OK, so McCain is pulling out of Michigan. So what now? The Politico has the McCain campaign's strategy.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) now must win Pennsylvania, Wisconsin or Minnesota in order to get enough electoral votes to win the presidency, his campaign says. [...]

"Our ability to pick off one of those three states is where our fortunes are largely held," a McCain official said. "These are states where Barack Obama is on the defense."

McCain political director Mike Duhaime also said on the conference call that they're going after Maine's 2nd congressional district's 1 EV.

Umm, really? First of all it doesn't even strike me as true, but also, how realistic do they really think picking off one of these states really is. What they really need to do is get off offense and go into full defense mode so they can hold Bush states minus NM & IA for a 274-264 EV win.

But this strategy they've laid out seems like more than just posturing or self-deprecation or even bluster. They're actually staffing up in Maine, so this admission that McCain's only path depends on winning a blue (albeit purplish) state + a purplish district must mean that they've already given up on winning at least one if not two Bush states. But which ones? Here are more clues:

McCain figures that winning one of those three big remaining swing states, plus those he considers safe, would put him 10 shy of the 270 electoral votes he needs to win.

"We can dig up an additional 10 electoral votes in Nevada, Colorado and New Hampshire," the official said. [...]

"We feel strongly that we're going to win in Florida, Missouri and the traditional Republican states of Virginia and North Carolina."

OK, so let's reverse engineer it. If we give McCain all the states that he feels he needs to win (which is essentially most Bush states + NH + 1 EV in Maine), we can then figure out which Bush state/s they expect Obama to win by taking some away and finding a scenario by which McCain's victory is by the slimmest of slim margins (which is the only reason 1 EV in Maine would be worth going after.)

1. McCain wins Minnesota (10 EVs):

Bush states - NM - IA + NH + MN + ME-02 = McCain 289/Obama 249

So what states, other than the ones Duhaime insisted they'd need to win, would Obama have to win for this to be even close? Ohio.

Bush states - NM - IA + NH + MN + ME-02 - OH = McCain 269/Obama 269

Yikes. All that Maine cd does is get them a tie.

2. McCain wins Wisconsin (10 EVs):

Same as above.

3. McCain wins Pennsylvania (21 EVs):

Bush states - NM - IA + NH + PA + ME-02 = McCain 300/Obama 238

What would Obama have to lose for McCain to win? Ohio AND Colorado.

Bush states - NM - IA - OH - CO + NH + PA + ME-02 = McCain 271/Obama 267

The point here is that if the McCain campaign really believes it has to win one of either Wisconsin, Minnesota or Pennsylvania, that means they're already conceding at least one Bush state, which currently looks most likely to be Ohio. That seems odd, since Florida at the moment looks far more likely to flip to Obama than Ohio does. Of course, they could know something we don't know, such the likely impact of early voting in Ohio, which just began on Tuesday, at what arguably is the height of Obama's popularity.

In the end, the McCain team would be wise to read Chris Bowers' advice, which is on the money:

Carpetbomb Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio and Virginia with paid media, mailings, field, staff, rallies, retail politics, the works. Seriously--don't target any other states except those six, based on the reasonable assumption that if McCain wins all six of those states, he will also pick up Indiana, Missouri, North Carolina and West Virginia. Supplement this narrow targeting strategy, and counter the 50 state investment by the DNC and the Obama campaign, with a high intensity national cable campaign designed to maintain national poll numbers and possibly shake another state or two loose. If the strategy works, then McCain wins the electoral college 278-260, and possibly edges Obama out in the popular vote.

See? Easy.

Update [2008-10-2 20:38:13 by Todd Beeton]:Chris Cilizza reports the McCain strategy conference call slightly differently:

Their map: Win six toss up states -- Florida, Missouri, North Carolina, Virginia, Indiana and Ohio -- that have traditionally favored Republicans and hold the solidly GOP states to get to 260 electoral votes. Then find 10 more electoral votes in some combination of Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania.

"To say we are on defense is not true," insisted Strimple. "We are aggressively using our resources in states where we have to win."

Maybe. But the problem with that logic is it assumes McCain can hold those six red state tossups, which, in the case of Ohio, Colorado and Virginia (at least) looks to be a dicey proposition.

"We're on offense! We're on offense!"