PAKPAC
Analysis of the "Battleground States" OR "Purple States" for the 2004 Presidential Elections.

As we evaluate the current polls and factor in the margin of error, voters with no opinions, the ever changing domestic economic situation and the war on Iraq, it is quite obvious that the 2004 elections will be a dead heat.

The elections results would depend heavily on the “Battleground States” also referred to as the “Purple State”.

If we consider the states in which there was a less than 7 % difference between the votes of the 2000 elections, some of the states stand out. (We are considering only these States as the battleground states)

Analysis of the last 4 presidential elections with respect to the purple states is shown in table 1. With respect to the battleground states won by Bush in 2000, (The numbers in brackets represent the electoral votes) {Florida (27), Ohio (20), Missouri (11), Tennessee (11), Arizona (10), Arkansas (6), Nevada (5), West Virginia (5), and New Hampshire (4)} each one of them favored Democratic President Bill Clinton in 1996. This suggests that these particular states are subject to influence on the popularity of the prevailing candidate rather than loyalty to a particular political party.

Looking at the battleground states won by Al Gore in 2000 {Pennsylvania (21), Michigan (17), Washington (11), Minnesota (10), Wisconsin (10), Iowa (7), Oregon (7), New Mexico (5), Maine (4)} the pattern of the last 4 years that were studies by us suggests that democratic candidates won more frequently in these states. If one evaluates the margin of victory in these states (Table 2), it is obvious that in 2000 there were many very close races even in these traditionally democrat supporting states.

Table 2 looks at the margin of victory to give us an idea, how many votes it took to actually change the results of a specific state.

Table 1:
This table shows the battleground states by the Democratic and Republican Presidential Candidate Vitories, 1988-2000.

Table 2:
The following table shows the Actual Votes, Margin of Victory, and the difference between Gore and Bush in the 2000 Elections.

Both these tables tell us that it does not take many votes to influence the results of the specific battleground states, which in turn can change the elections results altogether. Any community which can influence 5-7% votes can potentially easily influnce who the next President of United States will be.

In order to be an important player in the 2004 election we must do the following:
A) Register to vote:
You can do this ONLINE, and make sure that all community members, friends, also register. Initiate the process in every Masjid. Start educating the voters. Initiate registration drives especially in the battleground states.

B) Make sure that on the Election Day you do go out and give your vote. Those outside the country must mail their votes.

C) Make sure that you all call the campaigns of both candidates and keep them engaged on your issues.

D) Please share this information with other Pakistani American Organizations, Muslim American Organizations and other Coalitions Partners, locally and nationally.

E) Please join and support PAKPAC.