The Outer Core

The next group of states are solidly committed to one candidate over the other, but are believed to be, at least possibly, persuadable. Again, for categorical convenience, I've used Tradesports rankings to classify these categories. Thus, I have classified a state as "solidly Republican" if Bush is considered to have anywhere from a 70% to a 90% chance of winning it. I consider a state "solidly Democratic" if Bush is ranked anywhere from 10%-30%.

In this category, there are 8 solidly Republican states and 7 solidly Democratic states. Here is a map:


Bush's 8 states have a combined estimated population of 45 million persons. This represents just over 15% of the U.S. population. These states control a total of 85 electoral votes, which is also 15% of the college. Bush enjoys an average polling margin over Kerry in these states of +5.51%. This is the breakdown of where the average polls put each state:

Arizona: +15% (53.6% - 39%)
Tennessee: +7% (50.3%-42.9%)
Missouri: +6% (50%-44.25%)
Ohio: +5% (50% - 44.75%)
Virginia: +5% (49.75% - 45%)
West Virginia: +3% (46.3% - 43%)
Arkansas: +3% (48.4% - 45.75%)
Colorado: +0% (tied) (46.75%-46.5%)

Now, there are some discrepancies in this batch. Arizona gives Bush a commanding lead whereas Colorado puts him at a tie, yet they are in the same category. Part of this has to do with the time lags in polling and overall trends. Though a recent slew of polls showed a Bush blowout in Arizona, there have also been several times in the race where the gap between the candidates closed to within the margin of error. Colorado is currently showing a tie, but it hasn't been polled very much (so far as I'm aware) since the Republican convention so it's ranking may still reflect the late August rise in Kerry's fortunes. The consistent factor with each of these states is a regular tendency to poll strong leads for Bush with occasional outliers and fluctuations indicating a tight race.

Kerry enjoys the support of seven states of this type. These states have a combined estimated population of 38 million people, which is 13% of the U.S. population. They control a total of 70 electoral votes which is 13% of the total. Kerry's average polling lead over Bush in these states is 7.53% (Delaware is excluded from this calculation because no polls have yet been taken of the state). Here's their breakdown:

Maryland: +12% (41.75%-53.25%)
Illinois: +9% (41.75%-51%)
Hawaii: +9% (41%-49.5%)
Washington: +8% (43.25%-50.75%)
Michigan: +5% (43.5%-48.5%)
Maine: +3% (43.75%-41.17%)
As I mentioned, no polls have yet been taken for the state of Delaware, and considering its Republican history it's not sure how much of a given the state should be considered.