Ferrel Guillory says the "Seaboard South" is different.

The head of the Program on Public Life at UNC-Chapel Hill says that Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia and Florida have moved away from the rest of the South in recent years.

He said the increased focus on high-tech jobs in Research Triangle Park and banking in Charlotte as well as the strengthening of the state's university system has led to a demographic shift that made the state more open to Democrat Barack Obama.

"Economically and demographically, the South has split in two," he said. "The 'Seaboard South' states — with the exception of South Carolina — have been growing robustly. They have moved more speedily into the newer economy and their metropolitan areas are burgeoning."

He said Obama found a pool of "persuadable voters" in the metro suburbs of North Carolina.

"Obama campaigned on a theme of change, but it was the change that was already here that put him over the top," he said.

Guillory made a similar argument in the biannual "State of the South" report in 2007.