What is the likelihood of a major landslide happening?

[Alexander Hamilton]

Hillary Clinton said she channels dead people and still got the most votes in the 2008 Democratic Primary.

[Psychic Octopus]

How about if the Democrats nominate Dennis Kucinich? And Obama has a 39% approval rating?

Depends who the GOP nominates. If they nominate Palin or Huckabee, Kucinich could have a landslide win.

Are you serious?

Voters will prefer the more sane candidate. Palin certainly ain't it.

Dude, Kucinich has said he's seen UFOs.

Dennis Kucinich is, also, way too far to the left to win a presidential election. And, even if the GOP nominates a theocrat, the theocrat will still win.

What would that have to do with his ability to govern?

If you read the post, it wasn't about "governing". It was about winning a general election.

[pbrower2a]

This is Election 2008 imposed upon the Wikipedia projection of electoral votes for the 2012 election, with no display of margins of victory for McCain or Obama. Obama's razor-thin win of Indiana looks just as firm as John McCain's easy win of Tennessee. Because re-elections of three  Presidents in the last 60 years (Eisenhower, Clinton, and Dubya)  look much like those that they got elected in the first time suggest that they pleased their supporters and did little to win over those who didn't vote for them the first time, a projection of the 2012 election that looks like this is a good baseline.  

This rules out any "age wave" that manifests itself in new (largely younger voters) supplanting older ones or the effect of the presence or absence of a Favorite Son effect. Should Election 2012 much resemble Election 2008, then the states most likely to switch sides are Arizona, Indiana, Missouri, and Montana. It takes more contortions to figure how Obama could win South Carolina (poor whites recognize that his sincere efforts to help poor blacks have helped them as well, and he isn't so "scary" as they thought he was in 2008) or lose Michigan (where people start blaming the Democrats for economic distress and start voting to candidates who support legislation that would eviscerate the power of unions and allow the financiers, industrialists, and executives to keep more of what they make).

I frequently speak of political culture determining how states vote. It might be easier for the Republicans to strip away 8% of Obama's 2008 vote for themselves in Nevada and win the state than to strip away 6% of the Obama's 2008 vote in either Minnesota or Pennsylvania and win either state. On the other side it might be easier for Obama to win 8% of the vote in Tennessee and swing it than to win 5% of the vote in North Dakota. Any method that relies on a nationwide swing of votes of a set percentage applicable in all states is unduly crude -- but necessary in the absence of alternatives. We don't know what the state-specific issues will be in 2012, and we have no idea who the Republican nominee will be.  

So let's start by seeing how Obama can lose: start by stripping from him all states that voted for him by less than 8.95% in 2008; color them blue. Obama won Colorado by 8.95% and is the margin of winning and losing; color it white.

This still looks much like elections of 2000 or 2004; it's Gore 2000+NH+NV, which would have been enough for Gore to win, or Kerry 2004+IA+NV+NM -- likewise. But there will be the nagging reality that states that have been culturally attuned to the Democratic Party will have been losing enough electoral votes that Obama will absolutely need Colorado, which has NOT been a Democratic-leaning state over the last twenty years but instead a genuine swing state. At this stage, who wins Colorado might depend as some think that it did in Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004 on the integrity of the people who control the registration and counting of the vote.

 

Of course a simple win-loss scenario fails to show what happens in detail. A shift of 5% flips Iowa (which voted for Dubya in 2004) and New Hampshire (which voted for Dubya in 2000), and the Democrats are having trouble holding onto any majority.  A shift of 5.12% of the vote loses Minnesota (which hasn't voted for a Republican nominee for President since Nixon in 1972 and was the only state to vote for Mondale in 1984); a shift of 5.15% loses Pennsylvania.   At 6.25% of a swing, Nevada goes for the Republican nominee for President; at 6.95% so does Wisconsin. At such a point, Colorado is long gone, and the Republicans have won decisive control of the House and Senate and are taking "back" several state legislatures. Right-wingers like Santorum are winning Senate seats in supposedly-liberal states.  

