Hillary's 2016 Map

Hillary would start with about 251 likely electoral votes, a lead of over 100.

A likely "high end" for Hillary.

Iowan blogger John Deeth is a must read for people who want to follow the Presidential race correctly. In one of his recent posts, he talks about how Hillary backers are saying she'll expand the map. It's an interesting read, and it calls into question, what kind of national candidate would she be.

The top question about her is whether or not she can be Hillary Clinton (and therefore have this appeal to white working-class voters), and keep the Obama coalition. This is a fair question to ask, certainly. My answer is probably yes.

1. For one, the Republican Party is doing no meaningful outreach to these groups. They did well in 2014 mostly because the bulk of the Obama Coalition saw a huge drop in turnout.
2. While President Obama's standing with his own coalition may not be what it once was, he is still the most popular politician with these groups. If there was any thought that he would abandon his coalition or sit out the 2016 Presidential race, that is gone with his executive order on immigration. It seems obvious to me that he will go into battle and try to rally his base.
3. Congressional Republicans have shown in the past that they don't care to behave in the best interests of the national party winning a Presidential campaign, or don't know what that means. They are likely to fight immigration reform, and any and all other priorities of the Obama coalition.

That aside, let's just consider another possibility- that the 2016 election will be fought along the battle-lines of the 2000 or 2004 elections. I think that is possible, particularly if the President's popularity sinks farther. That would take us back to the point where we're looking at Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and a few smaller states being close, but really those three mattering. Those three states are at the heart of the Clinton-brand's strength, traditionally. Now, the electoral map has changed since 2004, in that if you re-ran Kerry-Bush, Kerry would need more than Ohio today. Hillary would win though by flipping Florida, or by flipping Ohio and say, New Mexico, out of the GOP column. She's fairly strong in all of these states. 

In other words, I think Hillary Clinton will be just fine nationally, even if some people out there who aren't crazy for her want to think up every single scenario in which the sky can fall on her.