The Breakdown for Oct. 31-- It's scary!

Ok, it's not really that scary, but in honor of Halloween, I had to do something.
It might be a little scary if you're really on the concerned side, though.

McCain had his best day in the polls since Oct. 23. The good news for Obama is the WI has moved back into the Strong Obama after one day in the Weak column. The bad news is that two states moved the other way. Both IN and MT are now in the Barely McCain column, MT moving from tied and IN from Barely Obama. Neither of these states are overly critical to an Obama win, however, so don't be too frightened.

Unfortunately, I probably won't be able to update the site tomorrow morning, and may not be able to get it updated tomorrow at all. In the meantime, here are a few things to help you pass the time:

To get an idea how difficult McCain's quest for PA is, check out this widget. McCain has only lead in a few polls in PA all year, so switching it now will be no easy task.

This widget will let you see the chart, as well as a few other useful visualizations. I especially like the pie chart that beter shows just how big of a lead Obama has. I would be more annoyed that the developer of this widget stole my chart design if he hadn't apparently designed it more than a month before I designed mine.

Finally, the simulator at Election-Projection.net is great for all of us wannabe Nate Silvers. The rest of the site is great also. Should be plenty to keep you busy until I update the site on Sunday.

Thanks to Blues Tea-Cha for all these links.


Obama's EV count in states where he's polling over 50%: 307 EVs.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	396	142
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	311	227
Shift since yesterday:	-0	-0
Shift this week:	+15	-+6

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Colorado Voter Purge Stopped

Big news in the fight against voter suppression just came in from CO. In a monumentally rational move, it was decided that votes should be counted unless they are known to be bad, instead of being assumed to be bad from the outset:

Under the agreement, voters removed from the rolls will be permitted to cast provisional ballots, and those ballots will be counted unless election officials can prove the voters were not eligible. To strike such ballots, county election officials must conduct an extensive records review on each one, a decision that must then be reviewed by Mr. Coffman’s office.

If ALL provisional ballots were treated this way, they wouldn't be nicknamed "placebo ballots". No one wants anyone to vote illegally, but the notion that we should disenfranchise tens of thousands in an effort to prevent a few hundred (or less) people from casting illegal ballots is absurd.

The Breakdown for Oct. 30

In spite of 29 new polls in 24 states, not a lot of movement today. WI tightened up a bit, moving it (just barely) into the Weak Obama category, while MO went the other way, moving from tied to (just barely) barely Obama.

UPDATE: As noted by Blues Tea-Cha in the comments, WI tightened up today, not MN. The error has been corrected.

Obama's EV count in states where he's polling over 50%: 307 EVs.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	396	142
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	311	227
Shift since yesterday:	-0	-0
Shift this week:	+15	-25

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Reasons for optimism

I talked to my friend Jen today, and she was quite concerned about the possibility of the election being stolen. I sent her a list of several reasons why I didn't think it was likely. Some of it has been mentioned here before, but I thought it contained enough new material that I'd post it here as well.

* Obama currently is polling at a 5% or more lead in 311EV worth of states (270 needed to win). That means that in order to win, McCain will need to switch at least three states that are currently polling at better than 5% for Obama (See the map at Electoral-Vote.com), and he has to do that without losing a single state that is polling at a closer margin. This late in the game, that big of a lead is very unlikely to switch.

* McCain is making a big play for PA, but I just don't see it switching. Obama has lead decisively in the polls all month, with an average lead of 11.43%. The media claims things are tightening, but only if you cherry pick in the polls. The average lead for this week alone is still 11% in ten polls. Only one poll out of 23 in the last month has showed Obama under 50 percent in PA, and his average in the last week has been 52%.

* PA, VA, and OH are the states most talked about as "swing states", and all three currently have Democratic Governors and Secretaries of State. It's much harder to steal the election if you don't control the election. McCain absolutely must win both PA and OH if he wants to have even a slight chance of winning. Obama can safely lose any one, and most likely he would still win even if he lost two of the three.

* For McCain, FL is an absolute must-win state. If he loses FL, he has no realistic chance of winning. To give you an idea of how crucial FL is if McCain somehow won CA, Obama would still have a 97% chance of winning if he wins FL (assuming all other swing states are unallocated-- see 270towin.com). As far as Obama is concerned, FL would be great to win, but it really doesn't matter if he loses it, so long as he doesn't lose all 8 other competitive states (NV, CO, MT, ND, MO, IN, OH, and NC), plus either PA or VA. If Obama wins even one of those states, he wins regardless of what happens in FL. Of those eight competitive states, three are tied, Obama has a lead under 5% in two and a lead of 6 or 7% in the remaining three (and he's currently ahead in FL by 3% as well). McCain doesn't lead in any of the states that are generally considered competitive, though some states that he was expected to win easily (GA and AZ) have recently moved to within Obama's grasp.

* There is lot's of talk about "the Bradley Effect", but there is absolutely no evidence of such a thing happening this year. In fact, all evidence suggests that Obama is actually doing -better- than the polls suggest. There are a number of reasons that this would be true, but a couple of the main ones is that most pollsters don't poll people who don't have land-lines, a group that largely includes young people who live in cities, college students, etc-- groups that largely support Obama. When those people are polled, Obama's numbers go up dramatically (See this post at FiveThirtyEight.com -- tons of other great stuff on this site also. It's the single best polling site on the net). Pollsters also use a likely voter model that takes into account whether people have voted in previous elections. Obama has registered more new voters this cycle than ever before, so those people are under-represented in the polls.