A 7.57% shift of votes is necessary for the Republicans to pick up New Mexico, 7.77% for New Jersey, 8.18% for Oregon, 8.23% for Michigan, 8.54% for Oregon, and 8.61% to win Maine at large -- likely splitting the two Congressional districts of Maine, and 8.66% to swing Washington. At this point Obama is losing the popular vote about 54-45 and he knows it. He will at this point win 150 electoral votes. That's still better than McCain did in 2008 in electoral votes, but such is academic.

Next comes Connecticut -- which takes a swing of nearly 11.2% of the vote. Then fall such states as California, Maryland, Delaware, Massachusetts, Illinois, and New York, Rhode Island, and the one remaining Democratic-voting district of Maine.  Obama ends up with Vermont, Hawaii, and DC -- and plenty of places in the world in which to seek political asylum.  For this to happen, Obama must be an abject failure as President and face a charismatic Republican opponent.  The political culture of the so-called "Blue Firewall" that developed over 20 years would have to disintegrate quickly for America to become the dream of the Hard Right of the GWB era -- a plutocratic theocracy, if not a fascist dictatorship. The GOP would have decisive majorities in the House and Senate capable of pressuring electorally-shaky Democrats to vote for Constitutional amendments. Those of us who despise the two Far Right Republican Senators from Oklahoma would recognize that those two now have fellow right-wing company.

Key:

ordinary blue -- Obama loses these states (and the election) with a swing between 4.48% and 5.1% against him (Colorado is his closest loss)

pale blue -- Obama progressively loses these states with swings between 4.75% and 5.1% (IA, NH)

white -- Obama progressively loses these states with swings between 5.1% and 7% against him

pink -- Obama progressively loses these states with swings between 7.5% and 8.7% against him


red --  Obama progressively loses these states with swings of 11.2% to 14%

deep red -- Vermont (19.5%), Hawaii, and DC.  


 
    

[pbrower2a]

Please bear with me: after the introduction, the first part of this post is the same as the last post of my previous post, but if someone wants to see how Obama can win bigger in 2012 than in 2008, keep reading.

This is Election 2008 imposed upon the Wikipedia projection of electoral votes for the 2012 election, with no display of margins of victory for McCain or Obama. Obama's razor-thin win of Indiana looks just as firm as John McCain's easy win of Tennessee. Because re-elections of three  Presidents in the last 60 years (Eisenhower, Clinton, and Dubya)  look much like those that they got elected in the first time suggest that they pleased their supporters and did little to win over those who didn't vote for them the first time, a projection of the 2012 election that looks like this is a good baseline. 

This rules out any "age wave" that manifests itself in new (largely younger voters) supplanting older ones or the effect of the presence or absence of a Favorite Son effect. Should Election 2012 much resemble Election 2008, then the states most likely to switch sides are Arizona, Indiana, Missouri, and Montana.

As a rule, voters under 30 were much more Democratic-leaning in 2008 than were voters under 30.  In 2012 that group will have expanded to voters under 34, and all accounts suggest that the new youngest voters of 2012 will be just as Democratic-leaning as voters of 2008 between ages 18 and 21, and that the Grim Reaper will have taken away some older voters who as a group were more Republican-leaning than voters under 30. Obama loses nothing to that tendency but picks up Missouri and Montana. Obama did few campaign appearances and his campaign put little effort into advertising in Arizona, political base of John McCain. John McCain won't be running for President in 2012, and he won the state by a narrow margin for a Favorite Son. Arizona is thus one of the easier possible pickups for Obama in 2012. The Age Wave and the reversal of the Favorite Son effect will allow only three pick-ups of states with no other effects upon the election: 

Such is the crudest model of political realities being much as they were in 2008 except for demographic change. Obama must pick up Arizona, Missouri, and Montana while losing nothing before he has any chance at winning any landslide that will require more -- much more. Even that suggests about a 54-45 split of the electorate and some landslide losses in enough states to preclude a landslide based solely on swinging 5% or so voters. Such will have happened should he win Georgia, South Carolina, and the Dakotas but nothing else beyond Obama 2008 +AZ+MO+MT. You will see why I have colored Texas as I did:

Georgia would take a 2.6% swing and about a 55-44 win. South Dakota? About 4.2%. North Dakota? About 4.4%. South Carolina? About 4.5%. Obama would have to have a nationwide 57- 42 percentage of the popular vote to win those three states with spaces in the middles of their names if the gain is evenly distributed nationwide.

