The next president is likely to triumph not by a landslide but by minute swerves in counties that prove decisive in a handful of states. He will win these important rural and suburban enclaves because of big things that he cannot control, such as the condition of the U.S. economy, and because of nitty-gritty things that he can control, such as his team's campaign organization and his advertising buys.
Close examination of the swing states that are this year's battlegrounds underscores just where John McCain and Barack Obama will meet in hand-to-hand combat. In a series published this summer, National Journal looked at eight of these states, and what follows are condensed profiles of each. The full series is available at NationalJournal.com.
McCain's reputation as a rebel and a patriot helps him in New Hampshire and Colorado, for instance, where independent voters will make a difference. Obama's call for economic renewal and his ability to inspire an uptick in Democratic voter registration and turnout (including among African-Americans) will be important in key counties in Michigan and Pennsylvania. And Obama has the money to meet voters and to organize activists, even in states that he knows will be tough to win.
But the victory-making states also expose the candidates' weaknesses, according to dozens of interviews and historical election results sorted by county and compiled by the independent firm Polidata exclusively for NJ. Obama has work to do, for example, to win Hispanic support that will be crucial in New Mexico and Colorado. Rural and small-community voters in Iowa and Ohio need help in warming up to Obama, who sounds more like an Ivy League urbanite than the just-folks politicians they know.
McCain's policies might be his undoing in Iowa, where he criticized ethanol mandates and the farm bill, and in Michigan, where he told voters that many auto-manufacturing jobs are gone for good. And some socially conservative swing-state Republicans, uncertain about McCain's core beliefs, may simply stay home on Election Day.
In the key states, the election results will hinge on sprawling cities such as Philadelphia, Detroit, and Des Moines, but also on counties such as Macomb, Weaver Creek, Dona Ana, Mahoning, Rockingham, Dallas, and Lackawanna. There, the candidates' organizations--and the resources to win new voters and turn out the ones who have already been wooed--will make as much difference in November as their competing messages, their policies, and their performances in debates and TV interviews.
Democratic Govs. Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania and Ted Strickland of Ohio are lending their considerable political organizations to help Obama on their home turf. The Illinois Democrat came to know Iowa inside out by winning its caucuses, which put him firmly on a path to the nomination. McCain, for his part, was on the ground early in Michigan, and he can rely on experienced campaign teams he has had in place for years there and in New Hampshire. Plus, Mitt Romney, McCain's former nemesis, is helping him in both states, where he has family connections. The Arizona Republican also has natural ties to Colorado and New Mexico.
If these swing states share a common denominator in 2008, it might be that the GOP brand has been weakening since 2006, as measured by election results and recent polling. Republicans are feeling gloomier about their chances, while Democrats are exulting that this might be their year. Independent voters, meanwhile, have become the target of both campaigns. Independents will be as essential to November's results in Albuquerque, N.M., as they are throughout New Hampshire.
The swing states boast political histories that both candidates can recite--histories worth keeping in mind, if the past is any kind of guide in an election year as filled with surprises as this one. No Republican has ever won the White House without carrying Ohio; since 1952, only two Democratic presidential candidates (Lyndon Johnson in 1964 and Bill Clinton in 1992) have carried Colorado; and Democrats have taken Pennsylvania in the last four presidential contests, but by shrinking margins each time. And history also suggests one other relevant predictor: During an economic downturn, the party in power in the White House almost always loses the privilege.
This article appeared in the Saturday, August 23, 2008 edition of National Journal.
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