[commish]

What is amazing to me is how basically static this election actually ended up. For all the twists and turns and "revelations' and "debate wins" and "october surprises" -- if you look at the polls from way back in the spring, and the results Tuesday, there was in reality very little change overall.

[Dales]

It was the same in 2000. In 2000, the only state that was in any of the safe, strong or lean designations in early spring that ended up flipping was Oregon, and that may have been a bad poll; in 2000 I used the most recent poll rather than looking at the last few, so Oregon may not have gotten such a powerful designation.

And while I did not 'do' this officially in 1996, going off of memory suggests it was pretty static too.

I am thinking the last time an election markedly changed was 1992, and before that 1980. The rest from 1976 on, I think, were predictable in spring.

Of course, how to tell in spring if it is a year like 1992 or 1980 is pretty hard. :-)