Between a 4.5% swing (South Carolina) and a 6.55% nationwide swing (West Virginia) is only one state -- but it is a big prize in itself:

TEXAS   

at roughly a 5.9% national swing, or about a 58-41 split of the vote for Obama.  Texas has as many electoral votes as the states that Clinton won but Obama got clobbered in (Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Tennessee, and West Virginia) and in itself suggests that Obama has about a 440-EV landslide. That's about an Eisenhower-scale win.

Texas hasn't voted for a Democratic nominee for President since Jimmy Carter in 1976, and even in the best of conditions it would be a difficult prize for any Democrat running a statewide campaign, and in any state a Presidential election is as much a statewide campaign as a gubernatorial or senatorial race.   That Texas appears at this stage, the 35th state that Obama could win, shows how difficult an Obama landslide will be. Maybe Obama wins NE-01 (eastern Nebraska except for Greater Omaha) at this point, but that is one electoral vote.

States "beyond" Texas don't get easier barring major and unforeseen changes in their core political realities.
   
************************************
 

Question: will he actively campaign to get a landslide? He might not. He might have other priorities -- like graceful exits from Iraq and Afghanistan or diplomatic efforts to isolate thug powers like Iran, North Korea, and Sudan. There could be a natural disaster that diverts his attention from winning votes because mishandling a natural disaster ensures far bigger losses of votes, if not for oneself then for political allies. Think of Hurricane Katrina, a political disaster for the Republican majorities in the House and Senate in the 2006 election.  He might have the opportunity to initiate politically-risky reforms of the economic system and do those. If he does much campaigning when he has a large lead, then it will because he has a point to make or a desire to offer coattails to someone who needs them.

He might not have to campaign. If health care reform works well, it might reduce age discrimination in the workplace. Considering that people over 50 are "trash" to health insurance companies and are harder to hire, an appropriate reform might make the prospects of older workers far better than they have been. Should his Surge in Afghanistan work and allow him to draw down troops in time for the election -- guess who profits politically?  A strengthened economy with a solid foundation (something lacking when Dubya was President) makes him harder to vote against. 

His opponent could be a partisan hack out of touch with political reality, someone who thinks that he (or she, and I am not naming names) can change the core beliefs of voters during a political campaign. That's Goldwater in 1964 or McGovern in 1972. 

 

[Old Man Willow]

You just spit out numbers as if you know anything about them, every state has individual politics. You seem to lack common sense. JACKASS.

[5280]

ha ha ha ha, pbrower, just give it up already.  People are tired of your nonsense.

[Rowan]

Right now, I'm leaning toward a 2004 like race with the incumbent with the advantage, but not out of the realm of possibility of the challenger winning. Just a few points either way is my thinking, no landslide at this point.

[pbrower2a]

You just spit out numbers as if you know anything about them, every state has individual politics. You seem to lack common sense. JACKASS.

Lay off it. All I have to offer now are models based on information already available. I show one model that shows what "much the same in 2012 as in 2008" looks like, one that shows Obama losses would look like, and one that puts him on the brink of an Eisenhower-scale landslide.

The numbers, by the way, come from Leip's Election Atlas and relate to the 2008 election. Shouldn't it be obvious that if 5.2% of the vote in Minnesota goes from Obama to his Republican opponent in 2012, Obama loses if he won Minnesota by 10.3% in 2008? Divide the split in half and adjust the raw number of votes accordingly, and give the opponent a little more, and Obama loses Minnesota. On the other side, Obama lost Texas by a margin of 11.76%, so if he gets a swing of 5.9% of votes on the net from the result of 2008, he wins Texas. That is simple mathematics.

