I'm a university professor on the East Coast, 37 years old, a progressive scientist, and a former Capitol Hill staffer.
A recent story tells about McCain's focused ad spending in battleground states, and Obama's broader spending pattern. McCain is focusing on battleground states, while Obama is spreading resources more broadly.
Why the mismatch in strategies? I think it makes sense in terms of optimal resource allocation. Both patterns of behavior make perfect sense, given what the campaigns may consider to be their best strategies.
[Cross-posted at election.princeton.edu]
Today on C-SPAN, Senator Joe Biden is making/has just made a speech on the proposed rule change on filibusters of judicial nominations - the "nuclear option." He made an interesting statement, that "we [i.e. Democrats] represent the majority of the American people." This is interesting and true. 51% of voters since 2000 have voted for Democrats, 49% for Republicans.
One way to calculate this is to add up the total number of votes cast for Democratic and Republican Senate candidates for the last three elections, a period of time in which all 100 Senate seats have come up for election once. That total is:
Dem 100,494,879 (51%)
Rep 97,276,977 (49%)
Here are details of the calculation:
http://clerk.house.gov/members/electionInfo/2004/Table.htm
http://clerk.house.gov/members/electionInfo/2002/Table.htm
http://clerk.house.gov/members/electionInfo/2000/Table.htm
Year R D
2004 39920562 44754618
2002 20630984 18959386
2000 36725431 36780875
Following the history over time reveals something interesting:
· WI-08: Wingnut plans to run as "conservative independent" (desmoinesdem)
· 50 percent of southerners say Obama better president than Bush (desmoinesdem)
· What Yesterday Says About Young Voters (Mike Connery)
· Max Blumenthal on the dysfunctional movement driving the GOP (Mike Connery)
· IA-Gov: Culver launches second tv ad (desmoinesdem)
· Hilarious Vid On Why We Must Vote No On Issue 2!! (Cliff Schecter)
· NY-23: Scozzafava Drops Out! (lipris)
· NY-23: Pataki Goes Rogue, Endorses Teabagger Darling Doug Hoffman (lipris)
· Dunne Considering Run For VT-Gov (Nathan Empsall)
· McGovern Grandson Looks to Challenge Thune in 2010 (Jonathan Singer)
· IA-03: Two potential challengers for Boswell (desmoinesdem)
· NJ-Gov: Daggett Goes After Christie and Corzine (Jonathan Singer)