Shannon, the numbers: Courtesy of John Ellis, Patrick Ruffini is running a map showing a town-by-town breakdown of the Dem primary results from Tuesday. A similar map appears in the Globe, but Ruffini’s is much better (scroll down a bit to view). Anyway, what does it all mean? First of all, Robert Reich’s support will go to O’Brien in November. Period. Can you imagine an Amherst professor voting for Mitt? Perish the thought. Also, don’t forget Warren Tolman’s base of support. While he may not have won many towns, he did pull in a sizable share of the vote, mostly from Clean Elections do-gooders. They’ll also go to O’Brien. ... But, ah, Tom Birmingham’s industrial/union/state-worker vote is a different matter, as Wayne Woodlief astutely notes. Just as some people fear O’Brien is the official candidate of Beacon Hill, there are equal numbers who think she is, in fact, a Beacon Hill reformer at heart. That’s her brilliance: Straddling both sides of the patronage/anti-patronage fence. And it profoundly unnerves a lot of hacks, i.e. Birmingham’s core supporters. ... But here’s the real key: The female vote. There is widespread, genuine pride among women that one of their own has scratched and clawed her way to the top of the Massachusetts heap. When a Margery Eagan can write a column like this, then you know something powerful is under way.

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