Did I say that it was likely that Obama would lose Minnesota or win Texas in 2012? Hardly! Did I say that if Obama gained a certain percentage of votes nationwide that that percentage would be distributed evenly? Hardly! Did I say that the distribution of electoral votes would be what I showed on the map? No -- but I said that that was a reasonable estimate based on an estimate of the 2010 US Census only in preliminary stages.

 I have shown awareness that some states are more volatile in their voting patterns than others.  Does anyone question that until one approaches November 2012 that Nevada has yet to show that it is firmly Democratic in its Presidential votes as are several states that voted by narrower margins for Obama (let us say Minnesota)? In 2008, Nevada broke late and hard for Obama. I can give plenty of rationales for believing that Nevada has joined the so-called Blue Firewall (because its population is heavily concentrated in cities and because the Religious Right is weak there), but I can also look at how it voted in 2000 and 2004 and that Nevada was a question mark for both parties until late October.

By the way -- I have more cause to believe in reversion to the mean than in sheer momentum. For example, Obama gained about 10% against the hideous percentage of votes that John Kerry got in Indiana in 2004 (39%) and won with a fraction of the vote just under 50%. Obama is not going to win 59% of the vote in Indiana in 2012 unless he wins by a national margin around 65% which nobody has gotten in recent years. 

Is it reasonable that Obama would gain or lose the same percentage of votes nationwide in all states? I think not.  It's hard to imagine him gaining much in a state like Massachusetts or California even if he wins 57% of the vote.  But if he is winning 57% of the vote, where do you expect him to make his gains? Most likely, those states that he lost by large margins -- like Texas or Tennessee... even Utah. Sure, Obama could swing 13% more of the vote in Utah toward him in 2012 and still lose it. That's Utah.

We aren't even a year into the Obama Administration, and little says that things have changed. The sorts of people who supported him in the 2008 election still think he's OK; those who supported McCain seem to think that Obama hasn't earned his vote.  We don't know what the economic conditions of 2012 will be. We don't know who the Republican nominee for President will be. We don't know what his legislative successes will be and what their effects will be on voting behavior; for example, should his legislation do good for the sorts of voters who typically voted for Bill Clinton but not for him, then voting patterns in some states that Obama got clobbered in could be very different.

Major wars can yet erupt with harsh effects upon economic realities in America. Iraq and Afghanistan could still turn into military debacles. Dien Bien Phu, anyone? Obama would lose lots of electoral votes if something like that happened -- enough to lose the election. We can't predict the state of the health, mental or physical, that our President will have in 2012. We can't completely rule out some scandalous disgrace. That's before I even discuss economic realities -- or changes in the political culture in specific states.

Maybe all that I can show with those models of huge losses and huge wins is to show what now look like equal levels of silliness. Well, it is true that Texas was his 35th-"best" state (not counting DC), wasn't it? I didn't count the electoral votes that would go to Obama if he won 35 electoral votes, but it would probably put him around 440-450 electoral votes if he won it, right?

 

     

[minionofmidas]

If you read the post, it wasn't about "governing". It was about winning a general election.

Dennis Kucinich defeating a Republican in a hypothetical general election is nowhere as unrealistic as Dennis Kucinich winning the Democratic primary. Even if we try to ignore the fact that for him to win the primary, something would have to happen to make him suddenly all that much more electable, and that same factor would likely still be around in the ensuing general election.


As to the question at hand - it's not happening. Not in the popular vote, not in the electoral college. Obama winning by more than Reagan 1980 is possible, though not in the EC I suppose.
Obviously, events may occur and pigs may fly, but I just don't see it. Actually, I just don't see Obama failing to be reelected, though that's obviously much less "far out". (I *can* see the Republicans regaining a chamber of congress by 2012, or even both by 2014, and am reasonably sure they'll gain a non-negligible number of seats in 2010. In other words, I can see Obama ending up a Clintonstyle two-term-failure.)

