| Obama | McCain |
| 100.0% probability of winning | 0.0% probability of winning |
| Mean of 368 electoral votes | Mean of 170 electoral votes |
Today’s analysis incorporates a slight change to my algorithm. With exactly two weeks left until the election, I’ve reduced the window for “current polls” from 14 days down to 10 days. (I’ll reduce that down to 7 days when there is one week remaining—these changes were all planned in advance).
With that in mind, Yesterday’s analysis showed Sen. Barack Obama leading Sen. John McCain by 364 to 174 electoral votes. Obama would have won an election held yesterday with near 100% certainty.
Today there were a remarkable 17 new polls covering 14 states released. The new polls (and, perhaps, with an assist from changes to the “current poll” window) give Obama a modest gain in his expected electoral votes.
Now, after 100,000 simulated elections, Obama wins 100,000 times. Obama gains four new electoral votes, for an average of 368 to McCain’s 170 electoral votes. Again, in an election held now, Obama would have a 100.0% probability of winning.
Detailed results for this analysis are available at Hominid Views.
Methods are described in the FAQ. The most recent version of this analysis can be found on this page.
Ok, this is about the umpteenth time that this pablum has been regurgitated.
Are you pushing to the front of the line to capture the Dewey Defeats Truman award? Unlikely? Perhaps. But just think of the fame if you pull it off.
re 1: Got under your skin a little bit? Heh….
I know! You can raise the spectre of ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS!
That ought to pull in a lot of the Hispanic vote — which you took for granted.
All of these analyses assume accurate polls, but poll accuracy is the Achilles Heel of predicting elections. There are lots of things that can go wrong with polling; and other things that can go wrong even if the polls are right, such as low turnout among young voters and last-minute shifts in voter sentiment.
Benjamin Graham, the godfather of “value investing” and teacher of Warren Buffett, liked to talk about a “margin of safety.” It is somewhat comforting to know that RealClearPolitics’ averaging of several national polls gives Obama 190 more electoral votes than he needs, which provides a “margin of safety” against something going wrong in one or more individual states. But this is no insurance against all the polls being wrong, and something going wrong everywhere at once.
Most people assume the polling data, despite flaws, are the best indicator we have of what will happen on Election Day. I think the campaign event crowds are a better indicator. McCain draws around 20,000 people; Obama pulls 100,000. What’s going on here? It doesn’t mean Obama is 5 times more popular. It does mean people believe we’re on the cusp of a historic event and they want to be able to say years from now that “I was there, I saw him.” It means far more Americans, no matter how they intend to vote, believe Obama will win. And that could easily become a self-fulfilling prophecy. That, more than the polls, is what enables me to sleep during the day.*
* Rabbits are nocturnal. That means I’m up most of the night, sleep during the day, and start drinking at 6 a.m. instead of 6 p.m.
@1 If you’re going to sling around fancy words like “pabulum” at least spell them correctly. We know you’re an ignorant fuck, but are you too lazy to use a dictionary or spell-check, as well? It looks that way. After you get the spelling down, then we can work on your grasp of the word’s meaning, which is another whole chapter in your long and tortuous uncompleted journey toward someday achieving a freshman level of literacy.
@2 “spectre”
Now there’s a man after my heart! The Anglicized rendition lends a certain panache to the term that sets my heart all a-flutter! But don’t you try this, wingnuts, or the Colonists may take you for a Tory and open fire.
Stock market’s down 340 points on weakening earnings. That should put another half million votes in Obama’s pocket. It’s too bad we have to win this way but better to swim for a lifeboat than sink beneath the waves.
By the numbers: 3,700 of America’s 1.4 million active duty military personnel are Muslim; to date 4 American Muslim soldiers have been killed in action in Iraq and Afghanistan. (Source: Seattle Times)
Michelle Bachman’s (R-Minn)trying to to repair the damage caused by her comments on Hardball.
In case some of you missed it, she responded to a question about her feelings about Obama by saying “”Absolutely. I’m very concerned that he may have anti-American views. That’s what the American people are concerned about. That’s why they want to know what his answers are.” She went on to say that the news media needs to investigate many members of Congress also for their anti-American views. The comments provided a windfall for her opponant for her House seat, and Democrats in Minnesota in generally, with over $1 million raised over the weekend to go toward her defeat.
Now she’s trying to contain the damage, but she seems to be causing as many problems in the process as did her original comments.
Bachmann: Talk show appearance `big mistake’
So, she’s kind of sorry she used that phrase, but she was tricked into it by that slippery “liberal media”, I guess, so it’s not really her fault, but she’s sorry anyway, because, well, it didn’t work out very well, did it???
And how can a Congresswoman claim to have never seen “Hardball”, and have no idea what it’s about?????? I guess she’s just used to the snowballs which Hannity and the others at Fox News throw to her in interviews. Real questions, in her mind, aren’t “fair”, I guess.
It would be nice to see this one as another Republican seat turning blue after the November election. Now all we have to do is get Reichart to go on Hardball.
@8 That may happen. Her seat is now in play, and her stupid remark helped her opponent raise $810,000 in 72 hours. In addition, it motivated the DNCC to pour $1 million into his campaign. Blaming the media probably won’t score very many points among voters who have concluded she’s too extreme for their district, but in any case the damage is already done, and it’ll be tough for her to save herself now.