Mccain's stunning collapse in polls after Lehman Brother's bankruptcy.

[super6646]

MSNBC Battleground map (Sept. 15): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hF9ndn-R1_I&t=126s

I was astounded at how close the race was till the last few months of the race. On the day Lehman Brother's collapsed, Florida and North Carolina was leaning Republican, Indiana was leaning Republican, and Mccain was virtually tied/leading in Virginia. He was tied in Nevada, and running close in Colorado, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Oregon and Washington only LEANED democratic, and the battleground map was 233-227 to Obama. These projections are according to MSNBC, though if anyone has maps from other networks from this time, I would more than happily accept other sources to see were this election was at this point.

Just 3 weeks later, and it was falling apart. Missouri, Indiana, North Carolina, and Florida were out of the republican column. Georgia was starting to tighten (leaning republican), and Obama was leading by double-digits in Virginia. Colorado was slipping away, and the midwest (with the exception of Indiana and Ohio) was looking very bad for Mccain: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlOrt4ONdg4

And for its time, this certainly must have been a stunner (and just look at the Dow Jones collapsing on the right hand side of the screen): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6FD4tz-XG0&t=310s

In the last 48 hours before the election, things were even bleaker. Montana and North Dakota were toss-ups (could anyone imagine that today), Iowa was SAFE democrat (remember those days when Iowa was a democratic state), Michigan was safe, Nevada and Colorado leaned democratic, and Virginia looked gone for Mccain at this point. And depending on the netork you were watching on, South Carolina, Arkansas, and South Dakota were considered LEANS. I mean... come on. This is ruby red country, and Mccain was having trouble in these type of states? Man, was he screwed.

CNN battleground map: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkaFKH3LHZU&t=61s

MSNBC battleground map: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eghaoPd-rY&t=156s

So this is what a month and a half can do to one candidate. Mccain was running competitive with Obama till lehman brothers fell - but once that crucial event of the great recession happened, things all but went south for Mccain. He lost spectacularly, losing long time GOP states like Virginia, North Carolina, and even Indiana.

[super6646]

Obama led the polls by a decent margin for most of the summer.  McCain got a huge boost from the convention and led in nearly every poll prior the day the financial crisis broke.  Then his chances sunk with it, because people blamed Bush and the GOP for what happened. 

However, the financial crisis isn't why Obama got Indiana or North Carolina.  In Indiana, he won because of being from Chicago and having a sort-of favorite son effect; in North Carolina it was high black turnout.  And Virginia was trending D well before 2008, as demonstrated by the enormous growth of NoVa over the last few decades and that region's increasingly bluish tilt since the 90s.

I can agree with the statement about North Carolina, but Indiana was won because Obama actually campaigned there, and the rural counties swung heavily against Mccain. Traditional republicans do just as bad as Mccain did in Indianapolis these days, but can still win by almost 20 points because of the rural areas. Mccain lost lots of votes in GOP areas, and all but collapsed in the urban ones.