[DS0816]

What would be the likelihood of either

a) Obama loses as or more badly than Jimmy Carter in 1980.

b) Obama wins as good as or better than Ronald Reagan in 1984.

Popular vote or electoral vote can be used as measurements.

An electoral vote landslide of that magnitude is not possible for either party unless Obama reveals himself as Osama in disguise or the Republican nominee is a member of the Klan. 

As for the popular vote, here’s the margin of victory for every election of the past 30 years:

1980: R+9.74%
1984: R+18.21%
1988: R+7.72%
1992: D+5.56%
1996: D+8.51%
2000: D+0.51%
2004: R+2.46%
2008: D+7.27%

The only real landslide there is 1984 and that is extremely unlikely.  However if Obama rebounds by 2012, I wouldn’t be surprised if we got close to a D+10% victory.  The best Republicans can hope for at this point is probably R+2%.

Prior to Election 2008, numbers of those predicting then-Sen. Barack Obama [D-Illinois] would win election as the 44th president of the United States had trouble envisioning him getting well past 300 in the Electoral College. They were waffling over their red-vs.-blue states observations.

You know what?

…In answer to your question, just go back to simple math. In addition to the political scene, the 2012 electoral results will depend largely on the margins. And presidents who get re-elected end up increasing.

Bill Clinton and George W. Bush saw their re-election margins—in 1996 and 2004, respectively—increase by, roughly, 3 percentage points. That meant a few states, five points within the margins of their first elections, traded colors. Result was ’96 Clinton saw a net loss in 1 state carried but a gain of 9 electoral votes. ’04 Bush saw a net gain in states carried as 1, while he had a net gain of 8 electoral votes (if you allocate the map in the same decade, he had 278—rather than 271—with the ’00 complexion of states won vs. 286 in ’04; otherwise, it’s 15).

If a landslide against Obama were to happen in 2012, it’s because he’s a low-approval president, and there’s a shakeup in the map with a stream of populous states won back to the Republican column for the first time in over 20 years (1988, with George H.W. Bush, to be exact). The shift in the margin of victory for a prevailing Republican would be between 15 and 20 points in the popular vote—and with that, a string of states for the ride.

Using red for Republican; blue for Democrat…

States colored in yellow are ones at play and likely to be (for the most part or all) lost…

If a landslide re-election—and I’m thinking in general terms of 400-plus vote in the Electoral College—were to happen for Obama, he would likely double his 7.25 win margin in the popular vote over 2008’s John McCain, and would probably increase his margin by 10 points and win in the popular vote in the high-10s (as Ronald Reagan essentially did in 1984).

In this scenario, it would involve the Republicans putting up a poor candidate—or, at least, one who doesn’t mount a credible challenge—and it may also involve a perception of the GOP being generally out of touch. States that would be targeted and make for a good bet to switch colors would fall along or around the 10-point average (maybe a little more, given the Obama/Biden re-election campaign’s focus and certain states’ histories and inclinations). With electoral votes’ allocations for Elections 2012, ’16, and ’20 projected by Wikipedia.org [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Proposed_Electoral_College_2012.svg]—which would have Obama’s 2008-cum-’12 victory at 358, rather than 365, Electoral College votes—I’m thinking of the following as potential additions: Texas (11.76 margin for GOP McCain), 38 electoral votes; Georgia (5.2), 16; Arizona (8.76), 12; South Carolina (8.98), 9; North Dakota (8.65), 3; South Dakota (8.41), 3; Montana (2.38), 3; Nebraska’s 1st Congressional District (9.23), 1. In addition to the Lone Star State, those within the 10.00–14.99 margin include: Kansas (14.93), 6 electoral votes; Mississippi (13.17), 6; Nebraska (14.93), for all 5; and West Virginia (13.09), 5. Outside the 15-points-and-under margin, but slightly, which is suggesting the making of a real blowout (450-plus electoral votes for an Obama/Biden re-election), we have: Tennessee (15.06), 11, and Kentucky (16.22), 8.

