Will North Carolina become the new Florida?

The Boston Globe reports:

For nearly a generation, those watching presidential election returns on television every four years have been taught to focus on the results in just one state: Florida, Florida, Florida.

But lately, another state has captured the attention of the political class. It may not decide who will become president in 2016 — but it may well in the future.

North Carolina wasn’t even considered a swing state until 2008. That year, the state voted for Barack Obama, the first Democrat to win there since 1976.

In 2012, both Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney lavished attention and money on the state, hoping to win it. The Democratic National Convention even chose Charlotte as the host city, hoping to give Obama a boost there. In the end, it was the one swing state that Romney won — with just 50.1 percent of the vote.

In the past 20 years, the state has undergone a dramatic demographic transformation. What’s left is essentially every group being fought over in 2016: the white working class, who saw their once stable textile jobs disappear; a growing minority population; and a young professional class living in more urban areas.

Gulp.