Electoral College problems for Republicans

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Defeating Ayoatte, Toomey, Kirk, and Johnson and holding CO and NV will give us the 272 votes needed for prez, ideal for Hickenlooper to be VP pick.

Run on minimum wage and equal pay as ad about Christie mnimum wage flap will be used.

[pbrower2a]

@pbrower: Minnesota, the last non-Democratic vote there was against McGovern

States change.

We have other threads about whether Hillary Clinton can plausibly win states Obama lost by more than eight points in a good year for Democrats. It seems reasonable to suggest that Republicans have a shot at winning a state Romney lost by eight points in a bad year for that party.

States change, but Minnesota in 2016?

Romney lost by 8 when he lost by 4 nationally. McCain lost there by 11 when he lost by 7 nationally.  Bush lost by 4 when he won by 2 nationally.

There's no trend in favor of the GOP. The only thing they've done recently is knock out their Republican Governor and Senator.

Minnesota is one of the least "swingy" states in America.  Should Hillary Clinton win 57-43 (a blowout characteristic of Eisenhower in 1956, which is the strongest imaginable win for a Democratic nominee), she might win Minnesota 55-45 and we would see Minnesota at R+2.

Minnesota is going to go 55-45 for a very strong Democrat who can safely take Minnesota for granted and 50.5-49.5 for a Democrat who loses 60-40 (in which case it is D+11). Maybe if Hillary Clinton declines to run the nominee will be Amy Klobuchar, and the Favorite Son effect takes hold, but that is not a legitimate swing effect.

[Devils30]

There's a lot of talk about what these elections mean for Colorado in 2016 but any GOP gains there would be more than cancelled out if Florida and the southeast is trending blue.

[Mehmentum]

There's a lot of talk about what these elections mean for Colorado in 2016 but any GOP gains there would be more than cancelled out if Florida and the southeast is trending blue.

That's true, there are actually relatively few swing votes out West.  There's Colorado, Nevada, and possibly New Mexico and Arizona. 

All four of those together just barely cancel out Florida alone.  That's not to mention Virginia, Ohio, North Carolina, and Georgia, each one is worth about as much as Nevada and Colorado together.   

[jeron]

To win, Republicans must win back the sorts of people who believe in thrift, investment, enterprise, and rational thought -- essentially the sorts who would have voted for Eisenhower in the 1950s. They have no use for attempts to impose fundamentalist Christianity in the schools or regulate sexuality.

If Republicans ignore such people, then Democrats will pick them up.

These people are rational and they understand that it is usually necessary to vote for someone who isn't a perfect fit for their own vies and beliefs, but who is a far lesser evil. Of course, Ted Cruz and his lookalikes would be off-putting to these people.

Romney won "affluent voters" by a comfortable margin and won affluent Whites by an even larger margin.  Gaining back "Eisenhower business types" isn't the problem; even though Democrats act snobby about the GOP and portray it as a collection of religious zealots and redneck xenophobes, that business-esque group is already in the fold.

With the exception of Blacks and White Southerners, the GOP is winning the same type of people it's been winning since the freaking 1800s ...

That is not entirely true. A majority of middle- and upper-income voters in the North East and on the West Coast voted for Obama. From 1856 to 1988, Vermont voted Democratic only once and Maine only three times. Vermont's population has barely changed (it is stil 95% white), the Republican party has.

[Devils30]

The GOP isn't winning New Mexico and most likely not Nevada in 2016. Both just aren't white enough unless whites vote like southern whites and they don't in the west. Colorado is a possibility but I have doubts that it will be any more red than R+2 PVI.

[Rockefeller GOP]

To win, Republicans must win back the sorts of people who believe in thrift, investment, enterprise, and rational thought -- essentially the sorts who would have voted for Eisenhower in the 1950s. They have no use for attempts to impose fundamentalist Christianity in the schools or regulate sexuality.

If Republicans ignore such people, then Democrats will pick them up.

These people are rational and they understand that it is usually necessary to vote for someone who isn't a perfect fit for their own vies and beliefs, but who is a far lesser evil. Of course, Ted Cruz and his lookalikes would be off-putting to these people.

Romney won "affluent voters" by a comfortable margin and won affluent Whites by an even larger margin.  Gaining back "Eisenhower business types" isn't the problem; even though Democrats act snobby about the GOP and portray it as a collection of religious zealots and redneck xenophobes, that business-esque group is already in the fold.

With the exception of Blacks and White Southerners, the GOP is winning the same type of people it's been winning since the freaking 1800s ...

That is not entirely true. A majority of middle- and upper-income voters in the North East and on the West Coast voted for Obama. From 1856 to 1988, Vermont voted Democratic only once and Maine only three times. Vermont's population has barely changed (it is stil 95% white), the Republican party has.

1) If you're suggesting that the Northeast's and West Coast's politics have always been the same and the GOP is just radically different, you're just misinformed.  California gave us Reagan for God's sake, it used to be a much more conservative state.  New England sent several very conservative Congressmen to DC throughout the Twentieth Century; it is a much more liberal region now than it ever has been in the past.  While VT's racial makeup is the same, its population is much different.

2) You may be right, but the affluent vote is still more Republican than the working class or poor vote.  But these are the numbers I could find for the highest income bracket voting in 2012:
NH - 51% Romney, 47% Obama
CT - 53% Obama, 46% Romney
MA - 52% Obama, 46% Romney
NY - 51% Obama, 49% Romney
VT - 67% Obama, 32% Romney

Considering that this includes all races and that VT and ME are tiny components of the average, I don't think it's outlandish to say that a slight majority of White affluent voters in the Northeast sided with Romney in 2012, and those would be "traditional Eisenhower business types."
ME - 56% Obama, 42% Romney

[Ljube]

With the new Marquette poll showing Walker winning with 50-43, a question has to be asked:

Can Walker carry Wisconsin in the Presidential Election and if so, will it be enough to tip the scales?


We haven't really discussed second tier candidates here, but Walker, provided he wins re-election, could become top tier.