Posted on 10/11/2004 3:06:51 PM PDT by Olly
An Electoral Surge for Kerry
This is BusinessWeek Online's second look at how the Electoral College map is shaping up in the 2004 Presidential race. In our first look, President George W. Bush had taken a commanding lead in the race after the GOP convention in New York. Polls had showed him ahead in 30 states with 284 electoral votes -- 14 more than the 270 necessary to win the White House.
But a week of Presidential and Vice-Presidential debates has scrambled the electoral map again. Massachusetts Senator John F. Kerry has closed Bush's lead in the popular vote and taken a tiny edge in the Electoral College.
THREE TOSS-UPS. Bush is clearly ahead in 28 states with 237 electoral votes, having lost a decisive edge in the pivotal battlegrounds of Florida and Ohio. Kerry leads in 19 states and the District of Columbia, which account for 247 electoral votes. The three toss-up states -- Florida, Ohio, and Iowa -- with their 54 electoral votes will determine the winner.
The senator must win just one of those three states to reach the 270 electoral votes necessary to capture the White House. Bush must win a megastate and at least two states captured by Al Gore in 2000, including Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, New Mexico, and Oregon.
Kerry strongly leads Bush in states with 164 votes, while the incumbent has a wide lead in states with 152. But Bush's occasionally halting performance in the Sept. 30 encounter at the University of Miami cost him support across the board, while consolidating Kerry's backing among core Democrats.
BATTLEGROUNDS. That moved six previous toss-ups (all won by Gore in 2000) back into Kerry's camp -- at least for now. The new Kerry-leaning states are Maine, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Oregon, and Pennsylvania. That gives the senator an edge in eight of the 20 original battleground states, compared to nine for Bush and three dead even.
Though Kerry has momentum, he shouldn't take anything for granted. Just as the first debate reshuffled the Electoral College lineup, his appearances in St. Louis and Tempe, Ariz., could change the current political landscape. And in this roller-coaster election year, the only constant has been constant change.
Alabama 9 Alaska 3 Arizona 10 Arkansas 6 California 55 Colorado 9 Connecticut 7 Delaware 3 D.C. 3 Florida 27 Georgia 15 Hawaii 4 Idaho 4 Illinois 21 Indiana 11 Iowa 7 Kansas 6
Kentucky 8 Louisiana 9 Maine 4 Maryland 10 Massachusetts 12 Michigan 17 Minnesota 10 Mississippi 6 Missouri 11 Montana 3 Nebraska 5 Nevada 5 New Hampshire 4 New Jersey 15 New Mexico 5 New York 31 North Carolina 15.
North Dakota 3 Ohio 20 Oklahoma 7 Oregon 7 Pennsylvania 21 Rhode Island 4 South Carolina 8 South Dakota 3 Tennessee 11 Texas 34 Utah 5 Vermont 3 Virginia 13 Washington 11 West Virginia 5 Wisconsin 10 Wyoming 3
Same here. The map at electoral-vote.com also shows Kerry winning. (Bush was ahead the last few times I checked.)
And they show Ohio now leaning toward Kerry.
e-v.com is a left leaning site. Chill.
"That is possibly the worst analysis I've ever seen. Kerry can win by winning Iowa? Uh, excuse me??? "
Wishful thinking by the writer. The crap that gets printed these days.
Do they let you do that at DU, or cBS?
Edit THIS!!
That said, every poll has shown Bush with a 4%-6% lead in Florida so it is highly likely that he actually does lead by this amount. At this time, anyone putting Florida into Kerry's column or even tossup is just drinking Democrat koolaid.
That's why its called push polling.
That's why its called push polling.
Olly is a troll but now he is zotted and ashes and HISTORY!!
Unfortunately, virtually all of the polls agree. If it were just Zogby, it might be plausible to consider otherwise. The unpleasant fact is, if the election were held today (and thank God it will not be) Bush would likely lose. I do not pretend to fully understand why this is so - but 35 years of political observation tells me that it's true. John Kerry is as an unlikeable a candidate as I've ever seen - and yet a majority appear to prefer him (or passionately hate the President). The lure of returning to a pre-9/11 world is apparently too strong for many to resist. Fortunately, there's still time to change things. I know you all hate negativity (and rightly so), but Reality is none too pretty right now.
Unfortunately trolls seem to be reincarnated on this site fairly regularly.
Well e-v.com had Bush winning for a couple of weeks and now has him behind.
Do you know another e-v site that is not "left leaning"?
It's just amazing that this race is so close considering that Kerry may not have been honorably discharged from the US Navy in the 1970's. His revised discharge dated 2001 does say 'honorable' but what did the original say? How can the American people elect a 'pig in a poke' as president????
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He has probably been here under numerous handles. I would like to invent something that recognizes the IP address and delivers a real ZOT! The kind that would leave the troll with an Angela Davis afro and smoke coming from every orifice. Plus a melted hardrive. I am diabolical!
Olly is a troll and is now dead!
There's going to be so much fluctuation in the polls these last three weeks, so it doesn't make much sense to worry excessively over it. We all know the media is doing everything it can to prop up the Kerry campaign, so we shouldn't be surprised if there are polls showing him ahead. I'm getting the sense this election may be alot like the one in 1980. Now, I'm not saying Bush will win with 489 electoral votes as Reagan did that year, but if you recall that race was pretty tight till the final weekend when Reagan pulled away as late deciders could not stomach another four years of Jimmy Carter. Kerry is starting to make some horrible gaffes as the protective shield around his senate record is being torn down. It's happening at the wrong time in a close election. People are starting to pay real attention to the race now, and the more Kerry opens his mouth the less people are inclined to vote for him. This may be wishful thinking on my part, but the global test gaffe, the $200,000 crack made in the last debate, and now the nuisance story in the NY Times are starting to come one after the other in quick succession. These untimely gaffes are exposing Kerry as a rich snob and a defeatist weakling. The carefully orchestrated Kerry campaign picked the wrong time to start imploding.
The plain fact is Bush has OH, WI, and FL, plus all the other states he won in 2000, and would, today, likely win New Mexico, Iowa and/or Minnesota and possibly Pennsylvania.
Aside from ARG, there is no poll anywhere that has shown Bush behind in OH; and seven that showed him up; plus what I hear from my little grapevine here in OH is very good---VERY good.
Just keep this little fact in mind: the pollsters TOTALLY missed Fox's victory in Mexico; they TOTALLY missed Howard's victory in Australia; they TOTALLY missed the five close senate races in 2002---almost every single pollster was off, and in every case, even with the so called "legitmate" pollsters, they have been off in the LIBERAL'S favor. Now what does that tell you?
Check Dales' site. He is the best there is.
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