From Politico:

John McCain is pulling out of Michigan, according to two Republicans, a stunning move a month away from Election Day that indicates the difficulty Republicans are having in finding blue states to put in play.

McCain will go off TV in Michigan, stop dropping mail there and send most of his staff to more competitive states, including Wisconsin, Ohio and Florida. Wisconsin went for Kerry in 2004, Ohio and Florida for Bush.

McCain’s campaign didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

(more…)

Yglesias brings up something I remember arguing with Graham about:

Ezra Klein and Brian Beutler both observe that the Electoral College doesn’t just lead to the occasional weird or unfair outcome but also biases policy substantially. If Michigan weren’t an Electoral College swing state, there probably wouldn’t be nearly as much bipartisan enthusiasm for car industry bailouts.

Conservatives, in particular, should take a gander at Virginia’s rising swing state status with alarm since that means a state where a huge number of federal bureaucrats live is soon going to pandered to at every opportunity. National Popular Vote can save us.

I am not a huge fan of the National Popular Vote movement.  To me, just looking at electoral strategy, it provides a much higher incentive to churn up your base than an electoral college scenario.  Look at it this way:  In an electoral college system, Alabama has 9 electoral votes.  If John McCain wins Alabama by 10 points, he’ll get 9 EVs.  Likewise, if McCain wins Alabama by 30 points, he’ll get 9 EVs.  The same is not true in a popular vote system.

This places nearly zero incentive for John McCain to pander to Alabama voters under an electoral college system.  There may, however be incentive to do so under a National Popular Vote system.

The same goes for California and Barack Obama.

The bottom line is, I’d rather have the election decided by persuading moderate voters in a variety of politically heterogeneous states than have it decided by turning out the most base voters in politically homogeneous states.

Are there some bad policy decisions made because politicians are pandering to swing states?  Definitely.  Look at Iowa and ethanol.  But I think these are much less damaging than having an extremist, regional candidate cranking out huge margins in the South and winning the presidency.