Is this fellow talking about Romney?
Karl Rove says the election may come down to about four states. WSJ:
Mr. Obama is best positioned to pick up Colorado’s 9 electoral votes…The GOP now has just 68,507 more voters on the rolls in Colorado than Democrats, down from a 176,572 edge four years ago….McCain…needs to run up votes in the GOP strongholds of El Paso (Colorado Springs), Douglas (south of Denver), Weld (Eastern Plains) and Mesa (Western Slope) counties, while appealing to Democratic and independent Hispanics and Catholics.
The last time Virginia (13 electoral votes) went for a Democratic presidential candidate was 1964. In 2004, the GOP’s margin was eight points. That makes Virginia an uphill climb for Mr. Obama, but not out of reach. He’s focused on increasing African-American voters in Hampton Roads (in the southeastern corner of the state), Richmond and Petersburg, and on deepening his strength in Northern Virginia, where Fairfax was one of only 60 counties in America to flip from Republican in ’00 to Democrat in ’04…
With 17 electoral votes, Michigan is an attractive target. But it is also a complicated state. The Democratic machine is in near meltdown in Detroit, where the city’s mayor is fighting felony charges stemming from an alleged cover-up of a sex scandal (he recently spent a night in jail). The party is also hurt by adverse reactions to Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm’s $1.5 billion tax increase last year, which dampened economic growth. Mr. McCain needs Reagan Democrats and independents in eastern Michigan. These working class, culturally conservative, mostly Catholic voters are how the GOP elected an attorney general, a secretary of state and a state Senate majority…
Ohio. Ground zero in ’04, its 20 electoral votes will be hotly contested again this year. No Republican has won the White House without winning the Buckeye State. How can Mr. McCain take Ohio? He can appeal to swing voters in the northeastern part of the state. Cuyahoga, Summit and Lucas counties and the Mahoning Valley are full of culturally conservative, working-class voters. In addition, Mr. Obama was wiped out in the primary among the blue-collar Reagan Democrats of southeastern Ohio. Outside of the university town of Athens, he won less than 30% of the vote in southeastern Ohio. This Appalachian region remains bad turf for him…
Mr. Obama needs to pick up 18 electoral votes more than John Kerry received, meaning Mr. Obama must carry Colorado or Virginia and add another small state to his column. If Mr. McCain carries Michigan as well as Ohio, it would make Mr. Obama’s Electoral College math very difficult.
Maybe it’s just us, but we found it hard to read this piece without thinking that Mr. Rove is making his suggestion on who McCain’s running mate should be.
August 14th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
I keep wondering why John Engler doesn’t rate so much as a mention for VP. He might not turn out to be the best choice, but you’d think he’d get serious consideration.
August 15th, 2008 at 12:41 am
Romney has won one election in his entire life, and was undistinguished as Governor, albeit handsome.. Depending on how you count, he’s lost three elections. He couldn’t even win New Hampshire, where he lives, spent a( his ) fortune and most of his Governorship. He’s sadly a vote threat from/to evangelicals, and I would say conservatives in the South, which makes him toxic.