[hudkina]

Even at the national level it won't be that hard for the Democrats to retain their strongholds and win a few battleground states.

For example, the Northeast including D.C., Maryland and Delaware has 112 electoral votes. The Upper Midwest (Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Illinois) add 62 more votes and the West Coast (California, Oregon, Washington, and Hawaii) add another 78. That's 252 votes that will likely go in favor of Obama, though there's always the possibilities of a few switches (Iowa, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, etc.)

If Obama can keep Florida then he has more than enough and in fact could lose New Hampshire and Iowa and still win. If he keeps the 252 votes in the likely states and also keeps Ohio then he has exactly enough. If he loses both Ohio and Florida he can take Nevada, Colorado, and New Mexico and win. And that doesn't even take into consideration Virginia, which has increasingly become more liberal. He can add Virginia and any one of the Mountain West states and still win.