[Momaw Nadon]

I went to TradeSports.com which is a futures market in which people bet on the outcomes of various things.

According to the current trading prices of the futures contracts, an estimate can be found of what traders are betting will be the outcome of 2004 Presidential Election.

If the traders are correct, President Bush would receive 355 Electoral Votes and the Democratic candidate would receive 183 Electoral Votes.

Opinions and commentary are welcome.

[Solson]

in other words...a landslide.

[anniegetyourgun]

Gosh, I'm amazed at how close to reality that probably is. What's their track (no pun intended) record?

[.cnI redruM]

Solid win. This is a plausible scenario.

[TommyDale]

I'm not so sure that California is solidly in the Democratic column this time...

[jmstein7]

BUMP!

[jmstein7]

BUMP!

[EERinOK]

I went through the list very carefully with a worst case scenario in mind, giving any state gore won last time to the dems, leaving all projected dem votes in place as listed, and giving the dems the benefit of the doubt (zombie vote) in states such as Nevada and WV listed for Bush.

With that approach, i came up with a 278-260 gop victory.

[Momaw Nadon]

Here are two more political futures sites that may be of interest:

Iowa Electronic Markets 2004 US PRESIDENTIAL VOTE SHARE MARKET and newsfutures.com U.S. Presidential Election

[gridlock]

69% chance that Bush wins Florida!

This state was decided by fewer than 1000 votes last time round. What has happened in the last three years to solidify Bush's position in Florida?

[AmishDude]

This is fun. Thanks. Plus, check out the Deaniac topic list!

[PhiKapMom]

If I were drawing a map, this sure looks a lot like a map I would draw for Pres Bush. Texas comes in first for Bush and Oklahoma 2nd just .05 ahead of a lot of the rest of the South. These numbers look good and what I would expect.

I think we have a chance to take Maine if Kerry is the nominee -- they don't like Kerry as too many of people from MA have moved to Southern Maine.

[B Knotts]

It looks pretty accurate to me. Please note the shift towards Bush in some of the last elections narrow loss states.

If there were a single state I would say seems a bit off, it would be California...I'd put it in the 30-40% range.

[mwl1]

I think the analysis is very credible... either CA or NY will also be in play... we are going to make the RATS spend a fortune defending either or both, bankrupting their efforts elsewhere... glad that IA, MN, and WI are on the Bush list because he is going to carry all three of these prior "blue states." Good work.

[Alberta's Child]

That's interesting. Last week, I posted a scenario of a Bush victory by a 289-249 margin -- I was pessimistic about the GOP's chances in several swing states.

Based on this list, I'll apply what I call my "Pennsylvania Rule," which is as follows: Since I think Pennsylvania is going to be the closest state race in November, I assumed that the 63% chance of winning is about 13 points too high (i.e., it should be 50%). If you reduce Bush's percentage by 13 points in each state (let's assume that the distortion in the Pennsylvania numbers is carried through every state) and re-work the numbers, you come up with a 285-253 GOP margin.

[Momaw Nadon]

Here is another site that may be of interest:

Electoral Vote Calculator

[Allegra]

I wonder if Vegas would back these odds? I sure like 'em.

Except that Texas comes in at 98%, when in reality, it's 100%.

[Wphile]

How depressing. Washington State is only at 48%. What a shame. I hope this isn't the case. Otherwise, looks pretty good to me.

[waterstraat]

Very flawed.

This is not accurate at all. For example Michigan, which went for gore, cant even elect any republican candidate for a statewide office and now even has a democrat female governor. With its high unemployment rate, there is absolutely no chance at all it will go for bush. Same with other states with high unemployment.

Instead of polling people who have extra money to use to bet on sports, maybe you should make a projection of who is going to win by polling the people who lost their factories and jobs to asian free trade and who are now standing in unemployment lines in each state? Perhaps you might get different results.

[Jedi Master Yoda]

Bump!

[Peace will be here soon]

Missouri: Bush 73% of winning the state.

2000 Missouri Pres. election : Bush 50% Gore 47%. This state is as flip flopping as it gets. Don`t forget, it went for Clinton twice !! I think that number should be closer to 55%. Kansas City and St.Louis will determine which way Missouri falls. High turn out in these cities means Bush will have a tough ride. That is exactly how it played out in 2000. Turnout was not as high as it could have been in STL and KC, so Bush won the state. Hopefully, all the crack downs on voter fraud will make some difference.