2. In campaign mode, the locked characters are not only viewable, they are also playable.
Weird, did you already unlock them previously? What version of the game are you running?
1. The "Political Strategy" tab simply displays all the states as the opponent's color no matter who is winning.
The intent of "Political Strategy" view mode is to let the user pick which states they want to go for. Click a state once to turn it your opponents color, click it again to turn it to yours. The game will show you the total Electoral Votes you'd get if you win all of the states you've selected. Is this not the way it is working on your machine?