What about Louisiana? Could it be a fourth pull from the South or does it just lack the incentives to pull in the educated urban whites?
I can't speak much for Louisiana, but Alabama and Tennessee are probably the furthest out of reach for the Democrats of all Southern states.
I think parts of Alabama are really sad. There are a lot of hollowed out small towns in the state that are clearly casualties of white flight.
Georgia has to be (and is) on the Dems radar
Forgot about Georgia, but with Louisiana, for whatever reason, it seems more shut off to the Dems. New Orleans and Red Stick can't seem to overcome the state (either they're not Democratic enough themselves or don't out-vote the state).
Russia isn't some push-over country that the US can fight like this. How do you use only drones against a country whose air force will be a real threat over its own air space unless the US fights hard for it and will mine the Baltic to hell?
Russia's military strength isn't terrible, but under no circumstances are we that concerned in a war with them (other than them nuking someone, but then we nuke them and win anyway. It'll just suck). They have a dilapidated military with poor infrastructure to keep it going. Ballistic missiles and drones are enough to pick at that infrastructure while you sweat them out.
As you mention, the Baltics take a big hit here, but the US isn't really going to care (much like we won't care enough if Estonia gets invaded to nuke people). Russia in such a situation isn't working from a position of power; they're the ones on the resource/time crunch, and they have to live with the destroyed infrastructure.
They won't win, and a lot of Russians will die, and so I think a political assassination followed by peace talks would be most likely. A US air campaign is brutal, and this is without allies who are already extremely close to the fight lending a hand (which they will).
If you get China to help (and I think they might since such a move would help them spread their influence over previously Russian-backed nations), and Russia is straight-up toast. It'd be over in less than a year.
