Where do you see this race going? Let's strategize!

[tedoll78]

I'll start..

All of the Gore states are needed for victory. Of those, I see these as being of concern:

Oregon
New Mexico
Iowa
Minnesota
Wisconsin
Pennsylvania

Of the states that Bush officially won, I see these as being ripe:
Nevada
Ohio
West Virginia
North Carolina
Virginia
Florida
Arkansas

If Kerry were to hold all of the Gore 2000 states, he'd have 260 electoral votes. And if Edwards were to somehow bring North Carolina into our column (which is think is more possible than ever), the ticket would win with 275EVs. Additionally, I think Ohio is very ripe for the picking with this ticket - that'd be a lovely 20EV padding. And BTW, I think Virginia is a bit of a stretch, despite a recent poll showing a statistical tie.

What's great is, I also think that Kerry can "fake" a campaign in the following states:
Louisiana
Tennessee
Missouri
Arizona

He can talk big about the campaign effort in these states, buy limited ad time to throw Bush off, and perhaps "accidentally leak" false inside polling results showing these states to be statistically tied. The Bush campaign would probably feel compelled to spend more time/resources defending them.. just in case. Sure, it's a bit dirty and underhanded, but it's also perfectly legal.. and no one's voting rights are being taken away..

John Kerry needs to send Teresa to the southwest for a few weeks of camping-out. She's fluent in Spanish - have her do a media blitz as a campaign surrogate. She's certainly intelligent enough to do a brilliant job.

And this is going to sound evil, taking advantage of small children and being sexist and all, but John Edwards needs to do the photo op thing with his kids pretty often. Not too often.. just enough to keep the voting public's appetite whetted for more. I can imagine this artificially widening the gender gap in our favor. (sorry if I offended anyone with that)

Bush is hurting right now. The electorate is indeed cranky. The incumbent has numbers that have historically resulted in defeat. The Democratic challenger has as much money as the GOP incumbent - very unexpected. The party is united. The splinter on the left is having trouble getting onto ballots, and appears to have much less support in general. Even the Greens have decided to help with a 'safe state' strategy.

The one stumbling block that I worry about is the post-convention bounce. Specifically, Bush gets his after Kerry does. I'd recommend that Kerry and Edwards make an infomercial to appear on television on the Sunday evening following Bush's convention speech.. to blunt that bounce. By then, they'd be able to answer the Chimp's perceived strong speech points, and they'd be able to address any of their own weaknesses revealed by polling and focus groups. As Perot showed in 1992 (leading the race at some points!), infomercials work well! If we blunt Bush's bounce with a carefully-timed and carefully-scripted infomercial, we'd be doing ourselves a huge favor.

And sure, the debates could help to break the bounce. But then again, there's probably enough time between Bush's convention and the first debate for the media to latch-onto some bullsh!t "Can Kerry close the gap?" meme.. we don't want to be fighting this for half of the time period where people are beginning to pay close attention. Unfair or not, there's that strange "vote with the winner" phenomenon that happens, and we can't let Bush turn a temporary lead into an aura of inevitability.

Finally, Kerry-Edwards need to do one final infomercial on the Sunday night before the election. At that point, as much as 10% of the electorate may be somewhat undecided! The campaign's research team would also be able to discern by then what the ticket's weaknesses and strengths are. Polling and focus groups would be able to identify what's stopping so many voters from "pulling the trigger" with Candidate X or Y. If we're able to find-out a huge reason stopping people from voting Bush, we might be able to exploit that in this infomercial time. Hell, if the race is close, the whole thing could be decided by that one program.

So that's how I see the race right now. You?