Ok... That's enough for now... Hopefully you'll be a little less scared now. FYI, here are the biggest things that I'll be watching for on Tuesday are:

1) Will we get a filibuster-proof 60 seat majority in the Senate? Not looking like we'll make it (57-58 is probable, though) but if Obama's coattails are big enough it could happen.

2) Will McCain be able to hold his home state of Arizona? Right now it's looking like he will, but things are a lot closer than he would like.

The Breakdown for Oct. 29

After a brief flirtation with good news yesterday, things continue to go downhill for McCain today. NH has moved back into the Strong Obama column, and NV has moved from Barely Obama to Weak Obama. At the same time, McCain lost ground in MS which has is down to a 8 point McCain lead, so it is in the Weak McCain category today.

The McCain campaign lately is focusing nearly all it's resources on the state of PA. I've commented a couple of times on the apparent futility of that course, though I'll admit I really don't see any other course for them to take. But looking back over this months polls, suddenly that course seems even less likely to work then it did before. PA is currently polling with an 11 point lead for Obama, but even more importantly Obama is the choice of 52% of the people in the 10 polls that EV.com uses for their number. In fact, looking back over all the polling data that FiveThirtyEight.com shows, Obama has only polled under 50% in PA in one poll all month. With Obama polling above 50%, McCain can't just swing undecideds, he must actively steal people who say that they intend to vote for Obama. That's not impossible, but it's much harder to do.

Obama's EV count in states where he's polling over 50%: 307 EVs.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	396	142
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	311	227
Shift since yesterday:	-0	-5
Shift this week:	+15	-25

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 28

For the first time in a while, McCain had a good day in the polls that doesn't also include some big loss to counteract the good news. That said, the movement is only in two states, one of which never should have been in play to begin with. McCain just can't catch a break. MO moves from Barely Obama to tied, and AZ moves from Barely McCain to Weak McCain.

Obama's EV count in states where he's polling over 50%: 302 EVs.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	396	142
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	306	232
Shift since yesterday:	-10	+0
Shift this week:	+10	-20

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 27

Minor movement on both sides today, with Indiana moving from the +5 column to the Barely column for Obama. More importantly, AZ has moved from strong McCain to Barely McCain, with McCain only holding a two-point lead. AZ is McCain's home state, so a loss there would be embarrassing. The last AZ Senator to run for President was Barry Goldwater, and even he managed to win his state in the otherwise-Democratic landslide. Even if we know the winner of the election early, AZ will be one to stay up late for on Election night

Obama's EV count in states where he's polling over 50%: 302 EVs.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	406	132
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	306	232
Shift since yesterday:	+10	+11
Shift this week:	+20	-20

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

50% or more...

Fifty percent is considered a magical threshold in politics. Above 50%, and a president is generally considered to have a "mandate". At least Bush sure claimed one in 2004, though I suspect that the Republicans will have a different opinion this year. Anyway, more importantly for our purposes, if Obama is polling above 50% in a state, it means that the undecideds can't swing the state. Even if every single undecided went to McCain, the state would still go to Obama. Of course, 'decideds' can changes their minds, but that is much less likely barring a significant external event.

So with that in mind, I decided to crunch the numbers to see just where Obama stands in that regard. Thankfully, the downloadable data that Electoral-Vote.com provides makes this sort of thing easy.

If Obama Takes...		He'll have...
all states above 52%		268 EVs
all states above 51%		278 EVs
all states above 50%		313 EVs

Note that Rhode Island is currently only polling at 48% for Obama, even though he has a 22% lead there. Because it doesn't cross the threshold, it's not included in any of the totals above, but it's probably safe to add 4 EVs to those totals above. In other words, If Obama can win only the states where he is currently polling above 52% plus Rhode Island, then he will be our next President.

(For poll data in spreadsheet form, see Electoral-Vote.com)

UPDATE: For perspective, here's where things stood nine days before the 2004 election:

If Bush Takes...		He'll have...
all states above 52%		173 EVs
all states above 51%		185 EVs
all states above 50%		208 EVs

The Breakdown for Oct. 26

No changes in the chart today. As Blues Tea-Cha said in the comments, "if the race is going to plateau, it couldn't plateau at a nicer spot". Personally, though, I'd love to see that the dark blue above the 270 line.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	396	142
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	317	221
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+13	-31

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Wassup 2008

The original cast of the 2000 Budweiser ad update their characters for 2008. I found the original (and the trend it started) incredibly annoying, but this almost makes up for it.

Ron Howard Talks about the Election...

...With a little help from his friends.

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

The Breakdown for Oct. 25

As noted in the comments of yesterdays Breakdown, GA is tightening up, with only a two point lead for McCain today. Maybe my comment yesterday that John McCain had hit his floor was premature. One thing to note is that Georgia has a Republican Secretary of State and votes electronically with no paper trail, so the possibility of voter suppression or election fraud is greater here than in some other states. It looks like they are aggresively checking IDs of voters, though it seems that the requirements are not too onerous. One concern I have is reflected in this sentence: "If information in these databases does not match information reported on the voter registration form, the applicant is asked to clarify their information". That doesn't make it clear as to whether someone can be disenfranchised solely for mismatched information, and I couldn't find anything on the website that further clarified the situation.