States colored in yellow are ones at play and likely to be (for the most part or all) pickups…

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

All we can do is what we've been doing.......basing our speculation on the GOP nominee and the ASSUMPTION that Obama remains popular. 

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

If the GOP nominates a genuine alternative to Obama's failed policies, like Gary Johnson or Dr. Paul, it will be a landslide defeat for Obama.

If the GOP nominates an establishment hack, it will be a repeat of 2008, with a few states flipped here and there.

As much as I like Ron Paul, he'd lose in a landslide to Obama.

[pbrower2a]

We are not asking so much whether an electoral blowout is likely so much as what it looks like. For the GOP to defeat Barack Obama it must win over constituencies that did not vote for McCain in 2008 while keeping what it has; such implies finding constituencies other than the Corporate Right, the Religious Right, and people scared of a black man as President. The Corporate Right is not expanding; the Religious Right is shrinking because young adults are not joining it; those scared of Obama in 2008 who have found that he is no dangerous radical and has done reasonably well for him could be big trouble for the GOP in 2012.

Economic failure? Military disasters? Diplomatic blowups?  Scandal? Those can only be described qualitatively, and those are the only ways in which a GOP nominee can defeat Obama by cutting into states that seem to be the core of Democratic support. Without such foibles by Obama the GOP practically needs someone with much the same political talents but somehow clean and "innocent". Such would take a visionary, charismatic leader that the GOP lacks now. 2016? Different story. But we here discuss 2012.

It is hard to imagine Obama winning 60% of the vote nationwide simply by getting 8% more of the vote in all states. Does anyone see how he could expand his margins in such states as California, Illinois, and New York? It is easy to split the margins in a mathematical model... far easier than convincing the needed half of the margin for him.  Such is the quantitative part of the explanation.

We must discuss states as much qualitatively as quantitatively. Obama loses about 8 electoral votes from 2008 to 2012 if he wins exactly the same states that he won in 2008 and picks up nothing. He would have to win Arizona  or Missouri to stay where he was in 2008 in the electoral vote count of 2008. Those are the two most-likely pickups for him in 2012. Obama's margin of loss in Missouri was smaller than the votes that Ralph Nader won there. Montana is a mystery to those who have no connections to the state; I have none. The only suggestion that Montana would go to Obama in 2012 would be if the 18-30 vote votes in 2012 as it did in 2008, but this time as the 22-34 vote...and of course the 18-21 vote of 2012 much as did the 18-21 vote did in 2008. Arizona? Reverse the usual Favorite Son effect, and Obama wins. 2008+MO+MT+AZ... 381 electoral votes, roughly a Clinton-style victory.

I didn't mention Georgia before Arizona. Georgia looks closer, but unlike Arizona it had no particular reason to vote for the Republican ticket. The state actually re-elected Saxby Chambliss, a sick joke to any liberal, to the US Senate. It would be tempting to believe that the youth vote would be more liberal than the non-youth vote, but Georgia is one of the few states in which such was not so.  A possible explanation: Georgia has a large military presence, and the volunteer military, although attracting non-whites of all political persuasions among them, tends to attract conservative-leaning white youth. If those youth register to vote as Georgia residents, they can act much differently from the youth of even some of states more conservative than Georgia -- like Texas. Add to that, the GOP nominee is a paragon of military virtue, which had to impress American soldiers.

Georgia itself seems rifted politically. Northern Georgia contains relatively-liberal Atlanta and a couple of college towns, but aside from Savannah, central and southern Georgia vote much like Mississippi and Alabama. Jimmy Carter notwithstanding, white people vote overwhelmingly Republican in central and southern Georgia and black people vote overwhelmingly Democratic. The majority rules, of course, and one thus gets a relatively conservative result.

