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by James R Whitson
September 28, 2011
2012 Electoral Map Analysis
We're a little over 400 days away from the next election and the race for the White House is very close, despite the fact that the Republicans don't have a consensus candidate yet! President Elect predicts that if the election were held today, and with Barack Obama facing a best case Republican, the President would miss out on a second term by 4 electoral votes.
 The electorate isn't feeling the change candidate Obama promised in 2008, at least not positive change! While the campaign does have a ready made foil in the Republican House of Representatives, Democrats controlled both houses of Congress for two years of his term (with a filibuster proof majority in the Senate for most of that time). So it doesn't seem that his complaints that a do-nothing Congress is to blame for current problems is resonating with political newcomers who expected more. Moderates in Republican friendly states who swarmed to his side are bailing back to more familiar territory. On his own side of the aisle one time supporters think he is being too accommodating to the opposition, and are clamoring for a more hard nosed approach to governing -- an approach that could alienate those in the center that he is trying to win back. It's a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation for the President.
On the Republican side no one candidate is standing out from the crowd. And voters almost seem to be hoping someone else will come forward to vie for the nomination. There is still a long way to go, but if the right could rally behind a standard bearer now while Obama seems vulnerable they could probably take advantage of the discontent out there and start building a base ready to go out and take the election next year.
 For now we're using a "best case" generic Republican to stand in as an opponent for Obama. (Don't read anything into the phrase "best case"! I simply mean an average, mainstream conservative capable of being elected.) The President has a good solid base of 186 electoral votes to work from. And half of his leaning states are just barely not in the solid column. The Republicans have a smaller solid base but a lot more votes leaning their way. While they have the total votes to win right now, the bad news for the GOP is that there are not a lot of Leaning Obama states they can realistically hope to pull away. Maybe Iowa, Colorado, or New Mexico, but that is probably it right now. Obama, on the other hand, could conceivably win any of the Leaning Republican states, giving him a lot more room to work with as he comes up with a strategy to reach the winning electoral vote total of 270. And in this scenario, he would just need a single Leaning Republican state on his side to win.
So the takeaway is this race is up for grabs right now!
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