The Monkey Cage

I'm not saying you're wrong, but I don't understand this at all! Before the current campaign finance restrictions, campaigns still had finite resources.

A slightly different argument you could make, however, is that in the old days, local volunteers were a more important part of campaigning--and you might well have more local volunteers in your "stronghold" states than in your "swing" states, or at least there'd be less ability to concentrate resources in swing states.

I don't have the data to evaluate this second argument, but it seems like it could be the case.

Finally, I don't see why you think that states with less campaign activity would "drift into a maximially partisan result."

There aren't really good data on campaigning that go back far enough to fully evaluate the argument about distribution of campaign resources (though I recall seeing a paper at APSA where some student had visited presidential archives). That said, I do think there is some anecdotal evidence to suggest resources have been more narrowly distributed. For example, I believe the Clinton campaign in 1992 was the first to bypass national advertising in favor of purchasing local time exclusively.

However, the bigger issue -- I think -- is why some states ever get on the battleground radar in the first place. Daron Shaw has shown us what distinguishes a battleground state from the others, but no one has really focused on why some states take on the attributes that make them desirable targets and others do not. In theory, I don't see why more states couldn't be competitive enough for the campaigns to expend resources there.

As an example...what happened between 2000 and 2004 that made Missouri *stop* being a battleground and supported the emergence of Colorado as one? It wasn't campaign spending per se, so the answer has to focus on other things.

I forget where I read it, but one commenter talked about how this reform effort isn't really reformist in that it provides incumbent protection.

Personally, I think it's more important to wage a 50-state initiative. The electoral map used to be about which states were solidly red or blue, and that really there wasn't much need to spend time there.

Obama has enough funds to take messages and campaigning all over the country, since no one particular red or blue state is doing all the prosperity or all the suffering. America, period, is in trouble.