Colorado polls had for some months shown a small but consistent lead
for Barack Obama, but his advantage there appears to be gone. A new
poll from the Rocky Mountain News shows John McCain with a 44-41 lead.
McCain
now holds the lead in three current polls of Colorado: Rasmussen,
Quinnipiac, and this Rocky Mountain News poll, while Obama holds the
lead in two others -- Frederick and Public Policy Polling. In all cases
but PPP, the leads are within the margin of error. Our model still
regards Obama as a very small, half-point favorite in Colorado, but the state has
tightened.
Colorado
is not quite a must-win state for Obama. It likely won't matter at all
if he wins Ohio, for instance. But without either Colorado or Ohio,
Obama faces a fairly difficult path to 270 electoral votes. Winning the
Kerry states plus Iowa and New Mexico -- two states that still look
quite strong for Obama -- leave him at 264 electoral votes, just five
vote shy of a tie and six shy of a win. But those five votes might be
tough to come by. It's hard to imagine Obama winning a state like
Missouri or Indiana if he doesn't win Ohio. It's also somewhat hard to
imagine him winning Nevada -- which would get him to a 269-269 tie and
probably a win in the House of Representatives -- if he loses Colorado,
although the two states are not as similar demographically as they
might seem. The key state, then, would probably be Virginia. The more
difficult that Colorado looks for Obama, the more important Virginia
becomes.
--Nate Silver