My questions has to do with the northern suburbs of NYC, so LI or NJ/CT information doesn't mean much to me....
I live in Weschester County, a former GOP stronghold that realigned in favor of the Democrats around the time of Clinton's first election (and despite the misconception from people in the city or out of state, the county as a whole is not Scarsdale or Chappaqua with people in fancy houses. There are a few rough towns, and we do have Yonkers and White Plains as cities). During the election I rarely saw a Bush sticker, and when I did it was usually that stupid "W '04" one of the back of an SUV, cleverly tucked away. "Support our Troops" magnets are also noticable, but every now and then I saw them with Kerry stickers.
After the election, I went online to look at the results in my state and see which counties voted blue or red. NYC perfect blue (with exception of SI, influnced by 9/11 in voting red) with Upstate mostly red with a scattered number of blue counties near cities like Buffalo or Albany. However, when I looked at the southern portion of the state that was north of NYC, I noticed something frightening: my county was the only one in the suburban sphere to vote for Kerry. Rockland, Putnam, Dutchess, and Orange all voted for Bush! Even more surprising was that Bush INCREASED his margains from 2000 in Rockland. Rockland was almost as blue as Weschester and was safely in Gore's column the last time around, but it narrowly went to Bush this time. I'm thinking that Orange might be red because of West Point, but I don't know why Putnam and Dutchess vote for the Republicans. Are there any Kossacks who live in the area who know about this?