THE MARSTON CHRONICLES

**Presidential Elections in a Nutshell**
Party	State	2008 Margin	2004 Margin	2000 Margin	00-08 Margin	60-08 Margin	2012 Votes	Party Totals
D	District of Columbia	85.73%	79.84%	76.21%	80.59%	70.93%	3	3
D	Massachusetts	25.81%	25.16%	27.30%	26.09%	20.25%	11	14
D	Rhode Island	27.84%	20.75%	29.10%	25.90%	21.03%	4	18
D	Hawaii	45.27%	8.75%	18.33%	24.12%	12.73%	4	22
D	New York	26.69%	18.29%	24.98%	23.32%	11.02%	30	52
D	Vermont	37.01%	20.14%	9.93%	22.36%	3.63%	3	55
D	Maryland	25.45%	12.98%	16.39%	18.27%	7.81%	10	65
D	Connecticut	22.37%	10.36%	17.47%	16.73%	4.84%	7	72
D	Illinois	25.10%	10.34%	12.02%	15.82%	4.00%	20	92
D	California	24.06%	9.94%	11.08%	15.27%	2.69%	55	147
D	Delaware	24.99%	7.60%	13.06%	15.22%	3.06%	3	150
D	Maine	17.33%	8.99%	5.12%	10.48%	2.75%	4	154
D	New Jersey	15.57%	6.68%	15.81%	12.69%	1.06%	14	168
D	Washington	17.17%	7.18%	5.58%	9.98%	2.48%	12	180
D	Michigan	16.47%	3.42%	5.13%	8.34%	2.68%	16	196
D	Oregon	16.35%	4.16%	0.44%	6.98%	2.15%	7	203
D	Pennsylvania	10.32%	2.50%	4.17%	5.66%	2.86%	20	223
D	Minnesota	10.24%	3.48%	2.41%	5.38%	8.01%	9	232
D	Wisconsin	13.91%	0.38%	0.22%	4.84%	2.15%	10	242
I	New Mexico	15.13%	0.79%	0.06%	4.80%	2.52%	5	247
I	New Hampshire	9.61%	1.37%	1.27%	3.24%	7.73%	4	251
I	Iowa	9.54%	0.67%	0.31%	3.06%	0.32%	6	257
I	Nevada	12.50%	2.59%	3.54%	2.12%	7.76%	6	263
I	Ohio	4.54%	2.10%	3.51%	0.36%	2.87%	18	275
I	Colorado	8.95%	4.67%	8.36%	1.36%	7.43%	9	257
I	Florida	2.81%	5.01%	0.01%	2.21%	9.05%	28	248
I	Virginia	6.30%	8.20%	8.03%	3.31%	9.44%	13	220
I	Missouri	0.14%	7.20%	3.34%	3.56%	1.43%	11	207
I	North Carolina	0.33%	12.44%	5.53%	5.88%	7.23%	15	196
R	Arizona	8.52%	10.47%	6.29%	8.43%	14.78%	11	181
R	West Virginia	13.12%	12.86%	6.33%	10.77%	2.56%	5	170
R	Tennessee	15.07%	14.27%	3.87%	11.07%	6.46%	11	165
R	Georgia	5.21%	16.60%	11.69%	11.17%	4.87%	16	154
R	Arkansas	19.86%	9.76%	5.45%	11.69%	2.03%	6	138
R	Indiana	1.04%	20.68%	15.64%	11.76%	12.32%	11	132
R	Louisiana	18.63%	14.50%	7.67%	13.60%	6.2%	8	121
R	South Carolina	8.97%	17.08%	15.94%	14.00%	12.33%	9	113
R	Montana	2.26%	20.51%	25.08%	15.95%	9.35%	3	104
R	Mississippi	13.81%	19.69%	16.92%	16.60%	16.93%	6	101
R	Kentucky	16.23%	19.86%	15.13%	17.07%	6.71%	8	95
R	South Dakota	8.41%	21.47%	22.74%	17.54%	11.37%	3	87
R	Texas	11.77%	22.87%	21.32%	18.65%	9.08%	38	84
R	Alabama	21.58%	25.62%	14.91%	20.70%	13.26%	9	46
R	Kansas	14.96%	25.38%	20.80%	20.83%	18.01%	6	37
R	North Dakota	8.63%	27.36%	27.60%	21.20%	16.09%	3	31
R	Nebraska	14.93%	33.22%	29.00%	25.72%	24.91%	5	28
R	Alaska	21.53%	25.55%	30.95%	26.01%	16.25%	3	23
R	Oklahoma	31.30%	31.14%	21.88%	28.11%	19.54%	7	20
R	Idaho	25.43%	38.12%	39.53%	34.36%	26.25%	4	13
R	Wyoming	32.24%	39.79%	40.06%	37.36%	23.49%	3	9
R	Utah	28.17%	45.54%	40.49%	38.07%	28.98%	6	6

All it takes to become a expert in Presidential election strategy is a study of the above table. The blue ink is for the Democrat party and the red ink is for the Republicans. The purple color in the first column indicates a battleground state. The critical figures are in column six for the average percentage that the state went for one of the parties from the last three Presidential elections. You will notice that the ink color changes between Nevada and Iowa since on the average, Nevada and the states above it went for the Democrats but Ohio and the states below it went for the Republicans.

Now look at the last column which accumulates the electoral votes for the two sides. Notice that right at the dividing line, the Republicans win by 12 electoral votes. The 2010 Census will change the electoral votes most likely to what is shown in the table. Using electoral votes from the 2000 Census, there was an exact tie at the dividing line. The 2010 Census will transfer 6 electoral votes from the Democrats to the Republicans. The strategy for the Democrats is to poach one or more states that usually goes for the Republicans while the Republicans now merely have to hold their own states. As you can see, the eleven purple states decide the election. There really is little point in campaigning in any of the other states since if you cannot hold the states in your core group, you are going to lose anyway.

Now let's look at the 2000 election which was extremely close. Bush won because he held all the states with a history of going for the Republicans and poached Nevada and New Hampshire from Gore. He won again in 2004 by doing the same thing but this time he poached Nevada, Iowa and New Mexico from Kerry. The 2008 election shows that Obama carried all the Democratic states and poached Ohio, Colorado, Florida, Virginia, North Carolina and even Indiana from McCain.

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