Follow the Candidates through Patchwork Nation
Where the candidates stump for votes can reveal much about their strategies for winning the White House. This page shows how much attention a candidate is giving each of the 11 community types of Patchwork Nation, based on the number of campaign events the candidate attends in each type of locale.
John McCain
John McCain (R) is in his fourth term in the US Senate from Arizona. In 2000, he lost the Republican presidential nomination to George W. Bush. For 22 years, Mr. McCain was an aviator in the US Navy. During the Vietnam War after a missile struck his plane in 1967, he was taken prisoner of war by the North Vietnamese. Five and a half years later, he was released. His naval honors include a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, and a Purple Heart. McCain has also coauthored five books with longtime aide Mark Salter. He graduated from the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. He is married and has seven children and four grandchildren.
Time spent with each community type ( Date range: February 1, 2008 - present )
Barack Obama
Barack Obama (D) was elected to the US Senate in 2004 from Illinois. Previously, he served as a state senator in Illinois for eight years. Mr. Obama began his career as a community organizer in Chicago. He has written the books "Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance" and "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream." He graduated from Columbia University in New York and received his law degree from Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Mass., where he was the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. He is married and has two daughters.
Time spent with each community type ( Date range: February 1, 2008 - present )
Timeline
Which community types did your preferred candidate visit this week? Last month? You can find out using the candidate timelines below. Each unit on the timeline represents one campaign event the candidate attended and is color-coded to represent the type of community in which the event was held.
NOTE: Candidates will often visit several communities in a single day. Each vertical line of color in the timelines below represent one visit with a particular community type.
