McCain’s latest ad buy is going up in Colorado, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin. This is a very defensive buy. Bush won all of these states at least once except Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. He won six of them twice. But the most glaring signal is that McCain is spending money defending Mississippi. I don’t know what his internal polls are telling him, but they obviously are arousing some concern. It’s also interesting that Michigan and Florida are not on this list. The RNC is running ads in Michigan though, so that might explain this particular omission in McCain’s buy.
One thing is for certain. Obama has succeeded in putting McCain on defense and forcing him to spend money on his own turf.
Update [2008-7-8 16:47:43 by BooMan]: The Page made a correction without notice, changing Mississippi to Missouri. Missouri is certainly not as traditionally red as Mississippi, but Bush did carry it twice.
A very defensive play. Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are, I think, almost undoubtedly head-fakes, because it’d make far more sense to go after other states that are closer (say, Oregon).
As for Florida, the answer is very simple: McCain can’t afford to defend Florida. Unless the election comes down to Florida (not likely), he has to assume he’ll win it. If he can’t assume that, there’s probably nothing to talk about in this race.
Well, I’m not so sure that Oregon is closer than Wisconsin. But McCain is going to have a hell of a time winning Ohio and it’s looking like Iowa is out of reach. So, he needs to win something big like Michigan or Minnesota or Pennsylvania or Wisconsin to make up for it.
How is McCain on the ground in PA?
New Mexico and Colorado are quite purplish these days.
So is Nevada:
he’s in trouble in colorado…most polls have him down 6 pts±.
his “town hall” in denver yesterday was a disaster.
Can you confirm Mississippi? I don’t see that anywhere, and it would really be bizarre.
Follow the link. It’s being reported.
Sorry to be a pest, but MS ain’t there.
Hmm. I copy and pasted the states right from the article and into an email I sent out. They have changed Mississippi to Missouri without any correction notice. So, that kind of blows my point here a bit. Yet, Missouri is another state that Bush carried twice.
Agreed, it’s still a good sign.
Well, McCain can afford to play defense when his “base” is running such a consistent offense, like here, here, and here.
Has he really been forced into defense by Obama or is he just choosing to let the rest of his “team” work the offensive side of the ball while he just bobs and weaves?
Hell, why spend money on ad buys when every time the corporate media open their mouths they’re shilling for the McCain camp? You have built-in ad buys every time a network anchor powders their nose and the red light on the camera comes on. Instant help. And at no extra cost to John Sidney McCain.
Missouri is the key state, even more than Ohio. Obama needs to go after McCain in the Show-me state aggressively and persistently. Like the Germans went to the French at Verdun. On second thought, perhaps not such a good analogy, but you get the point. Obama has a better chance of winning MO than he does Ohio, and either state kills McCain. If he can generate a commanding lead there early, the rest is history yet to come.
I’d like to think so, but I am not as optimistic. Demographically it’s not that different than Ohio, but there is a sizeable military presence in MO, couple of big bases.
Obama is up by 3.5% in Ohio and down by 3.5% in Missouri.
The political animal is voracious and has no sense of good, or justice.
There are other animals.
Let’s discuss evolution, shall we?