BTW, today marks the high point for all year for Obama in the Breakdown. Today's number of 396 EVs if all of McCain's <5 point states switched to Obama beats his previous record of 393 set on June 25th. Both yesterday and today are tied for his best simple EV total of 375.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	396	142
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	317	221
Shift since yesterday:	+15	-31
Shift this week:	+13	-31

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

For those of you worried about McCain flipping PA

Countdown tonight looked at what would happen if McCain manages to flip PA. As I've stated, I'm not worried about this scenario. I just don't see McCain coming back from a 10+ point hole with less than two weeks left. But what if I'm wrong? Turns out, Obama most likely still wins. Assuming that Obama can hold VA and CO, plus NV or any other red state worth at least 5 points, then he wins. With all the various states where Obama's currently ahead, McCain's PA gambit seems like a long shot to me.

The Breakdown for Oct. 24

Wow, not a good day for McCain. I think we can finally put to rest the rumors that McCain is somehow staging a comeback.

So much happened yesterday that it's hard to know where to start, but I'll flip a coin and work west to east. That means that the first state up is MT which has moved from Barely McCain to tied. Next up is probably the biggest story of the day-- IN has moved from Barely McCain all the way to Weak Obama. Also moving to Weak Obama is OH, which is almost as big of a story. Finally FL moved from tied back to Barely Obama.

One noteworthy thing about today is that there is currently not a single state that is polling in the Barely McCain category. That's more then an interesting bit of trivia, I think that it means that McCain has finally reached his plateau (though not the direction that he would prefer). I don't expect any more states to move in Obama's direction before the election (this doesn't include ties, obviously). Come election day, there might be one or two more if Dem turnout is high enough, but I doubt that we'll see any big moves in the polls. We might see further weakening in a few states (and strengthening on Obama's side), but I wouldn't expect to see any more blue states on the map before election day.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	381	157
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	317	221
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-31
Shift this week:	-2	-31

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 23

Only one change today, and it's in McCain's favor. FL has clearly been tightening in the polls, and today it officially moved into the tied category. This one will come down to turnout.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	381	157
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	-0	+0
Shift this week:	-2	+3

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Obama vs. McCain on Fundraising: An Illustration

In his Road To 270 today, Sean Quinn at FiveThirtyEight.com looked at NY. One interesting thing that I noticed was that in terms of rank, NY is one of the best fundraising states for both Candidates. It's Obama's fifth best state, and it's McCain's sixth best. So the numbers should be pretty close, right? Nope. Nowhere near. Obama has raised $1.77 per eligible voter, while McCain has only raised $0.53.

The Breakdown for Oct. 22

Two changes today on McCain's side today, resulting in a +5 gain for McCain in the breakdown.

First, WV has moved from Barely McCain back to Weak McCain. This one disappoints me. If you look at the relative voting history of the states (the second set of tables on this page at FiveThirtyEight.com) you'll see that WV is one of the bluest states in the country. In fact compared to the rest of the nation, they have only leaned relatively Republican in three elections since 1948 (1972, 2000, 2004). I believe that WV has a low number of evangelical Christians, which also should work in Obama's favor. But, for whatever reason, his message doesn't seem to be catching on here.

The other state to move today was SD, which moved from Strong McCain to Weak McCain. This is exciting, because unlike WV, this is an area where Obama (or any other Democrat) has no business winning if you go by the historical record. The Prairie and Big Sky regions that include MT and the Dakotas are by far the reddest areas of the nation, even making the deep south look blue in comparison. Currently one of those three is tied, one Barely supporting McCain and one Weakly supporting him. If Obama follows Nate's suggestion on Countdown yesterday and starts dumping advertising money into these states, it could make for a very significant historical shift. I'm not terribly familiar with the Dakotas, but I know that MT is more of a Libertarian state than a Republican one, so this shift could be just one more nail in the coffin of the mutant version of Republicanism that we've had over the last 30 years.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	381	157
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	-5	+0
Shift this week:	-2	+3

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Lots of Polling (and Nate Silver) on Countdown Tonight

Tons of polling details covered on tonights Countdown. In fact three of the five segments were covering various polling-related topics, including another appearance by Nate Silver. All three are worth watching.

McCain campaign manager Rick Davis has theorized that the race won't be decided on the issues, but on personality. If so, more bad news for McCain. Obama is polling ahead in every personality and temperament metric, not to mention almost every issue metric. Specifics in the video, but here are the margins:

Personality:
The right temperament to be president? Obama +20 (N)
Compassionate enough to understand average people? Obama +26 (N)
More Favorable: Obama +20 (N)
Less Favorable: McCain +24 (N)
Better judgment: Obama +14 (P)
Campaign too critical of opponent: McCain +30 (P)
Campaign not too critical: Obama +30 (P)

Issues:
Experienced enough: McCain +22 (N)
Better Commander in Chief: McCain +18 (N)
Better Able to handle the Economy: Obama +9 (P)
Better Able to handle the Economy: Obama +21 (N)
Better on Taxes: Obama +24 (N)
Better on Mortgage & Housing Crisis: Obama +21 (N)
Better on Energy: Obama +12 (N)
Better on Wall Street Crisis: Obama +17 (N)
Better on Iraq: McCain +5 (N)
Better on Catching Bin Laden: McCain +20 (N)
Overall favorite (Among first-time voters only): Obama +47 (N)

(N) NBC/Wall Street Journal
(P) Pew Research

This segment featured analysis by Howard Fineman, and discusses among other things, the possibility of the Obama campaign attacking MCCain in states like ND, GA and even AZ.



The Second segment focuses on Sarah Palin, and how her numbers became so incredibly low. Analysis by Richard Wolfe.

