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Why do Election 2012 swing states matter? 5 resources to explain.

Looking for better analysis on swing states? D.C. Decoder has compiled a list of excellent resources to help you understand the impact swing states really have.

2. The Wall Street Journal

Tony Dejak/AP/File
This January file photo shows a woman voting at the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections in Cleveland as early voting began in Ohio's March presidential primary.

At first glance The Wall Street Journal's State of the Race map looks a lot like the Times' map, but it is the filters that set this map apart. Readers can view the country by state, or by county, and then view data on a number of issues sure to impact this year's election.

Click through a range of unemployment rates to see which states have the highest or lowest rates of unemployment, click on per-capita income to see where the big earners live, or mortgage delinquency to see which states were able to weather the mortgage crisis.

The filters become even more interesting, and arguably more valuable, when paired with each states' political leaning. Readers can easily see which states were most impacted in the financial crisis, and which way they are likely to vote.

An especially interesting feature at the county level is the Wall Street Journal's "Community Type" labels. Clicking through categories like "Monied Burbs," "Minority Central," "Service-Worker Centers," and "Emptying Nests," allows you to quickly see what type of Americans live where, and how they're likely to vote. 

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Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

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