… For the first time in memory, it is the Democratic, not the Republican nominee, counting on Ohio as his firewall in an achingly close campaign. Republicans almost always have viewed Ohio as a linchpin in their race to 270 Electoral College votes. This year, holding Ohio is the centerpiece of President Obama’s strategy for repulsing the surging challenge from Republican Mitt Romney. …
The president has been lifted by his support for the auto rescue and Romney’s opposition to it; a state unemployment rate now well below the national average; and the successful effort by his campaign and his allies to portray the Republican as a corporate raider indifferent to the problems of working families—imagery with powerful emotional resonance in a state so scarred by decades of factory shutdowns. [cont.]
Ron Brownstein, National Journal