Hi Trades,
You seem to be "right on" here !!!
"Still don't know how in the world a Republican is colored Red on a political map and a Democrat Blue. Conservatives have always been Blue and Liberals have always been Red for obvious reasons. I suspect someone is screwing around with a psychological mind game with that. "

Seems it was "super Liberal" Tim Russert that pulled it off on "super Liberal" NBC !!!

I did think the blue Repub, red Dem was much more ingrained than it appears to have been from the Wiki article though ???

Anyway, the "gods of political maps" got even with Russert for his deceptive move,

Below from Wikipedia:
The terms red states and blue states came into use in United States presidential election of 2000 on an episode of the "Today" show on October 30, 2000 to refer to those states of the United States whose residents predominantly vote for the Republican Party or Democratic Party presidential candidates, respectively. A blue state tends to vote for the Democratic Party, and a red state tends to vote for the Republican Party. According to AlterNet and The Washington Post, the terms were coined by journalist Tim Russert, during his televised coverage of the 2000 presidential election.[1] That was not the first election during which the news media used colored maps to graphically depict voter preferences in the various states, but it was the first time a standard color scheme took hold; the colors were often reversed or different colors used before the 2000 election. Since 2000, usage of the term has been expanded to differentiate between states being perceived as liberal and those perceived as conservative.

This unofficial system of political colors used in the United States is the reverse of that in most other long-established democracies, where Blue represents right-wing and conservative parties, and Red represents left-wing and social democratic parties.