Is Targeting Ohio an Offensive Strategy for Obama?

[SPC]

I was just thinking about the race and what states each side would need to win. I think that the following map is fairly accurate in describing which states each party will win assuming they win the election:

If Obama wins, he should win all the states in red, and if Romney wins, he should win all the states in blue. That leaves five states whose PVI is uncertain in this election (CO, IA, OH, VA, WI). Assuming that each candidate is able to hold down their essentials (far from certain, given Romney's troubles in FL and NC) that leaves 7 paths to victory for Obama and 6 paths to victory for Romney (given that the HoR will remain majority GOP delegations.) Obama must either hold OH and one other state; VA and WI; VA, CO, and IA; or WI, CO, and IA. OH is in 4/7 paths to victory for Obama, with the other states being in 3/7 paths to victory each for Obama.  For Romney, on the other hand, the only winning combination without OH requires winning all four other states. Even with OH, Romney would have to either win VA and IA; VA and WI; WI and CO; VA and CO; or WI and IA. Thus, OH is in 5/6 paths to victory for Romney, with VA and WI in 4/6 paths to victory each and CO and IA in 3/6 paths to victory each. Although OH is essential for both campaigns, it is clearly a greater necessity for the Romney campaign. With this in mind, is the Obama campaign heavily targeting OH less because they think it is an important state for them to win and more because winning OH would cripple Romney's chances?

[Vosem]

The answer to your question is 'of course'. However, if this thread is meant to be a discussion of PVI, I would probably remove NH from Obama's column and add it to the uncertain states; not that it makes much of a difference.

[SPC]

The answer to your question is 'of course'. However, if this thread is meant to be a discussion of PVI, I would probably remove NH from Obama's column and add it to the uncertain states; not that it makes much of a difference.

Sorry I didn't realize I was stating the obvious. I suppose this discussion could be expanded to analyze all of the swing states. In addition to OH, Obama is clearly on the offensive in FL, NC, and arguably VA, while Romney is on the offensive in WI, NV, NH, CO, and IA.

[Likely Voter]

Short answer: Yes, of course.

longer answer...there was an extensive post on 'can Romney win w/o OH' a few weeks back with the consensus of it not being very easy, with the inclusion of WI a key if he really wanted a chance (this was before Ryan came on board, which may be telling).

There also seems to be a consensus that Obama has been taking advantage of the auto bailout popularity in the rust belt and that has helped put MI and PA away and make OH more competitive than usual.

[You kip if you want to...]

He was going for this in 2008 before the bank crash. Kerry 2004+IA+NM+any other swing state. With Ohio being the bell weather and such an EV heavy state, then why the hell not?

[pbrower2a]

PPP will have a poll of Iowa, which (as much on the bubble as it has been) has not been polled for some time.

I'm going to guess that Obama wins Iowa if Missouri is at all close, and that Wisconsin should be very close to Iowa in its vote. (If you try to remind me of 2004 when the states differed in voting for Dubya and Kerry, just remember that both states were won on razor-sharp edges).

[Stranger in a strange land]

In the sense that Obama has a viable path to 270 without Ohio while Romney doesn't, yes.

[TJ in Oregon]

No. "Stopping Romney from winning" is the same as Obama winning himself. Someone has to win (and 269-269 is very likely a Romney win so Obama's certainly not playing for that). Obama must believe there is a reasonably likely scenario where he loses without Ohio and wins with it.

[SPC]

No. "Stopping Romney from winning" is the same as Obama winning himself. Someone has to win (and 269-269 is very likely a Romney win so Obama's certainly not playing for that). Obama must believe there is a reasonably likely scenario where he loses without Ohio and wins with it.

The distinction is that Obama has three other options, none of which require sweeping all the other marginal swing states. If Obama lost OH, he would simply have to play defense in the other states. Romney losing OH would require him to sweep all the other marginal swing states, something that isn't happening absent a shift in the popular vote in his favor.