Throw Out The Old Electoral Maps In 2008

[Terri]

By Michael Barone
March 3, 2008

It's time to throw out that old map with the red states and blue states. The map that implies that all but a handful of states will definitely vote Republican or Democratic and that the real contest will be decided in Florida or Ohio or whatever.

For a time, the map served its purpose. Only three states changed parties between the 2000 and the 2004 presidential elections, and the average change in percentage margin in those states was only 1.5 percent. But such hugely static political patterns are the exception rather than the rule in our history.

The last two presidential elections whose results so closely resembled each other were 1952 and 1956, when the two parties nominated the same candidates and only four states' results were different.

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