9%, Kirkpatrick 0.4%. Excluding the votes for independent candidates, Adelson received 54.7% of the two-party vote in SD 33 to Bartlett Jr's 45.3%.

SD 33 is a very diverse district. (That link leads to a demographic analysis of the district based on 2000 census data.) It includes blue-collar areas north of I-244, along the Sand Springs Line, and west of the river, but it also includes some of Tulsa's wealthiest neighborhoods. It was drawn to be competitive for Democrats, and it's been represented by Democrats for as long as I can recall -- Rodger Randle, through most of the '80s, Penny Williams from 1988 to 2004, when she hit her term limit, and Tom Adelson since 2004. Still, George W. Bush won the district in 2004 (54.5%), as did John McCain in 2008 (52.6%). John Sullivan narrowly won the district in 2004 over Doug Dodd (49.2% to 47.9% in a three-way race), but won by a wide margin in 2008 (57.2%).

(MORE: According to this on the Southwest Tulsa website -- "select all" to see the hidden text -- Senate District 33 has been held by a Democrat since its creation in 1965. Ed Bradley represented District 33 from 1965-1972, and Rodger Randle from 1973-1988, when he was elected mayor.

To the best of my recollection, in the 1988 mayor's race, in which one-term incumbent Republican Dick Crawford was defeated by Randle, Crawford sent out a last-minute tabloid newspaper-style campaign piece with an illustration of the SD 33 map after the fashion of a Gerrymander. Crawford's mailer tried to use the obvious manipulation of the boundaries of Randle's district for electoral advantage as an argument against Randle's character.)

The district isn't as fond of our U. S. Senators. In 2004, Tom Coburn finished second to Brad Carson (45.7% to 49.7% in a three-way race). In 2008, Jim Inhofe was edged out in SD 33 by Andrew Rice (47.8% to 48.5% in a three-way race).

One more thing: Adelson and Bartlett Jr each lost his own home precinct. Bartlett Jr got barely a third of the votes (34.0%) in Precinct 62, and Adelson did only a little better, 35.4%, in Precinct 71.