It’s probably a lot more likely than any of us think.
Not so much here at
Atlas Forum but in numerous venues … during Election 2008, there were people who took the George W. Bush 2000 and 2004 maps and thought presidential-White House-party-pickup Barack Obama would win modestly. As if less than five states were feasibly able to flip from 2004 R to 2008 D. They were
not betting on, weeks let alone months in advance, the 2-to-1 spread in the Electoral College. I knew that Obama would be, at least, in the upper-300s — rendering John McCain not only unable to hold the White House for the Republicans at the minimum 270 … but that McCain wouldn’t get to
200.
I think some states don’t get much attention because the time and money involved make today’s campaigning different in nature. For example: Montana is underrated. In the last 25 elections (1912–2008, the same year bellwether New Mexico first voted; ditto McCain’s home state Arizona), Mont. carried for all election winners but four: 1960, 1976, 1996, and 2008. (Except ’76, Mont. was under 3 points for each national losing candidate.) I pointed out, in another thread, that Mont. and Colo., voted the same from the first post-WWII election of 1948 and until 2004. I presented the spread of the two states’ margins. Lately they’ve been past 10 points. In 2004, they were more dramatic: 15.83%. But the state hasn’t been given much attention; foolishly underestimated by some Democrats. There’s certain nuances with some rather likeminded states. And of the 16 elections of 1948–2008, Colo. and Mont. averaged a spread of just 5.65%.
My assertion is that the measly 3 electoral votes from Mont. were worthy of more visits from the ’08 Obama camp; it was one of three of the McCain-held states in which Obama won the female vote. Given next year’s U.S. Senate race (Rs win over control
if they flip the White House!), the president should campaign in Mont. to the flip the 2.38% (R hold) for carriage
and assist Sen. Jon Tester with winning a second term.
With what I’ve mentioned about Mont. … who the hell can say that the same kind of pursuit might be wasted on Dark Red states like Idaho, Utah, and Wyoming? Not making bets on their potential to at least purple up; but, with one of those three, Idaho — which voted for all winners five straight decades (1910s through the 1950s) — has voted the same as Mont. from the latter’s second presidential election, in 1896, with just the exception of 1992.
