Pennsylvania becomes major battleground for Obama in 2012

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The Obama campaign says it is working on an expanded electoral map in 2012, preparing for battle in so many places that it can afford to lose some of the big, traditional states he won four years ago. Pennsylvania is not one of those states.

As is clear from President Obama’s Wednesday visit to Scranton, some battlegrounds are more equal than others.

Every Democratic nominee in the past two decades has won Pennsylvania — and Obama did so by a comfortable margin in 2008 — but the state has grown less hospitable to Obama in the past three years. Republicans swept the 2010 midterms, winning the governor’s seat, a Senate seat and five congressional districts, including the 11th District, where Obama will appear on Wednesday.

Yet unlike other similarly challenging states — Ohio and Florida — where Democrats think they can lose and still win overall, Pennsylvania’s 20 electoral college votes are still key to almost any path to 270 electoral college votes. “It’s hard to figure out a scenario for a Democrat to win the presidency without carrying Pennsylvania,” former Democratic governor Ed Rendell, a prominent Obama supporter, said. “It’s not impossible, but it’s very, very hard.”

full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/pennsylvania-becomes-major-battleground-for-obama-in-2012/2011/11/29/gIQAam7RAO_singlePage.html