Voters concerns about McCain: (N)
VP not qualified: 34%
Will continue Bush policies: 23%
Economic policies: 20%

Is Sarah Palin qualified to be president? Yes: 40% No: 55% (N)
Feelings about Palin: Negative: 47% Positive: 38% (N)



Finally, analysis of the Electoral map, featuring Nate Silver from FiveThirtyEight.com.



The entire episode is worth watching... Keith was in particularly good form tonight. You can watch the whole thing here.

Update:
Rachel has more info from the same NBC poll:
Topline: Obama +10
Positive feelings towards Obama: 56% (+4 since Oct. 5)
Negative Feelings: 33% (-2)

Which two things concern you about Obama:
None of these cause concern: 33%
Too inexperienced: 23%
Too Liberal on Social or Moral issues: 18%
Would raise taxes: 17%
Too influenced by Ayers/Wright: 16%

Analysis on the state of the race in VA with former VA governor Douglas Wilder


She also had an excellent piece on the potential for Election fraud and voter suppression with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

The Breakdown for Oct. 21

Only one change today. NH moved a bit towards McCain from the Strong Obama column to the Weak Obama column. The previous polling data in NH is more than 10 days old, so this move isn't terribly surprising. NH is a bit of a 'maverick' state that supported McCain in 2000, so it was often assumed that it would be a safe McCain state this time. 

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	386	152
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	+0	+0
Shift this week:	+3	-6

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Size of McCain's Hill

Nate at FiveThirtyEight.com has this interesting detail for those of you still concerned about a McCain comeback:

Roughly speaking -- and accounting for his inferior position in the electoral college -- McCain needs to gain about half a point per day every day between now and November 4 to become a favorite in the electoral college. That is not an easy task; from the nadir of Obama's numbers, which we put at 9/12, to his peak, which we put at 10/11, Obama was gaining about a quarter of a point per day on average. That is, by the standards of a presidential campaign, very rapid movement. But McCain needs to get those numbers down about twice as quickly as Obama got them up, and he does not have any debates or other major public events to assist him.

Of course this doesn't include election fraud or the like, but it does help illustrate just how big the hill that McCain has to climb to pull off a victory.

The Breakdown for Oct. 20

Only one change to the map today... MT has moved from Weak McCain to Barely McCain.

There is also one significant change that EV.com missed, unfortunately. FiveThirtyEight.com lists two polls in WV that would both move it back into the Weak McCain category, so expect to see some movement there in the next few days.

UPDATE: Corrected the Breakdown numbers. MT's move changed Obama's number by +3, and I forgot to update the table.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	386	152
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	+3	+0
Shift this week:	+3	-4

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 19

Only three changes today, but all three in Obama's favor. NC has switched back to Obama, where it should have been all along. EV.com doesn't list polls from Public Policy Polling, which has consistently showed an Obama lead in NC since mid-September, so if those polls had been included, the state never would have been tied. FiveThirtyEight.com lists PPP as their 10th highest rated pollster, so it seems that they should be considered.

The other two changes today are that both MN and ME have moved from the Weak Obama to the Strong Obama category. I don't think that either of these states were ever truly in play, so this isn't that big of news, but it's nice nonetheless. The most siginificant meaning of this change is that it puts Obama at 264 EVs in his strong category alone. If he can get even one other state to move into that category, then he would have the full 270 EVs in states where he has a 10% lead in the polls. Either CO or VA could move that direction.

One thing that I noticed yesterday... VA is the closest thing to a true swing state in this year's election. Obama doesn't need to win it to win the election, but McCain absolutely does (and every other swing state). VA's polls close early, and with Obama's big lead in the polls there, it's quite possible that he will win VA by a big enough lead that it can be called immediately or close to it. If that happens, than we could all but know the winner of the election by a few minutes after 7pm EST (4pm PST).

It's even conceivable that IN could steal VA's thunder and decide things as early as 6pm EST, though that's probably unlikely since part of the state doesn't close until an hour later and IN is likely to be close. Either of these scenarios will kind of ruin the suspense of Election night, but I wouldn't complain about that spoiler! Remember though, don't take that as an excuse not to vote. If nothing else, remember all the downticket races!

(If you're curious, here's a list of every state's poll closing time for 2008.)

Update: Oops, I almost forgot. Today is both a new record high in Obama's EV count according to Electoral-Vote.com, and a new record for the margin between Obama and McCain (currently 193 EVs)!

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	383	155
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	+0	+0
Shift this week:	+3	-4

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Obama Campaign Strikes Back on Acorn Allegations

The Obama campaign struck back on Friday against the rampant allegations of voter-registration fraud, asking the Attorney General to expand Special Prosecutor Nora Dannehy's investigation to include looking in to "recent conduct undertaken by Bush Administration officials, Republican party officials, and representatives of the McCain-Palin campaign" that includes "abuse of the law enforcement process to advance, in the name of combating "voting fraud", a partisan political agenda". These are broadly the same crimes that Special Prosecutor Dannehy is currently investigating in the US Attorney Firing scandal, so these new alleagtions seem to fit right in with her task.

Read the Obama Campaign Letter

The Breakdown for Oct. 18

Only two changes today, both in McCain's favor, but neither effect the numbers in the breakdown. First, as expected, ND has swung back to tied. This one will be interesting come Election Day.

The other one is a bit less interesting. MS has moved from Weak McCain to Strong McCain. A few people (myself included, early on) had hoped that Mississippi's large black population would help move it towards Obama, but that's not looking good at present. Of course it all comes down to turnout, so who knows. I wouldn't be betting on MS personally, though.

