[Dales]

Obviously, I do not agree with your analysis. But as I generally say, time will tell!

[chimera]

It will that. There's time for Bush to try to dull the sharpness of the Rat attacks on the jobs issue if he starts speaking to it directly instead of through surrogates who shoot their feet off. People need to feel he's engaged on the issue, and not "disconnected" or "aloof", which was the knock the media and their Rat favorites put on Bush 41. I don't think there's time to turn the job situation around to the point of recovering everything that's been lost the last three years. That job creation estimate was just nonsense. But telling people to "put some ice on it" is not a winning political strategy.

[AntiGuv]

I think Nevada will be near impossible for Bush unless he wins a national landslide anyhow.

First, there are new media reports starting just days ago that Yucca Mountain is unsafe, and the Democrats will harp on this nonstop between now and November. The threat of radioactive poisoning has a way of trumping all other political concerns on an election day..

Second, Harry Reid will probably glide to reelection having evaded any top-tier challengers, and it now appears likely that the NV-03 district will feature a vigorous campaign after all, with the Dems hammering on Bush in the district that the statewide vote swings on.

BTW, I think it will become swiftly apparent that West Virginia is a lost cause in 2004. The state is intensely Dem - occasional flukes notwithstanding - and the local Dem establishment will be galvanized to reclaim its EVs in 2004. It will not be ignored as a backwater like it was by Gore in 2000 and I expect the Dems to deliver their own.