Well I have taken my time, but here is my final electoral map.

Of course I have received, via twitter, the final electoral map of Ted Panos. It is an interesting contrast to mine, and not just because we have different views of the ultimate winner. Lets take a look.

Teddy has Romney emerging with an electoral college victory by a 281 to 257 margin. I have Obama emerging with an electoral college victory of 281 to 257. Hmmmm. Maybe Teddy and I are not so far apart after all. We seem to agree on all, except Ohio and Iowa. But what both maps say is that we both agree that it is all up to Ohio. On both maps an Obama win in Ohio, and a Romney victory in Iowa, would still produce an Obama Electoral College win. And an Obama win in Iowa, on Teddy’s map, coupled with a Romney victory in Ohio, would still give Romney the victory. So after all of the back and forth we end up in Ohio, where President Obama is 10 points better with working class whites than he is anywhere else in the country. The auto bailout, if I am correct, will have decided this race.

Lets speak frankly here. Republicans were against the government intervention on ideological grounds. The position was that the Big Three would have their output replaced by foreign manufacturers. It was a position based on a free market/free trade ideology, which is still Republican dogma. I have had so many of my Republican friends say to me, in private, that GM and Chrysler should have been let go. I have heard the phrase “The government won’t bail me out, why should they bail out the inefficient auto industry with my money” so many times. When they say it now I just ask why they don’t go to Ohio and make that case there. They tend to hang their heads and mumble in response. I remember quite well the warnings of conservative Republican Patrick Buchanan when the auto bailout was being discussed. Lets look at one of his columns from way back when.

Before Republicans follow this free-trade fanaticism to their final interment, they might study the results of a poll by Peter Hart:

– Seventy-eight percent of Americans believe the U.S. auto industry is highly or extremely important. Three percent think we can do without it.
Ninety percent of Americans believe the death of the U.S. auto industry would do great damage to our economic future.
By 55 percent to 30 percent, Americans favor federal loans to save it. And by 64 percent to 25 percent, Americans back President-elect Obama’s resolve not to let the U.S. auto industry go under.
If the GOP blocks these loans, and the industry dies, the party can forget about Ohio, Michigan and the industrial Midwest, for the Reagan Democrats will never come home again. Nor should they.

A stark warning from Pat Buchanan. If President Obama wins Ohio tomorrow Buchanan’s prediction would be eerily accurate. And one New York Times op-ed would have trumped, by a slight margin, the Romney comeback.