Quote:
Originally Posted by Xellos-_^
he no chance in ND and Montana
a slight chance in Virgina and good chance in Indiana and Ohio.
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Luckily, those are the ones McCain can least afford to lose (ND and Montana are 3 EVs each, while Virginia is 13, Indiana is 11, and Ohio is 20), but the point isn't that he has a particularly good chance in ND and Montana. The point is that it's shocking that he's competitive in those stats at all. Polls have shown him ahead at both at a few points, and even when McCain is ahead, his lead is much less than it should be in states that have gone Republican for the last 12 years. McCain will have to either defend them, or risk an unexpected upset that he can't afford with the map this close. All of these are states that have been key to Republican electoral strategies in the past three elections; losing any of them would be very problematic for them (losing either Ohio or Indiana + Virginia would probably decide the election, unless they can pull an unexpected upset somewhere else.)
I'm also not sure why you say Obama has a better chance in Virginia than in Indiana. If you look at the polls, Obama's actually been doing better in Virgina, out of the two. It has a fairly sizable black population, and has been edging increasingly Democratic as its northern urban areas grow. (Don't confuse it with
West Virginia, mind. The two states are very different. Virginia is much more urban, especially today.)
If you're just talking about gut feelings and the way the states "usually go", that's the point. Virginia is not quite so surprising for the reasons I mentioned, but North Dakota and Montana are very surprising.