I agree with Peter and Sean Trende that we shouldn’t worry too much about the state polls in North Carolina right now. If Obama wins North Carolina, it will be because he clearly won the national popular vote and North Carolina’s electoral votes will not have proved decisive. I’m a little bit more worried about Virginia. The economy is bad in the country as a whole, but actually pretty good in Virginia. I’m leaning more and more in favor of Romney picking Virginia governor Bob McDonnell as his running mate. This is only secondarily for Virginia-related reasons. McDonnell has just about the perfect rhetorical style for the moment. He is an articulate, likeable, and unapologetic social conservative who is relentless in talking about the economy. He also has a record of cutting government spending while maintaining government services. McDonnell is also the right guy to handle Obama’s “hey let’s get off the economy and talk about making religious organizations provide free birth control” strategy. The Virginia Democrats tried to run just this play on McDonnell in 2009 and McDonnell handled it beautifully. McDonnell defended his position ably and then hammered the Democrats on the economy.