Georgia goes to Obama in 2012 if one of three things happen:

1. Young white soldiers vote on military policy instead of on an admiration for military heroism of the GOP nominee. It seems that the GOP will not be running a nominee with any history of military heritage anything like that of John McCain. This of course depends upon Obama having military success even if such is defined as "graceful exits" from Iraq and Afghanistan or unqualified progress toward such.

2. White voters get much closer to the norms for voting for Obama as shown in such states as Kentucky and West Virginia in which roughly 40% of all white voters voted for Obama. Kentucky and West Virginia have few blacks, so Obama's failures to get close to winning those states has nothing to do with ethnic polarization in voting.

(I will have other states to discuss for ethnic polarization in voting and discuss that more fully there. If you expected me to talk about Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana on that topic -- you are right).

South Carolina is politically and economically more like Georgia than like North Carolina -- and it voted more Republican than Georgia. It's much more rural than Georgia (no megalopolis). It will be a larger swing than Georgia, but without South Carolina, Obama has no chance at an electoral blowout. Add Georgia and South Carolina to Obama's 2008 wins and his most-likely pick-offs, and Obama has 406 electoral votes. That surpasses Clinton in 1992 and 1996 but falls short of Bush 1988 with 426.

North Dakota and South Dakota comprise only six electoral votes, and they will travel together unless John Thune is somehow on the ballot.  The two states have no large cities, and the apparent closeness (by standards of other Obama losses)  may be deceptive. These states may be more stable in their Republican lean than some states that Obama lost by larger margins. NE-01 (eastern Nebraska except for greater Omaha) is in roughly the same range, and demographics look fairly similar. [Note well: NE-03 is one of the most conservative districts in America, and it is so conservative that Obama could win NE-02 about 55-45, NE-01 about 52-48, and lose the state because NE-03 could vote about 70-30 for almost any Republican.

These states and NE-01 depend heavily upon agriculture, and agriculture seemed not to be hurting as badly as the rest of the country in 2008. (The subprime lending in rural America that put lots of farmers out of business hit before it hit urban and suburban America, and rural America may have recovered to some extent. Obama wins seven electoral votes here if the GOP nominates a turkey -- either an incompetent campaigner or someone out of touch. Add ND+SD+NE-01 and Obama is at 413.

Obama would have to pick up about 5% nationwide to win the next prize, but it is Texas. Texas is an expensive state in which to campaign both for travel and advertising. Obama did well in urban Texas (the state is attracting lots of economic "refugees" from the Rust Belt -- almost all going to the cities and suburbs) and of course the heavily-Hispanic areas along the Rio Grande. Why "only" 5% nationwide to split the margin by which Obama lost the state? Obama has likely maxed out in the Blue Firewall. Texas puts Obama at or near 450 electoral votes.  It's not so questionable as other states not yet mentioned, which says more about those other states than about Texas. The under-30 vote in Texas split about 55-45 in 2008, and that segment of the Texas electorate will expand to the under-34 vote in 2012. The Hispanic segment of the Texas electorate is growing in all age groups (and especially applies to the under-30 segment of the population, so don't double-count), and economic refugees from the Rust Belt will likely vote Democratic in this scenario.  Texas puts Obama in the 450 range in electoral votes; that is bigger than FDR 1944 and Eisenhower 1952.

"Beyond" Texas,  further Obama wins depend upon statewide electorates voting far differently from what their behavior in 2008 showed. Consider the five states that Bill Clinton consistently won, yet Obama got clobbered in: Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Tennessee, and West Virginia. The Religious Right is very strong in those states. They will account for about as many electoral votes as Texas, but they will all be harder for Obama to win than Texas. He would have to win back the "poor white" vote that went for Carter and Clinton.

Alabama and Mississippi were the most polarized states in their voting. Obama has a fairly-high floor in Mississippi, but to win it he would have to get a much larger segment of the white vote.  Alabama is even harder.   

