At the Base of the Rockies

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The big confrontation of the 2008 presidential election will be the East versus the West. The conflict will not, however, be fought along the lines of the Cold War: America and its Western European allies versus the Soviets and Red Chinese. Nor will it be a struggle between Western values and militant Islamic ones — although this will surely be an issue in the race.

The political battle will be between the candidate who represents the East Coast elites against the candidate who resonates in the West, aside from the Pacific coast cities, as well as in the country’s heartland. Already one Democratic candidate, who had the potential to reach both regions, Senator Bayh of Indiana, has opted out of the presidential race.

In 2004, the Republican ticket swept key Western states, such as Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado, two of which, Arizona and New Mexico, have Democratic governors. Because it is growing demographically at a rapid pace, the significance of this region may equal or even surpass the electoral importance of the industrial Midwest.

If the election were to occur today, the Republicans would still have an advantage in the contest for the West. The current GOP frontrunner is Senator McCain, who has represented Arizona for 20 years. His blend of conservative and unconventional views strikes a chord in an area where values are often as much libertarian as red-meat conservative.

A rival of Mr. McCain’s for the nomination, Mitt Romney, derives a significant portion of his political identity from the West even though he governs Massachusetts. Mr. Romney came into the limelight as a Westerner when he served as president of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee for the Winter Olympics. Mr. Romney, a 1971 graduate of Brigham Young University, donated $1 million to the school to create the George Romney Institute of Public Management in honor of his father, who served as governor of Michigan, where the younger Mr. Romney grew up. Among the top-tier Republican candidates, only Mayor Giuliani is exclusively associated with an East Coast city.

One would expect the Republicans to have a geographic advantage in the West, and to an extent they do. But the Democratic field is getting a bit more geographically expansive. The geographic diversity of these candidates is advantageous for their political hopes. Mrs. Clinton, like Mr. Romney, is geographically ambidextrous. She came into the national public eye as the wife of an Arkansas governor, but grew up in a suburb of Chicago and attended a famous single-sex Massachusetts college. Her senatorial persona today is more Midwestern than Southern, New York, or New England.

Senator Obama has an exotic sounding name but lives in Mrs. Clinton’s hometown of Chicago. He frequently invokes the Rust Belt neighborhood in the far south side of Chicago, in which he worked as a community organizer, as well as the Kansas of his mother’s birth. This week, he is vacationing where he grew up — Hawaii. America doesn’t go any farther West than that. Another potential candidate, Governor Richardson of New Mexico, speaks fluent Spanish, grew up in Mexico, and has found the right formula to win the election as a Democrat in the West.

Looming over this entire discussion of geography is the question of where both parties will hold their political conventions. St. Paul, Minn., will host the Republican convention, which could help the GOP win such states as Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. The Democrats will soon decide whether to hold their convention in Denver or in New York City.

Aside from other criteria that determine convention cities, politically, Denver is the right place for the Democrats to hold their conclave. If Senator Clinton can’t win New York and the other Northeastern states, the Democrats are in grave danger. The same speech given in Denver followed by a bus trip across the West will give the Democratic candidate key visibility in the region.

The Democrats began to look westward when they opted to move the Nevada caucus to the front of the election calendar. It is very possible they will further this decision by holding their next political convention at the base of the Rocky Mountains, a wise choice if they believe their opponent to be either Messrs. McCain or Romney.

Mr. Gitell (gitell.com) is a contributing editor of The New York Sun.


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