The second installment of the Race42012 Electoral Map is upon us, and already we are seeing a little positive momentum for Governor Romney. Most notably in this edition is the Tar Heel State turning light red (sorry, UNC fans) and Wisconsin changing from Lean Obama to a solid tossup.

North Carolina was a pretty easy call to shade red this week: two polls came out of the state which averaged together gave Romney a three and a half point lead there. However, making it an even easier decision was the fact that one of those polls had Obama only up one point – with a sample that was over seven points more favorable to Obama than the actual electorate in 2008. When that happens, it’s pretty easy to say Obama is in trouble in North Carolina.

Wisconsin was a little more difficult to switch — in an effort to be cautious, I almost didn’t pull the trigger on labeling it a tossup. But adding all the ingredients together — the state’s recent history of incredible close Presidential contests (a 0.2% margin in 2000, and a 0.4% margin in 2004), the Walker recall election and the passion of the state GOP, and the three polls that all showed the race tied or very close to tied — I had to flip the Badger State into the tossup column. The current poll average in Wisconsin is 47.3 – 45.7 for Obama, a margin of just 1.6%. When pressed, Wisconsin still falls to Obama since no polls have shown an actual Romney lead there as of yet, but if trends continue…

Arizona also turns dark red on this map, as old polls drop off the average and the newer ones show Romney with a sizable lead. Arizona is a conservative enough state foundationally that Romney isn’t hurt as much by the GOP Hispanic struggle there like he is in other swing states (i.e. Colorado, Nevada, and especially New Mexico).

Obama does get some good news on this map as he swings New Hampshire into the blue column after a poll gave him a ten-point lead in the Granite State. However, since that poll was from notoriously unreliable PPP, I shaded the state light blue — I think the race there is much closer than that at the moment. Also trending a deeper shade of blue this week is Maine’s second congressional district, a just-unreachable goal for GOP candidates for quite some time now.

Florida remains a tossup, leaning slightly in Romney’s favor. And with no new polling out of Virginia and Ohio, those two states remain leaning Obama for now. Obama enjoys a 48.7 – 44.0 lead over Romney in Virginia and a smaller 46.3 – 43.0 lead over Romney in Ohio. That means Ohio is on the cusp of falling into the tossup column, but so far the state has proven resistant to Romney’s positive trends elsewhere around the country. Here’s some food for thought for this week: even if Romney pulls out a victory in FL, VA, NC, and OH, he will still need one of the following states to get to 270: WI, CO, NV, IA, or NH. A few months ago, I would have said New Hampshire would be his best bet for the state to put him over the top. Now, it’s looking like Wisconsin might be worth some heavy investment from Team Romney.

Updated May 21st, 2012 – Matt Coulter.