Opinion: National electoral map update: Barack Obama losing Montana to tossup

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OK, here’s the second weekly installment of The Ticket’s ongoing Electoral Map courtesy of Karl Rove & Co.

The map, as the methodology box explains below the jump, is an average of all public telephone polls state by state within the last 30 days. States within a three-point lead for either Republican Sen. John McCain or Democrat Sen. Barack Obama are rated as tossups. From last week’s map to this week’s, the only significant change was the movement of Montana, with its three electoral votes, away from Obama’s electoral column into the tossup category.

Also on this item’s jump (click the ‘Read more’ line to open the rest of this item) is a graph showing the electoral vote totals by week from March 3 through Aug. 6. It also reveals a steady growth starting in mid-July in the number of states considered electoral tossups.

These maps are published in The Ticket with the permission of Karl Rove & Co. They will be a regular weekly Thursday feature here right up through election day, Nov. 4. Feel free to bookmark this page for your ready reference.

-- Andrew Malcolm

For each state, the map uses the average of all public telephone polls (Internet polls are not included in the average) taken within 30 days of the most recent poll available in each state. For example, if the most recent poll in Montana was taken July 15, the average includes all polls conducted between June 15 and July 15. States within a three-point lead for McCain or Obama are classified as tossups; states outside the three-point lead are allocated to the respective candidate. There is no polling data available for the District of Columbia, but its three electoral votes are allocated to Obama.