UPDATE: I guess I was in wishful thinking mode when I wrote this yesterday, because I said ND moved from Weak McCain to Barely McCain. It actually moved from Weak McCain to Strong McCain.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	383	155
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	+0	+0
Shift this week:	+3	-4

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 17

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	383	155
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	+0	+0
Shift this week:	+3	-4

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

John McCain and Barack Obama are Funny

John McCain and Barack Obama speak at tonights Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner in NY. Overall, both candidates did great. McCain's wrap up in particular was very funny, and Obama showed that he can hold his own on the comedy stage as well.

The Breakdown for Oct. 16

Andy must have gotten out of bed early today, so I can get the site updated before I go to bed... Got to love those transcontinental time differences (EV.com is based in Amsterdam & I'm in Seattle WA).

Lots of movement in all directions today, though it was generally in Obama's favor. The most significant change is probably that NC has moved back into the tied category, from Barely McCain. With the advantages that Dems will likely have on turnout, ties will probably tend to go to Obama.

The other big change today is that VA has moved back into the Weak Obama (>5 point lead) category. At the same time, MO has moved from Weak to Barely Obama. New Mexico has also moved back into the Strong Obama category from weak.

Finally, WV has moved back to Barely McCain from Weak Obama. This is not entirely surprising since the last poll showed a 16 point swing in two weeks (See Oct. 10). That seemed unlikely, so I'm not surprised that it has swung back the other way

As an aside, one of the numbers that I have in my spreadsheet that I don't normally publish is the "margin of leaners". Take all the states that are leaning towards Obama, then subtract all the states that are leaning towards McCain. Ties are ignored. Today, Obama has his largest lead ever in that metric, a lead of 181 votes. (Of course, this is the same as just taking Obama's top-level number at EV.com and subtracting McCain's top-level number).

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	383	155
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	286	252
Shift since yesterday:	+0	3
Shift this week:	+8	-9

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 15 (Sort of)

I'm having some computer troubles that are preventing me from getting the site updated, so until these issues are resolved, I'm going to have to skip the normal updates. I will hopefully be able to get it fixed by tonight.

In the meantime, there were two big changes today both towards Obama. CO moved from the barely Obama category to the Weak Obama column, and WI moved from Weak to Strong. That mean the the magic number for Obama (if he wins all states currently polling +/- 5 points) remains at a 383-155 victory. If McCain were to take those same states, he would still lose 289-249.

UPDATE: Here's the full breakdown:

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	383	155
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	289	249
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-9
Shift this week:	+8	-12

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 14

Today's polls show movement in just two states. MO moves solidly back into the Obama column, going from Tied to the Barely Obama category. The biggest gap on MO's polling seems to be an outlier, so I suspect that it will move back into the Barely Obama category unless there is new polling.

VA moved the other direction a bit, moving from Weak to Barely Obama. VA's polling has been all over the board recently, but one thing has been consistent: Obama is ahead. VA hasn't voted for a democrat since 1964, and even then Johnson's margin of victory was tiny in comparison to his margin in other states. If Obama pulls of a victory in VA, as now looks likely, it will be almost as historic event as his election in general.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	383	155
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	280	258
Shift since yesterday:	+3	-0
Shift this week:	+8	-18

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The "Enthusiasm Gap"

Polls are showing a big lead for Obama, but due to a variety of factors (hidden racism, voter disenfranchisement...), those leads could be may not be as big as they now look. Voter turnout may well end up deciding the election (or at least the margin of victory). The main polls that I  document don't really give you any indication of the enthusiasm of support that will lead to the high turnout numbers that both sides need. With all the factors working against the Republicans this year, it seems reasonable to assume that they're not too enthusiastic this year, but wouldn't it be better to have some hard numbers? I spent some time tonight searching polling sites to try to find some numbers to back up my assumptions.

It seems obvious that pollsters must ask a question like "How enthusiastic would you say you are about [candidate specified in earlier question], very enthusiastic, enthusiastic, or not very?" Unfortunately, they don't sem to ask that question. Some ask similar questions or questions that suggest an answer, but many don't even ask anything close. Nonetheless, I was able to ferret out some useful information.

The very first site I visited looking for this data was Gallup's website. Fortunately, right at the top of the page, they had an article that seems pretty close to exactly what I was looking for: Democrats’ Election Enthusiasm Far Outweighs Republicans’.

Only 51% of Republicans say they are more enthusiastic about voting than in previous years, compared to 71% of Democrats, marking a shift from October 2004, when enthusiasm was about the same for both partisan groups.

Enthusiastic about voting isn't necessarily the same thing as enthusiastic about your candidate, but the numbers should be directly relevant to the question. Gallup regularly polls this question in their national polls, and Obama has lead all year. The closest it's been was immediately after the RNC when McCain pulled within seven points when he selected Palin as his running mate.

I don't trust poll data from only one source, so I kept looking... Quinnipiac was the next site that provided any useful info (From Oct. 1):

"During the past three weeks, Florida voters lost their faith in Sen. McCain. His net favorability dropped in half and Sen. Obama's almost doubled over the same period. One look at independents shows the massive change. Three weeks ago, McCain had a seven-point edge among Florida independents. Today, Obama leads among that group by 12 points," Brown said

and

"It's easy to see why Sen. McCain is doing so poorly. On September 11, his favorable/unfavorable ratio among Ohio voters was 53 - 34 percent. Now it's just 49 - 40 percent, dropping from a 19-point plus to nine points in just 20 days, while Sen. Obama's ratings have remained as positive as they were. And the economy is the reason. Obama's five-point edge as the best candidate to handle the economy - which is by far the most important issue to voters, especially in economically distressed Ohio - has doubled," Brown said.

