Politics

There have been many polls that have come in the recent week, and we'll get to those soon enough. Now that almost all primaries are done, let's look at the county by county national map for these primaries. (County graphics and results taken from CNN. I put them together on the US map. US Map taken from WikiMedia commons.).



To get a better sense of who has the better chance, we need to remove red states. However, red states are different for Obama than for Hillary. Currently, there is talk about VA, NC & SC. I'll leave these out because there is no indication that either Democrat can take these. Hillary is polling the same as Obama in most polls. As for the others, they just don't make sense. Take NC. SurveyUSA says Hillary beats McCain by 6% while Obama loses by 8%. Yet the poll I mentioned earlier has Obama winning in Virginia by 7% even though a new poll by VCU has both Dems losing to McCain by 8%. We need to look at states that Dems have a VERY good chance at winning where this is supported by history. If Obama wants to draw a new map, then so be it. But it there should be concrete evidence and there isn't any yet.

Here is the map. I've removed not only red states, but blue states as well. We want to know who has the best chance to pick up the MOST electoral votes. That's the ultimate goal. That's the ONLY goal. The rest matters little.



If you look at this, you'd think Democrats were in very good shape, no?

D: 221 EV
R: 183 EV
I: 134 EV

134 Electoral Votes up for grabs. More than enough to secure the White House. 49 out of 134 is 37%. By those odds, Democrats are lucky indeed. But the picture is not the same for both of them and the above map shows why.

All of the swing states are in play for Hillary, many of which are firmly in her column. For Obama, he cannot hope to get AK, NV, FL, KY, WV & NH.

So the above map is actually worse than Hillary's worst case map. She's the reason Nevada has opened up. But Obama's map fares much worse and is not getting any better. He is actually losing Ohio by 4% against McCain right now and has only continued to go down in recent weeks.

But first, let's put in the states that are firmly in Hillary's column.



HC: 284 (257 w/o FL)
JM: 183
I: 71 (98 w/o FL)

Hillary has already won and if you discount Florida, she needs 13 electoral votes. Michigan alone takes care of that. Guess what that means!!! It means Michigan is MUST WIN for the Republicans. If they lose Michigan, it's over. Strategy wise, this can only help Democrats because they can push for 13 electoral votes elsewhere and diversify. Looking at the above map, it's easy to see that her options are wide open for those votes. She's got those votes once. She can get them again.

Now, let's look at Obama's map.



This map is nowhere near as good as Hillary's.

BO: 230
JM: 238
I: 70

Obama needs 40 of the remaining 70 Electoral Votes (57%). Now look at the above map and see who's better even WITH Obama's map.

Let's even suggest that Obama can carry Virginia. Obama gets 243 EV to McCain's 225. Obama is still 27 away. It's looking like he'll lose Ohio, so winning WI & MI are a must. With Obama stopping the revote in FL & MI, his chances are questionable at best. Even with Ohio, it's not a sure thing. And I'll keep repeating Obama's greatest weakness... He can hold PA, OH, MI & WI and still lose if McCain can grab NM, CO & IA. Is that likely now? Maybe not, but these are all swing states and McCain has already started campaigning in those states (including OR & WA).

The situation is clear. Obama has 6 states in play to get 40 EV and Hillary has already won with 8 states still up for grabs. With FL as a toss up, Hillary has 9 states available to get 13 EV. Without Florida, Hillary starts off 74 EV ahead of McCain. Obama starts off 8 EV behind McCain.

With states such as OH and MA being increasingly doubtful for Obama, things aren't looking good. If IN, PA and OH are any indication, it's that Hillary can gain voters while being outspent 4 to 1. That kind of resilience is very valuable come November. Nevada has recently opened up for Hillary. Will it stay? Who knows? But if you take NV, WV, NM & AR, that's a 21 EV that's looking good with at least 11 of those (WV & AR) as safe bets. Also, two polls show her winning in FL against McCain by wide margins. I still believe FL will be close, but one thing for sure is that Obama has no chance here.

In November, you need to look at who has the best chance. The above maps show quite clearly that Hillary has gotten the majority of voters there and will continue to do so. Hillary even does better than Obama on his very own map. And that's where Obama's ability to retain Hillary's supporters will be of critical importance. He hasn't been able to reach them during the primaries. And recent polls show that he is trending downwards with Hillary supporters in these states. Just to bring the point home as to WHO exactly these voters are, let's look at the 2004 county map taken from USA Today.



See those rural voters? They have no problem voting for Republicans. The worst mistake that Democrats could do is assume that Hillary's voters will come home in November if Obama is the nominee. This is because many of them might just do exactly that and go back home to Republicans, at least in swing states. West Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio and Arkansas are proof of this. The maps are there. The people have already voted in the primaries, and the county maps from previous years are available. There can be no doubt that Hillary is getting the votes that a Presidential candidate needs to win.