Battleground: Virginia

By Chris

On Friday, one of my favorite bloggers, RealClearPolitics’ Jay Cost, posted an excellent and thorough electoral analysis of the battleground state of Virginia and what it will take for Barack Obama to win the Commonwealth in November.  This is the fourth in a series of battleground state reviews that also includes Pennsylvania, Ohio (here and here) and Colorado.

Cost’s bottom line is this: “I would say that of the four states we have reviewed thus far, Pennsylvania is the most likely to go for Obama, Virginia the least, and Colorado and Ohio fall in between.”  However, Cost also points out that, for Virgina observers on Election Night, the key groups/areas to watch are 1) Washington, 2) Virginia Beach, 3) Richmond, 4) Downstate Whites and 5) African-Americans. How these groups vote in relation to past elections will determine who gets Virginia’s 13 electoral votes.

While this analysis is largely intended for those who are not familiar with the state’s politics, I nonetheless recommend that Virginia politicos bookmark Cost’s analysis and refer to it frequently as this campaign progresses.  In addition, it will remain relevant for the 2009 campaign once the results for 2008 are available.

Cost’s analysis divides the state into four geographic regions (NoVA, Tidewater, Richmond and a remaining catch-all category) and compares the electoral results in those regions from John Kerry’s 2004 loss, Tim Kaine’s 2005 victory and Jim Webb’s 2006 victory. What is telling about those results is the fact that George Allen in 2006 lost Northern Virginia by a whopping 15%, but still only lost the race by a few thousand votes.  As Cost points out, the truth remains that, despite the rapid growth of Northern Virginia, downstate votes still determine who wins elections in Virginia.

Of particular interest to me were the graphs in the endnotes that broke down the “catch-all” category even further into the eight smaller metropolitan areas of Roanoke, Charlottesville, Lynchburg, Blacksburg, Danville, Harrisonburg, Bristol, and Winchester. Most of these areas have been getting more Republican over the last 20 years, while he major metropolitan areas have been moving the other direction, in some cases more swiftly than others.

In any case, it is a fascinating review for us political junkies and a helpful baseline from which to judge this year’s results.  Ultimately the playing field still seems to favor McCain in the Old Dominion, but I am certain that recent results will ensure that we Republicans take nothing for granted this year.