Jim Messina's State of the Race: "The president will win re-election if ...

Obama campaign manager Jim Messina discusses some of the metrics on the election especially those related to early voting.

The campaign is outdoing what it did in 2008 and is well ahead of the Romney campaign in most early voting and registration stats. The lead is particularly important in the battleground states. For example, in Colorado, Democrats have a bigger lead in new voter registration compared to November 2008. Same thing in Nevada.

In most battleground states, early in-person voting will end this weekend either on Nov. 2 or Nov. 3.   Additionally, it's near the deadline to mail absentee/mail-in ballots.  Otherwise, voters will have to deliver the ballots to the registrar's office or to another acceptable location.

In order to find an early voting location, the Obama campaign has set up a special tool at http://barackobama.com/lookup.  Eventually, this tool should also work for Election Day voting locations.  It provides the street address along with a driving map.