Rasmussen also yielded some info:

Obama is viewed favorably by 56% of voters, McCain by 51%. For McCain, that figure in unchanged since yesterday and represents his lowest favorability rating since Obama clinched the Democratic Presidential Nomination.

A closer look a these numbers suggests an even larger advantage for Obama—39% of voters have a Very Favorable opinion of the Democratic nominee while 32% have a Very Unfavorable opinion. The comparable numbers for McCain are 23% Very Favorable and 26% Very Unfavorable.

Just 48% of Republicans have a Very Favorable opinion of their party’s nominee. Seventy-two percent (72%) of Democrats are that enthusiastic about Obama. (From Oct. 13)

and

Forty-five percent (45%) of voters say they are certain they will vote for Obama and will not change their mind. Thirty-eight percent (38%) say the same about McCain. Thirteen percent (13%) currently have a preference for one of the candidates but might change their mind. Four percent (4%) are either undecided or plan to vote for a third-party candidate. (From Oct. 5)

Yet more data that suggests that McCain needs to pull an awfully big rabbit out of his hat if he wants to pull off a victory just 21 days from today. It's certainly not impossible, but it will be very soon if he doesn't start turning things around soon.

Obama Gaining Ground in OK!

Ok, not enough ground to matter, but I find it amusing. In their Sept. 27 poll, TVPoll.com showed McCain with a 41.1 point lead in OK. By 10/5 that lead had dropped to 36.4, and by the 11th, it had dropped a full 10 points to 31.1. At this rate, Obama might just pull with 20 or 25 points of winning in OK!

The Breakdown for Oct. 13

Today's polling shows ND moving all the way from the Strong McCain column to the Barely Obama column. This result isn't completely out of left field: Obama has polled well in ND before, and even when he's trailed the race has been much closer for most of the year. Nonetheless, I would consider this poll to be an outlier unless another poll backs it up.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	383	155
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	282	256
Shift since yesterday:	+3	-0
Shift this week:	+8	-18

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 12

No changes today...

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	380	158
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	282	256
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+5	-18

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 11

I'm away from home today, so I can't update the chart. Fortunately everything stayed the same. I'll get the chart update tomorrow, though it might be fairly late in the day. I'll post the breakdown as usual each day.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	380	158
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	282	256
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+5	-18

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

An interesting theory...

Two interesting events happened today. First, as you've undoubtedly heard, Sarah Palin was found to have abused her position as Governor in Alaska. Second, McCain is clearly uncomfortable with the current line of attack his campaign is using, and came to Obama's defense when someone stated that he was scared of an Obama Presidency (leading to McCain being booed by his own audience).

On Olbermann tonight, Jonathon Alter mentioned a previous presidential candidate (Humphrey?) who completely changed their platform just a few weeks before the election and came back from a big deficit in the polls to almost pull off a victory. Alter suggested that McCain's only remaining course to victory might be to make a similar 180 degree change.

So what do you think... What would happen if McCain went back to the old McCain? What if he fired his campaign staff, fired Palin and started running as the "maverick" that he was in 2000? I suspect that he would lose even bigger than he will currently, but at least he will salvage some of his honor. Anybody else have any thoughts?

(Note: I don't think this will actually happen, it's just an interesting theory.)

The Breakdown for Oct. 10

Wow... Lot's of changes today. In fact each of the seven categories changed from where it was yesterday. Both Obama and McCain made some small gains today, though the biggest prize went to McCain (but see below!).

Probably the most important change on the chart is that a new poll shows WV moving all the way from barely McCain (-8 on 9/24) to Weak Obama (+8) lead. I'm skeptical of any state moving 16 points in just about two weeks, but a lot has happened in the last two weeks. ARG's polls are erratic, but I doubt that it would be off by 8 points, so it is likley that Obama does hold at least a small lead in WV. WV is a small state, but it is one that McCain was expected to win.

The other important change is that NC has swung back towards McCain, at least according to Electoral-Vote.com. The only problem is that they don't list at least one poll that shows Obama with a significant lead. FiveThirtyEight.com shows a PPP poll from 10/5 that had Obama with a 5 point lead in NC, which should have moved NC into the Barely Obama days ago, and should still be outweighing the +3 poll for McCain from 10/6. The chart here always uses the data from Electoral-Vote.com, but when I see an anomoly like this, I'll try to point it out. You can mentally switch NC if you would like.

MO has moved from barely Obama to tied, due to two conflicting polls. The one leaning towards McCain is from ARG, and as noted earlier, ARG is erratic, so I wouldn't worry to much about this poll yet.

The other changes are a bit more routine, with MI moving from Weak to Strong Obama, and TX did the same but moving towards McCain. I think that's all of the changes, but with so much going on, I may have missed something.

UPDATE: Oops... I forgot to change the numbers in the chart. Fixed now.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	380	158
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	282	256
Shift since yesterday:	+5	-5
Shift this week:	+5	-22

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Great Schlep

I suspect that I'm the only one who hasn't seen this by now... Sarah Silverman's humor isn't for everyone, but this should be quite effective for her target audience. As the warning says, Viewer Discretion Advised.


