Posted on 03/29/2011 10:36:22 AM PDT by mandaladon
From the states that he won in 2008, Democratic operatives believe that President Obama will have the most difficulty carrying Indiana again when he runs for reelection, according to a special National Journal Political Insiders Poll released on Tuesday.
Choosing from a list of 10 swing states that he won in 2008, Democratic Political Insiders were asked to rank the top five states one-thru-five that would be the hardest for Obama to carry in 2012. Indiana was the clear consensus pick of the Democratic Insiders for where the president’s reelection campaign is likely to encounter the most difficulty—nearly two thirds of the Democratic Political Insiders ranked it first on their list.
Following the Hoosier State, the next four states that the Democratic Insiders predicted would be the hardest for Obama to carry were: North Carolina, Virginia, Florida, and Ohio.
“There’s no way he keeps Indiana; the economy and weakness of Indiana Democrats makes this exceedingly difficult,” said one Democratic Insider. Echoed another: “It’s the state most reliant on manufacturing and that helped in ’08, but now hurts Obama.” And a third Democratic Insider observed that Indiana “went red in last election; was fluke he won there in 2008.”
In tallying the rankings, a first-place vote was worth five points, a second-place vote was worth four points, and so on. The Insiders Index reflects the percentage of points that each state received out of the maximum possible. For example, Indiana scored an Index rating of 87, meaning it received 87 percent of the possible 505 points; the number it would have received if all 101 Democratic Political Insiders participating in the poll this week had ranked Indiana first as the state that would be the hardest for Obama to carry in 2012.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationaljournal.com ...
The electoral votes have changed since 2008 too. The GOP states probably have added 4-6 votes just from the new census.
I don’t think any one state flipping will make the difference. Hopefully, the GOP candidate will be so strong, it will be 1980 all over again.
More like 210%
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