registered voters. by 4:00 they magically showed up. folks may wonder why we focus so much on virginia. this goes to something that two of you are talking about last spring. 3-2-1 strategy. six states. that get romney presidency. three states historically states that obama carried. ohio and florida, battleground states. that swung republican to democrat in 2008. if romney wins those two then he just needs one other state, anything like new hampshire, pennsylvania, wisconsin, iowa, colorado, nevada, any of those. five. in the 3-2-1 strategy be virginia is one of the three. if you don t win virginia, how much of a problem? they re blocked. that is the strategy a lot of the electoral strategy was to block romney in the 3-2-1.
that s what we think is going on in pennsylvania on romney side. while the president spent the afternoon continuing his lucky tradition of playing basketball with friends on election day. local media report the athletic facility was foreclosed upon last month. maybe not such a good omen. i hope that everybody is out there and fired up and knocking on doors. earlier he worked the phones at a chicago campaign office to thank volunteers and n neighboring wisconsin. was blissful again as he offered words to his opponent the man he charges not to be trusted. i want to say to governor romney, congratulations on a spirited campaign. i know that his supporters are just as engaged and just as enthusiastic and working just as hard today. after-school today the president s daughters flew here to chicago with their grandmother. they will have a family dinner at the president s private home as they wonder and wait, i m told by a senior advisor. they are expecting inside the obama camp, wa
and that means the election. you know, we have been talking about these exit polls. i m not sure how much they add. if you are on either side, take solace for obama, of course, it s the fact that the wrong track number which was pretty high is a little bit lower now than it was. but these are the early returns. i suspect it will be up there in the 60% range by the end of the evening. for romney, there is something interesting which i think brit alluded to. i was also struck by the fact that in the virginia numbers, and virginia is one of the two really key states here. the other being of course ohio. government workers, majority went for romney. 51%. i m not sure you would have expected. now they are concentrated in the northern part of the state. which is what obama will depend on. to carry them through. i think if you already have romney with majority of the government workers that bodes well for romney. i think either side can look
many americans. it seems so far. well, you tell me. put it in perspective. 39% believe the economy got better. but 59% say it s either the same or worse than it was. right. i don t think it is a big news flash people are not happy with the way the economy is going. but when you look at the xil polls you see they feel that barack obama is somebody who relates to them, more like them, understands them better. and that he was successful at painting romney as being somebody who has been out of touch rich guy. i would not under estimate that. that is very serious thing. if people feel that mitt romney is somebody who is not going to relate to their suffering and not care about it and maybe take care of rich people, i don t think it bodes well for romney. bret: steve, it s important to point out with the exit polls they come in waves. we get certain waves of results. number one. number two, some people don t talk to interviewers when they leave the polling places. they just don t.
i feel great about ohio. paul ryan and his wife voted in wisconsin. ryan met up with ryan in ohio where they greeted an thanked the volunteers. i m so optimistic. not just about the results of the election, but optimistic about what is ahead for america. i got a good feel for it on the ground. it didn t feel it in 2008 frankly. we have momentum. tossups are a slight essential for ohio and pennsylvania for president. g.o.p. candidates traditionally outperform the polls on election day. we do better on election day. that historically has been the pattern. democrats tend to try to bank as many votes as they can. in early voting and absentee ballots. without a win in ohio, romney s path to 270 electoral vote is harder. he focused on pennsylvania where the race tightened as a possible a terntive. appreciate all the work you are doing. then back to boston to