The Great Schlep from The Great Schlep on Vimeo.

The Breakdown for Oct. 9

Two new polls in MN move it back into the Weak Obama category, where it really should have been all along. Otherwise, no changes to the map.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	277	261
Shift since yesterday:	+0	+27
Shift this week:	+0	-27

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Nate Silver on the Colbert Report

FiveThirtyEight.com's Nate Silver was on the Colbert Report yesterday. His best prediction? Jet packs for all by 2036.


Watch the Full Episode

The Breakdown for Oct. 8

FL moved back into the Barely Obama column today, so Obama's +5 point lead count is down to 277 EVs. Still enough to win, but not quite as decisive as it was yesterday. On the other hand, PA has moved from the Weak Obama to the Strong Obama, making two states that have been universally cited as swing states to move into the strong Obama column since the first of the month (the other was NH). Otherwise, no movement today.


The bad news of course is that many people STILL remain undecided. In the comments, diogenes99 points to some excellent analysis of who will really be deciding our nation's future:

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	277	261
Shift since yesterday:	+0	+27
Shift this week:	+0	-27

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Why I Insist On Being Optimistic (Partisan)

(This is a partisan post. If reading a pro-Democratic post will hurt your feelings, please skip this one)

A lot of people have said that I'm too optimistic. They point to 2000 and 2004 as examples of close elections that were lost at the last minute. I don't disagree with that broad criticism. I do think that it's vitally important that that we continue to work on GOTV efforts, voter registration, etc. And I do agree that given the chance, the Republican party will do whatever it can to pull off a victory, even if it means disenfranchising millions of legal voters. These are very real issues.

Unfortunately, I frequently talk to people who make comments like "I like Obama, but why bother to vote? The Republicans will just steal the election anyway". The idea that the Republicans don't need to steal their vote if they just give it to them doesn't seem to cross their minds.

A healthy dose of skepticism is absolutely necessary, but so is a healthy dose of optimism. If people don't believe that a victory is possible, then they won't bother to vote.

Of course, being too optimistic can lead to the same effect, but some of you seem to WAY overestimate the amount of traffic this site gets if you think that my optimism will somehow bring down the Obama candidacy (for the record, I get somewhere around 1200 visitors a day. Presumably most of them are just as obsessed with this election as I am, so I doubt that my optimism will cause many of them to stay home on election day).

There are plenty of websites, magazines, TV news shows, etc. devoted to making people more pessimistic, but with this website, I wanted to inject just a small touch of optimism into the race. We do need to work on GOTV efforts, but put your focus on GOTV for down-ticket races. We have a very real possibility of taking 60 seats in the senate, for example. Work on GOTV in states that we will not win. Even if Obama wins, the margin of his popular-vote victory is a factor on just what he can get accomplished, and even if we can't win a state, increased democratic turnout is a good thing for the Dems. And work on GOTV for Obama in your home state. Even if you live in the bluest of blue states, higher Democratic turnout is in your long-term best interest, for all of the above reasons.

But as you do this GOTV work, remember... We WILL win this election. I get tired of some of the new-agey mumbo-jumbo that many on the left like to throw around, but one thing that I do agree with is that if you don't believe in something, it probably won't happen. If you believe the Republicans will steal the election, then they probably will... But if you believe that the Dems will have a decisive vitcory and send Ms. Hockeymom back to Alaska where she will be removed from office on a corruption charge, then that will probably happen instead.

Sorry to be so long-winded... Bonus points if you read the whole thing!

The Breakdown for Oct. 7

Wow... A very big day. For the first time ever, Obama is polling above 270 EVs in the +5 point category alone. And not just by a little bit, but by a 34 EV margin. What that means is that even if every state that currently supports Obama by less than a 5% margin voted for McCain, Obama would still win a decisive 304 EV victory.

As noted late yesterday, today's polling was pretty decisively in Obama's favor. CO and MO moved from Barely McCain to Barely (<+5) Obama, while FL and VA moved from barely Obama to Weak (>+5) Obama.

UPDATE: If you're wondering, yes, this was Obama's best day ever. You can see on the chart that he had one day that was almost as good back on June 19, but he only had a 344EV lead then. Interestingly, the map then was almost identical to todays, except NV and NC was backing McCain. Today NV is for Obama and NC is tied.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	304	234
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-40
Shift this week:	+0	-54

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this day's page on Electoral-Vote.com:

Sorry for the slow update today...

My power was out when I got our of bed this morning, and it didn't come back on until sometime after I had to leave for work. Now I have to run out to go watch the debate. I'll be posting today's updated chart later this evening after the debate. For now, just a teaser: Things don't look good for McCain today. Not at all.

Pessimists Should Not Read This.

FiveThirtyEight.com's latest batch of simulations has Obama winning a 375+ EV landslide 33.6% of the time. The single most likely scenario (by a fairly large margin) has Obama winning all of the swing states resulting in 375 electoral votes*. That scenario accounts for only about 5% of the outcomes, which means that somewhere around 28% of the simulations have Obama winning states that are not currently considered swing states. Overall, they give Obama an 88.5% chance of winning with an average of 343.8 EVs. The simulations also predict a popular vote margin of 5%, down 2% from today's average of 7% in the national polls. Granted these are only simulations, but they are sure good looking numbers.

Obama also had his best day of the year in the statewide polls, with two polls showing double digit leads in PA, two in VA (though a third VA poll only shows a 2% lead), a 13 point lead NH, among several other good results. The only good result for McCain is his 1 point lead in Ohio. McCain's 7 point lead in GA looks great until you realize that just two weeks ago he had an 18 point lead in GA.

