Reliable Red States No Longer
Poll results from Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia contain little to cheer McCain.
Saturday, Nov. 1, 2008
by James A. Barnes
As John McCain battles to remain competitive with Barack Obama in the closing days of the campaign, he is facing an uphill task just to hold some of the key states that President Bush carried in 2004, according to the Allstate/National Journal battleground polls in Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia. McCain cannot count on the Electoral College votes of a single one of them.
In this quintet of supposedly red states, Obama is running strongest in Ohio, where he leads McCain by 7 points, 48 percent to 41 percent. When Allstate/NJ first surveyed Ohio voters -- back in mid-September -- the nominees were in a statistical dead heat, with McCain at 42 percent and Obama at 41 percent.
The state that apparently has taken the biggest turn in the past month is Virginia, where Obama has spent more than $18 million on television and radio advertising, vastly outpacing McCain. According to the Allstate/NJ poll, Obama now holds a narrow lead, 48 percent to 44 percent. In September, McCain led Obama in the Old Dominion by 7 points, 48 percent to 41 percent.
Meanwhile, Colorado and Florida have held fairly steady. In Colorado, Obama leads by 4 points -- 48 percent to 44 percent. In September, Obama was edging out McCain, 45 percent to 44 percent. The race is still neck-and-neck in Florida, with 45 percent of the Sunshine State's voters siding with Obama and 44 percent aligning with McCain. In September, the two were tied at 44 percent.
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http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/print_friendly.php?ID=pi_20081101_2087