Obama the Second: Have the Democrats already got 90% of the electoral votes they need for 2012?

Electoral college map 2008

270 Electoral college votes, not popularity, elect the president. In all five presidential elections since 1992, the Democrats kept 18 high-vote states plus the district of Columbia blue for 242 electoral votes.  Just hanging onto this bloc that hasn't changed allegiance will almost put Obama in the White House for a second term.  (Gerald Seib at the Wall Street Journal, reported by Via Meadia).  Add a few extra to this core and it's President Barack Hussein Obama again.