BTW, FiveThirtyEight.com's Nate Silver appeared on Countdown with Keith Olbermann tonight. As always, great analysis from Nate.



* I think that this is the most likely scenario. FiveThirtyEight doesn't actually breakdown which scenario is which, they just have an Electoral Vote Distribution chart which lets you guess as to what the actual vote count for a given spike is. The biggest spike actually looks to be above 375 EVs, so the most likely scenario might actually have one or more non-swing states switching over to Obama.

The Breakdown for Oct. 6

No changes today...

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	264	274
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+0	-0

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this days page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 5

Only two new polls today, and both of them lead to questionable results. First, Princeton Survey released a poll today showing Obama with an 18% lead in MN, moving MN into the strong Obama column. Obama has held a pretty consistent lead in MN, but nothing that big, so that result is questionable. UPDATE: See this post at fivethirtyeight.com for an analysis of that Princeton Survey/Star Tribune poll. The post discusses the senatorial poll, but the same flaws are likely present in the presidential poll as well.

In McCain's favor is the ARG survey showing McCain with a 3 point lead in CO. This survey was actually released a week ago, but due to the weight of older polls that have now fallen off, the state just flipped the state today. Considering ARG's poor polling history (see here, a lower score is better), I question that poll's reliability. The latest CO poll is from a more reliable pollster (Mason-Dixon), and shows the race a tie, so things are clearly tightening up. Regardless of who is actually ahead there, expect that CO will probably switch back to the Barely Obama column tomorrow as that ARG poll falls off due to it's age. Hopefully we'll have another poll or two there in the next few days so we can have a better idea of where things actually stand.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	264	274
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+0	-0

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

For the raw poll data and more details, see this days page on Electoral-Vote.com:

The Breakdown for Oct. 4

One of the numbers that I consider to be the most important is the number of states each candidate has polling for them at a 5% or greater margin (represented in the chart by the medium blue or red). By that measure, Barack Obama is polling better today than he has all year. With 264 EVs at better than 5% strength, he only needs to take an additional 6 EVs to win. By the same measure McCain needs to take 107 EVs to win.

New Hampshire is starting to look tough for McCain. Two new polls are each showing Obama with a 10% or greater lead, moving it from the Barely column into the Strong column. With New Hampshire's reputation, it still could switch back, but it would take some work. Washington has also firmed up, moving from the Weak to the Strong column. All the days other Polls were also in Obama's favor, but none resulted in any changes to the chart.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	264	274
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+0	-4

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

The Breakdown for Oct. 3

Late today, so just the numbers.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	260	278
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+0	-1

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

The Breakdown for Oct. 2

Lot's of movement today, all in Obama's favor. FL and OH moved from tied into the Barely Obama column, NV switched from Barely McCain to Barely Obama and MN moves from Barely Obama to Strong Obama. TX and MS are both still on McCain's side, but they have tightened up considerably, moving into the Weak McCain column.

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	260	278
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-10
Shift this week:	+21	-49

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)

Update: They're all must-win states for McCain

I realized a big flaw in my earlier post about FL being a must win state for McCain. It's still correct, but I was painting the picture much too brightly for McCain. In the comments to that post, Bio-Nelly pointed out that Ohio is also a must-win state, which is also true, but still not enough. In order to even tie, McCain must take all the states that 270towin.com currently allocates to him, plus FL, NC, VA, OH, IN, MO, NV and NH. Given the way the polls have been moving, that seems pretty unlikely. But even winning all those states only gets McCain to a tie, which likely means a win for Obama. In order to actually win, McCain must take all those states, plus at least one of the remaining five: PA, MI, MN, WI, and CO. and in spite of all the talk of these states as swing states, they are all very much in Obama's favor right now. Of these, McCain's best shot of a pickup is in CO, where fivethirtyeight.com currently gives him a 16% chance.

The Breakdown for Oct. 1

Today's breakdown numbers are a perfect example of why you should never believe statistics. If you just look at the numbers below, you'd assume that McCain's position is as strong as it has been for the last several days. Unfortunately for McCain, that's not the case. Remember, the numbers below are really intended as more of a scale to the information in the chart than as anything really useful in and of themselves. They tell you the most likely range of outcomes if the election were held today, but they don't really tell you anything about the likelihood of those outcomes and they only give you the most basic information about the trends that we're seeing. The chart gives you all that information, just not in exact numbers.

Obama's numbers remain unchanged today, but today was a very bad day for McCain. OH and NC-- together 35 EVs-- join FL in the tied column, while GA and WV move from the Strong Column into the Barely column. I still doubt that Obama will win either of those states over, but Nate at fivethirtyeight.com places Obama's odds of taking the states at 13% and 26% respectively. They have Obama's Overall win percentage at a huge 85.4%!

If the election were held today and...	Obama	McCain
...all McCain <5% went to Obama	375	163
...all Obama <5% went to McCain	250	288
Shift since yesterday:	+0	-0
Shift this week:	+21	-52

(See this post for an explanation of these numbers.)
(Note: The shift numbers in the breakdown has been wrong for most of the week. I put some bad data in, and since the numbers haven't changed, I didn't notice it to fix it. The data here is correct, and the older numbers will be corrected soon. The totals were correct, only the shift numbers were wrong. UPDATE: Oops. The totals for a McCain win were wrong too... Not sure how I missed that, but it's been fixed.)