Michigan Mittmentum?

The Electoral College redshift keeps expanding. Here’s Dan Blatt putting it all together:

Earlier today, the National Review’s Robert Costa referred to Minnesota, Wisconsin and Pennyslvania as “maybe states,” three “blue” states which could turn “red”.

Perhaps had he written later in the day, he might have added another state to that pile. His colleague Jim Geraghty reports “that the Obama campaign is buying a week’s worth of television ads in the Detroit market.“:

This is an ad purchase aimed at securing Michigan; it is not aimed at crossing into Ohio or any other state. Detroit’s radio market runs into Monroe County which borders the Buckeye State, but it does not cross over, as some metropolitan media markets do.

This is the eleventh-largest media market in the United States and one of the more expensive ones, particularly compared to the smaller cities that make up most key swing state markets.

With such a pricey ad market, as Ace puts it, “You don’t play there for fun.” Reporting on this news, Allahpundit speculates that “Team Mitt may be eyeing not only Oregon but even Washington state(!) as having turned more purplish than anticipated.”

It wasn’t all that long ago that Team Obama was boasting about making a play for Arizona. Set the Wayback Machine for April, right around the time Romney was securing the GOP nomination:

Obama strategists are simply following the same techniques they used in 2008 when putting states like North Carolina and Indiana into play. Then, too, there was much initial skepticism, though both states ended up going for Mr. Obama.

There was even talk from David Axelrod — even if ever-so-briefly — about Texas having some kind of future as a purple state. That talks seem a long time ago. Today he was on one of the cable networks doing the Flop Sweat Tango. By most accounts, he made Nathan Thurm look like Derek Flint.

Today? Obama is spending the very last Wednesday before the election touring New Jersey’s storm damage. No, I’m not saying New Jersey is in play — far from it. In fact, what Obama is doing is politically quite smart: He’s looking presidential. And that’s a feat he’s had difficulty pulling off these last four weeks.

But it also speaks to his weakness. Obama should be out campaigning hard in the swing states, raising money for relief like some other candidate I could mention.. Instead, Obama is doing what he can to nurture some health back into his enfeebled image.

And if Romney is feeling strong enough to push into Michigan (as I’ve been arguing for weeks he needs to), then image-bolstering photo ops is probably the best Obama can do.