Red State, Blue State

Winning a presidential election is no easy task. By the time election time creeps into the societal picture again, Americans are already overwhelmed with ads, campaign slogans, and picture perfect promises that seem to vary from state to state. Believe it or not, there is truth to that inconsistency of campaigning, which is all determined by how much the candidate values the worth of that state’s Electoral College vote.

Each state has a certain number of Electoral College votes. Depending on the outcome of the popular vote, the winning party’s representatives will be sent to vote for the presidential candidate that they prefer. This determines the “color” of the state; Americans refer to states as “Red States”, or Republican Party states, or “Blue States” for Democratic Party states.

The strategy sets in based on how the presidential candidate plans to win the election. The president wins the White House by reaching 270 Electoral College votes. This is where planning and campaigning hopes to pay off. In reality, a candidate only needs to win the states with the higher number of Electoral College “value”. If this is the strategy, the candidate doesn’t even need to consider lower numbered states at all, which does that part of the country’s needs and concerns left in the dark and ignored. For example, using the numbers in the 2008 McCain/Obama race, one candidate could take the presidency  if he won California (55), Texas (34), Florida (27), New York (31) Ohio (20), Illinois (21), Pennsylvania (21), Michigan (17), New Jersey (15), Massachusetts (12), Georgia (15), and North Carolina (15), reaching 283 and covering majority of the higher numbered states in the nation.

Seems simple, right? Well, no. Simply based on humanity itself, people in different demographic regions of the country have different opinions in politics. For example, New York, California, Illinois, and Massachusetts are historically Democratic voting states in the last couple elections. A Republican candidate is the underdog in these blue states. The same is for a Democrat campaigning in Texas or North Carolina, which are high in number but Republican voting states. The presidential candidate then must make the decision, “where do I concentrate?”, “where will I get majority of my votes?”, “how fast can I get to 270 reliably?”

Appealing to a candidate’s particular audience is sometimes obvious, and sometimes subliminal. One that comes to mind is a Ronald Reagan commercial shown in the 1984 for the election. “It’s Morning Again” is the title slogan. The imagery used in the commercial depicts what they’d assume as standard living in America: farms, picket fences, people getting married in a church, older people raising American Flags, blue collar American life. Looking at the bigger picture, it doesn’t depict ALL life in American, especially in the cities or coastlines, in 1984. However, the commercial is designed to gain the trust of that specific demographic, Southern and Midwest states, that would vote for Reagan based on those portrayed values alone.

That is just one tactic that seems overly obvious for the manipulation of a perception. But nothing has necessarily changed. There’s no doubt why McCain spent significantly more time in Pennsylvania during the last race- he deeded their vote.

This election in 2012, let’s challenge ourselves to see not the empty promises made in campaigns, but the tactics they use in order to make those promises, and to whom they are made.