Put another pot of coffee on in Mississippi

It takes 270 to win. So here is what Obama pretty much has in the bag (I don't think any of these are in dispute):

California -- 55
New York -- 31
Illinois -- 21
New Jersey -- 15
Massachusetts -- 12
Washington -- 11
Maryland -- 10
Connecticut -- 7
Oregon -- 7
Hawaii -- 4
Maine -- 4
Rhode Island -- 4
Vermont 3
Delaware -- 3
District of Columbia -- 3

That gives Obama 190 EVs pretty much in the bag. The states he SHOULD win but could theoretically be in play are:

Pennsylvania -- 21
Minnesota -- 10
Wisconsin -- 10
Colorado -- 9
Iowa -- 7

That bumps up his likely total to 247.

From there, he would only need Michigan (17) and Missouri (11).

Or North Carolina (15) New Mexico (5), Montana (3).

Or New Hampshire (4), Virginia (13) and South Carolina (8)

Or Ohio (20) and Nevada (5).

I think it's a far rosier picture for Obama than it is for McCain. What does he have in the bag?

Texas -- 34
Arizona -- 10
Tennessee -- 11
Alabama -- 9
Kentucky -- 8
Oklahoma -- 7
Kansas -- 6
Arkansas -- 6
Mississippi -- 6
West Virginia -- 5
Utah -- 5
Idaho -- 4
Wyoming -- 3
Alaska -- 3

That's only 117 I can count for sure for McCain.

The states he seems highly likely to win but could conceivably lose include:

Florida -- 27
Georgia -- 15
Indiana -- 11
Louisiana -- 9
North Dakota -- 3
South Dakota -- 3

That bumps him up to 185

Even if you say, Obama makes a good run but comes up short in Virginia and the Carolinas, that's 221 for McCain. If you give him all five EVs from Nebraska, it's 226.

From there, it really becomes difficult for McCain. Even if you then give him Michigan, Ohio and New Hampshire, he's only at 263.

At that point, McCain will have to win Nevada AND New Mexico to win. Or Missouri. But all those scenarios include McCain winning Michigan, which probably isn't too likely at the end of the day.

 

McCain is not highly likely to win in Louisiana, spinning. It's, at best, a 50-50 proposition for him at this point.

 

There is no way Minnesota is in play this fall.
And the Bob Barr/Ron Paul combo could cost McCain deraly in Georgia.

 

I'm just trying to paint a best-case scenario for McCain, to show how difficult it will be for him to win the general.

 

Even more important, though, than winning all of, say, Doc's list, is how many states he has a shot at.

He will have a financial advantage over McCain.

He will have a field advantage over McCain.

Take three plains states: Both Dakotas and Kansas. GOP registration numbers trump Democratic numbers by a good percentage in all three. But Obama will make a play in all three. He's got Sebelius in Kansas, the entire delegation in SoDak, Conrad in NoDak -- meaning he has a list of every vote he needs to win statewide in those places. He's already started voter reg. drives in all three states for the primaries. He adds to the list.

With relatively few registered voters, he can make it close. Which is going to force McCain to spend time and money in those states.

Hillary would have had a path to the presidency, too. But it involves just four states -- she probably flips Arkansas, and then spends all her time and money in Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania. I can see how people are attracted to the simplicity. Win two of those three, hold the solid blue states, and you're the president.

But that strategy has been tried, and it has failed. And I think McCain wins Florida, against either of them. And if that's the case, you allow McCain to concentrate all his time and money in two states.

If you're going to have a financial advantage, it makes sense to spread the other guy out.

And it isn't just the Great Plains. Make him play in Texas (and I concur, Alley, that Obama won't win there, but, again, he can make McCain play there), in Georgia, in Mississippi, in North Carolina, in South Carolina, in Montana. Beat him in Colorado, in New Mexico, in Virginia, in Iowa (which is all but a lock with Obama on the ballot).

While it goes largely uncovered on the television, Obama has a 50-state voter registration drive underway. At a time when the GOP "brand" is in the shitter, it's really important to register new voters all over the country.

(And Fenian's right: Minnesota goes blue, no matter what. HRC, however, is very weak in Wisconsin and Iowa, where Obama coasts.)

 

This argument, to me, is like:
Celtics lead the Cavs by 20 with five minutes left. LeBron hits some threes down the stretch, cutting Boston's final margin to 12. Hillary is basically asking us to declare Cleveland the winner for outscoring Boston by eight in the final five minutes, and to disregard what happened in the first 43 minutes.

 

Thanks for reminding me why talking politics here while not being part of the groupthink is damn near impossible (Zeke being one of the exceptions). Douche.

 

It's amazing why anybody cares what West Virginia has to say about things at this point. You're talking about a state that is 96% white where 70% of the residents have never attended college and carries all of five Electoral Votes. And it's not like the bad economy has hurt West Virginia, where the big industry is coal.

 

You certainly are welcome to bow out of the discussion if you don't like its direction or the manner of discourse. Just remember that you play in that same kind of alleged groupthinking you're accusing others of.

 

As one of the TV people said (I forget who), this is another reason Hillary might be so obsessed with winning.

The Democratic nominee has an excellent chance to win the Presidency. They'll have a heavily Democratic House and Senate to work with. That's a lot of power. A lot. Imagine the things you could get done with a fillibuster proof Senate and a large margin in the House?

Kinda scary, but wow!

 

Yeah, like what happened in 1993-95 and when the GOP had the same situation this decade? That worked out real well, didn't it?

 

I didn't say whether it was good or bad, just that it would put a lot of power in the hands of the President.

Oh, and there's this:
http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x1295.xml?ReleaseID=1177

Either one of the two Democratic contenders, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama or New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, leads the likely Republican presidential nominee, Arizona Sen. John McCain, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released today. Sen. Obama leads Sen. McCain 47 - 40 percent while Sen. Clinton is up 46 - 41 percent.