As we near the 4th of November, one question seems to continually arise: Who will win the presidential election? In order to answer that question we must first inquire as to the different paths to victory for both Senator Obama and Senator McCain.
This is part one of a four part series regarding election strategies.
Part I: Good Old Dependable
There are certain states that in recent history have almost always gone Democratic or Republican. States that exhibit this recent history of voting solidly Democratic or Republican and show large leads in the polls (a realclearpolitics.com average of 10% of points or more) may be referred to as solid states.
Solidly Democratic states include those with large amounts of electoral votes, like California (55 electoral votes), New York (31), Illinois (21), Massachusetts (12) and Maryland (10), and those with less, like Connecticut (7), Maine (4), Rhode Island (4), Hawaii (4), Vermont (3) and Washington, D.C. (3).
Solidly Republican states also include those with large amounts of electoral votes, like Texas (34), Tennessee (11) and Arizona (10), and those with less, like Alabama (9), Louisiana (9), Kentucky (8), South Carolina (8), Oklahoma (7), Arkansas (6), Kansas (6), Mississippi (6), Nebraska (5), Utah (5), West Virginia (5), Idaho (4), Wyoming (3), South Dakota (3) and Alaska (3).
Counting only these dependable states, Democrat Barack Obama would have an electoral lead of 157 compared to Republican John McCain’s 142 electoral votes. Keep in mind that the objective is to reach 270 electoral votes.
Check out the upcoming components of Paths to Victory coming soon.