Ignore the polls, watch the action and the rhetoric.
Obama and Romney are both playing on mostly BLUE state turf. Romney is running the sort of campaign winning camps run, optimistic, hopeful, bland. Obama is running the sort of campaign losers run, nasty, desperate and shrill.
Obama is not acting like a candidate whose internal polling is showing him winning.
It’s no coincidence that Obama is having a rally with Bruce Springsteen in Madison, Wisconsin tomorrow. Clearly, he’s trying to rally the base.
Turnout will be interesting. In 2004, John Kerry and Springsteen drew 80,000 in Madison.
Campaign sources were claiming 20,000 for Katy Perry and Obama yesterday in Milwaukee, but according to the venue’s website, the maximum capacity for the room they played was a little more than 12,500. ...and that’s before setting up two stages, security perimeters and the like.
You bring up a critically important observation. Obama hasn't extended himself into Republican dominated territory. He's fallen back to defending Democrat dominated territory because Mitt has advanced his offensive and has him on the run.
In military terms, Obama is in a mad retreat. You can see it in everything his camp is doing and saying. They're going down, and they know it.