      




  

[Rowan]

I think you fail to realize that Obama is currently losing support right now, not gaining support. Check out the latest approval polls, he's under 50%.

[useful idiot]

How about if the Democrats nominate Dennis Kucinich? And Obama has a 39% approval rating?

Depends who the GOP nominates. If they nominate Palin or Huckabee, Kucinich could have a landslide win.

Are you serious?

Voters will prefer the more sane candidate. Palin certainly ain't it.

Dude, Kucinich has said he's seen UFOs.

Carter said he had seen a UFO as well, before he was elected.

Still, Kucinich would lose...

[DS0816]

We are not asking so much whether an electoral blowout is likely so much as what it looks like.…

It is hard to imagine Obama winning 60% of the vote nationwide simply by getting 8% more of the vote in all states.…

Georgia goes to Obama in 2012 if one of three things happen:…

South Carolina is politically and economically more like Georgia than like North Carolina…

Agree with what you have written; but won’t comment on all.

One thing we don’t talk about is the male–female vote in some states. What resulted in 2008.

Missouri, Montana, and Georgia are the only three—of 22—states won in 2008 by John McCain, in which Barack Obama won the [states’] female vote. That opens the possibility of them being picked up by Obama in a 2012 re-election that sees him in a favorable light (and no GOP unseating the 44th president).

South Carolina was a generational divide in which the 18–29 and 30–44 groups voted for Obama. Those age groups combined for 47 percent of the vote. Obama received 55% of the 18–29 vote (18%); 54% of the 30–44 vote (29%). The 45–64 and 65+ groups gave McCain victory (and they combined for 52 percent of S.C.’s vote). McCain received 61% of the 45–64 vote (39%); 66% of the 65+ vote (13%). Compared with 2004, McCain gained 2 points with the 45–64 group; 10 points with 65+. Compared with ’04, Obama shifted the 18–29 vote 14 points; swung the 30–44 by 25 points.

McCain won the female vote [54%] in S.C. by 3 points (51%), down 10 points as carried by Bush. With the male vote [46%], McCain carried by 17 points (58%), down from 27 points won by Bush.

That female S.C. vote won by McCain came primarily through the latter two age groups; no one should be dumb to think the younger groups saw Obama lose the female vote. So in order for S.C. to be winnable for the Dems in 2012, the margins in the older groups need to tighten further, and the female shift has to be enough to top that 50-percent mark, overall (this was what helped flip Indiana). S.C. in 2008 is worth considering for 2012 if you think a trend may be taking shape—like with the changing electorate regarding young voters’ future voting patterns—or you wanna be on the lookout, generally, to say the least. In the past, Democrats’ road to the White House was won in the South through the likes of Arkansas—which, prior to Obama, had carried for all prevailing Democrats—much more so than South Carolina (which, since the 1960s, has given only two Democrats the vote: 1960 John F. Kennedy, 1976 Jimmy Carter). Thanks in part to changing demographics, Obama’s route proved what a different period it now is.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

I think you fail to realize that Obama is currently losing support right now, not gaining support. Check out the latest approval polls, he's under 50%.

So did Reagan - don't count on an Obama loss just yet.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

I think you fail to realize that Obama is currently losing support right now, not gaining support. Check out the latest approval polls, he's under 50%.

So did Reagan - don't count on an Obama loss just yet.

True, Americans were foolish enough to re-elect Reagan, why not Obama?

[Rowan]

I think you fail to realize that Obama is currently losing support right now, not gaining support. Check out the latest approval polls, he's under 50%.

So did Reagan - don't count on an Obama loss just yet.

Oh, I'm not saying he is going to lose at all. But the talk of him doing better than in 2008 if the election were held today is just absurd.

[DS0816]

Rowan,

Where does it ask about the election of 2012 if it were held today?

What would be the likelihood of either

a) Obama loses as or more badly than Jimmy Carter in 1980.

b) Obama wins as good as or better than Ronald Reagan in 1984.

Popular vote or electoral vote can be used as measurements.