Florida is the crux of this election for me. 25 electoral votes, and without it, the Republicans do not get the White House, period. Obama can win without Florida, but it requires either Ohio, or multiple other states to go his way. With Florida, the rest is just landslide. He wins in Florida.
I've been following developments in and around Florida for a while now, and today we have a good picture on where it stands, why it looks like Obama will win it, and McCain's initial steps to firewall there.
Keep reading to see where we stand.
(This is a cross-post from The Daily Shocker.)
First, Pollster.com's trend is so strong for Obama, it's been moved from light blue, to dark blue: Strong Democratic:
That's a gap of near 7%, which is right in line with his national averages. There's a reason for it, however, as Marc Ambinder pointed out
a week ago:
Steve Hildebrand, the deputy campaign manager, will oversee operations from Miami, and Paul Tewes, the chief general election strategist, will help supervise the get-out-the-vote program from the campaign's state headquarters in Tampa.
Tewes, the Obama campaign's liaison with the Democratic National Committee, arrived today, a colleague said. Both will work with Obama state director Steve Schale, who has put together the biggest field team ever field by a party, Republican or Democratic. There are more than 60 open field offices and more than 100,000 active volunteers. In addition, the Obama campaign is outspending McCain on television in the expensive state by a factor of five to one, records show.
Obama is outspending 5:1 on McCain in the state. There's a lot of talk of McCain's negative ads, and if they'll be effective. There's one way to make ads work: run the hell out of them. In my commercial-editing past, I picked up the tidbit that an ad has to be seen an average of seven times before it's message hits home. If you are under that number by any significant amount, it's usually a waste of money. Obama's money advantage is by all accounts huge now. He's running the hell out of ads in Florida, and he's not going to cease. As for their effectiveness? An anecdote: I live in Massachusetts, and aside from a few NH focused ads (shared market) we don't get much political advertising, and I don't watch much TV. But I caught a bit of the Dodgers Phillies game last night, and Obama's "mother" ad ran during a break. Caught me totally by surprise. I'd seen it on the web—even linked it on this site—and it still hit me emotionally to see it on TV. His ads, especially that one, work. And he's outpacing Mr. Negative McCain 5:1.
The other part of the quote above, however, refers to the GOTV aspect of the state. Obama's campaign realizes that Florida will win it for them, so they sent their top tow field marshals to the state. This isn't reflective of any problem the state is having; it's not a rehabilitative move. It's an offensive tack to make sure that of all the states in play; of all the states that will possibly turn blue in this election, Florida is the most important. Their Get Out the Vote effort in Florida is their most important, so their most important people will lead it. They aren't messing around down there.
On the flip side of the ticket, there are two interesting developments. The biggest, to me, is Gov. Charlie Crist backing away from a commitment to campaign for McCain in Florida. This article from the Orlando Sun-Sentinel calls the race for Obama, and Charlie Crist is their Crystal Ball:
You can skip the third and final debate Wednesday.
Barack Obama is going to be the next president of the United States.
I don't base this on poll results, pundit opining or even my own preference.
I refer to a higher source -- Charlie Crist.
You can criticize Charlie for any number of weaknesses, but his political antenna never has been in doubt.
Charlie sized up the Republicans during the primary and at the last minute moved his chips into John McCain's campaign.
Political analysts say Charlie delivered Florida and the nomination to McCain. I think Charlie saw McCain could win and positioned himself to make it look like he was responsible.
He is that good.
And so it does not bode well for McCain to see Crist begin to distance himself from the race.
It is like Warren Buffett discreetly, slowly unloading stock in a company.
It is like Dandy Don breaking out into a chorus of "Turn out the lights, the party's over" on the old Monday Night Football.
I think if Crist thought McCain had a future, he would be out campaigning for him nonstop, just like he was when McCain was on a roll leading up to the national convention.
Crist said last week that he's going to spend the remaining days of the campaign focusing on Florida's economy, and will campaign for McCain only if he has time:
"I’ll be involved, but my first duty is to the people of Florida, to be their governor and I take that role very, very seriously," he said. "So when I have time to be able to help, I’ll try to do that but I know where my first loyalty is to and it’s to the 20 million people that live in the state that I love."
So Crist is clearly untying his political fortunes from the McCainchor, and going back to asnwering to the constituents that matter to him.
But that's not the end of it. Today, john McCain announced his new economic plan, and part of the plan is catered directly to seniors. This is a voting bloc that has consistently gone for McCain all year, and the sense is he's losing them, and he's losing them big in Florida. To introduce a new campaign agenda that focuses on senior citizens signals some distress in the McCain camp that his titan's grip on their support is wavering, and they need to be cajoled back into the fold. But he's got a problem with older voters now, and it's his health care plan. His plan calls for "increasing efficiency" in Medicare and Medicaid, to help pay for the costs of his health care plan. In fact, his entire health care plan is terrible, and exposing his plan to attacks on Medicare and Medicaid by Obama leaves him incredibly vulnerable to Obama pillaging supporters in the 65+ range. Of course, Obama is taking advantage of this opening.
People are talking about a landslide: 350EV+. I don't care. Sure, great, get a mandate. That's awesome. Right now, I just want to win. I want to make sure we have Obama and Biden in the White House, and McCain and Palin have to reckon with their sins. The most direct route to victory for Barack Obama is through Florida, and he's taking it. The opportunities are there, and the defense is weak. Obama is going to win this thing, and he's going to win it in Florida.