LL --- Good analysis Lambert using the popular vote. However if you drill down and look at it on a state by state basis, for McCain to have won the election there only needed to be 402,000 people switch their vote in 7 'swing' states:

102k in Ohio, 98k in FL, 7k in NC, 77k in VA, 13k in IN, 72k in CO, 33k in NH, and assumes McCain wins MO.

That is how close it really was on an electoral basis; 402,000 voters could have turned the entire election the other way. That is just .0033 of the total votes cast of over 120 million.

Unfortunately, urban (liberal) America is now running the nation.