THE WESTERN FRONT
Swinging Is Everything
Bush and Kerry won't even bother campaigning in 30 or more states. That's good.
BY BRENDAN MINITER
Mr. Miniter is assistant editor of OpinionJournal.com. His column appears Tuesdays.
Sorry Alaska. You may be America's last frontier, but you're just a frozen Republican tundra. Sure, George W. Bush will be happy for your three electoral votes, but don't expect a presidential visit this campaign season. And John Kerry's not coming either. Same goes for you, Hawaii. Everyone knows you're voting for the Democrat, so all the luaus in the world won't get you on the bus tour.
This year you are a swing state or you're nothing. If the popular vote mattered, President Bush and Sen. Kerry would be spending a lot of time in California, New York, Texas and maybe even Massachusetts. But it doesn't. Thanks to the Electoral College, both major candidates know they must sway swing voters in swing states on swing issues. And that leaves the outcome of the election in the hands of some 18 states. If you live in one of them, you might have noticed the ad blitz taking over your TV.
It may seem a bit unfair to the other 32 states, but it's not. Swing states aren't chosen at random. They're evenly divided because they are the ones threshing out the big issues facing the nation. The states up for grabs are also the states where the old economy is losing out to the new, or where immigration is high, or where suburbanization is changing the landscape.
In New Hampshire the change is encroaching Boston suburbs, leaving many residents to contemplate how to Live Free or Die on their morning commute. In New Mexico it's immigrants from old Mexico who are changing the economy and the politics. Florida is a magnet for immigrants, retiring baby boomers and military personnel. Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia are old-economy states being wrenched into the information age. They may become safe states again if workers find a way to mine data instead of ore. Missouri, Oregon and Washington state are mini-Americas, where red and blue voters meet on relatively equal footing.
Many of the nonswingers have either let the future pass them by or have made some pretty bad leadership choices. California did a nice job with the recall, but why did they have to recall their governor in the first place? New York has a city that never sleeps, but doesn't seem to be kept up at night worrying about the economy north of Manhattan. Howard Dean hails from Vermont, but he didn't have much to scream about besides Ben & Jerry's ice cream (and Häagen-Dazs is better anyway). Georgia, is a peach of a state, but Atlanta hasn't been the national focus since Sherman burnt it in 1864.
Let's not be too tough on the safe states, however. Many of them are off the table because they've done pretty well over the past decade. And others can't help their situation--admit it, Wyoming's not for everyone. Then there's the candidates' home states. Neither is up for grabs, although Mr. Kerry hopes to turn the nation away from Texas to embrace Massachusetts' values. We'll see on Nov. 2 if the nation swings that way.
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