Which States are Swinging Most towards Obama ?

While the raw poll numbers are interesting, what’s really surprising is which states are swinging most towards Barack Obama. Comparing the 2004 presidential results with the current polling average shows that Obama has made huge gains in some traditionally Republican states. Two regions stand out : the Mid-West and Mountain regions. Obama won’t win many of these states, but the swing towards him is often dramatic and bodes well for the Democrats in the future.

Not surprisingly, Hawaii is the biggest shift (since Obama is from there). But many of the other big swings are surprising : North Dakota, Indiana, Wyoming, Montana, Virginia, Idaho, and Nebraska, South Dakota, Kansas, Colorado, and Iowa for example have all shifted towards Obama by at least a dozen points over Bush’s 2004 numbers.

In fact, only 4 states are currently polling higher for McCain than what Bush received in 2004, but even there only by 1-2 points : ironically Massachusetts (no doubt because its senator, John Kerry, ran in 2004), Maryland (although the polling data is old here, so Obama might actually be ahead of Kerry), Louisiana (possibly because many African-Americans left the state following Hurricane Katrina) and Arkansas (maybe resentment among Dems because Obama beat former First Lady Hillary Clinton ?). Note : the data for several small non-competitive states (Vermont, Rhode Island, etc) is quite old, so Obama may be much higher now in these states.