Posted on 07/01/2012 8:07:47 AM PDT by centurion316
It is a source of constant amusement to me that so many people obsess—as if fiddling with a Rubik’s Cube—over the various combinations of states that could get either President Obama or Mitt Romney to the magic number of 270 votes in the Electoral College. The guilty include pros at both ends of the political spectrum; people who ought to know better; and armchair analysts who seem to think that they can crack the magic code.
The simple fact is that our nation has had 56 presidential elections. In 53 of them (94.6 percent), the winner in the Electoral College also happened to be the one with the most popular votes. Of course, we all recall the 2000 presidential election in which Al Gore prevailed in the popular vote, while George W. Bush was the Electoral College victor. But few remember that the previous divergence between popular and electoral votes was 112 years earlier, in 1888. Incumbent Grover Cleveland was the popular-vote winner. However, challenger Benjamin Harrison carried the Electoral College and was declared the winner. The only other time that happened was in 1876.
Two points are worth keeping in mind: First, the chances are about 94.6 percent that the same person will win both the electoral and popular votes. So people are expending a lot of time and energy trying to figure out something that has about a 1-in-20 chance of happening.
But second, close races are just that: close races. Notwithstanding the almost daily e-mails that I get protesting that the election will be a slam dunk for either Obama or Romney, this race will be close. Obama has a high floor, meaning that he has a fervent base of support. He also has a low ceiling, meaning that he has large and adamant opposition.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationaljournal.com ...
The liberals are still pushing the war on women and all that crapola. They expect that it will resonate with middle America and lead Obama to victory.
Pretty good analysis from Cook.
While I think demographics make it impossible for Romney to win in a landslide, there is still a chance he could win a close election similar to GWB in 2000.
To do so, he absolutely has to have one of the following: Colorado, New Mexico or Nevada. If he can capture one of those, then I think the rest of the pieces will fall in place for him to win a squeaker.
Gore /Bush 48.38/ 47.87
Tilen/Hayes 51/ 47.9
That Tilden/Hays number is the one of most concern. If there is no significant 3rd party candidate draining votes from one side (thank you Ralph Nader), you can win by almost 4 percentage points and still lose the election.
I don’t like the term “ landslide,” but it is a truism that if “a” wins a state, it cannot be won by “b.” in other words, when Indiana flips this year-—as it certainly will, not only do 11 EVs (I think that’s IN-—too lazy to look it up) go to Romney but they come off Zero’s total. So when you get to possible flips like Wi and MI, you’re looking at a shift of 70 EVs more or less (35 onto Romney, 35 off of Zero.) the gap can become very big very quickly, ESP. Considering that Romney is either up or very close in several states that went for Zero in 08.
The reason for Tilden’s loss lies with the fractured political structure in the years following the Civil War. The Democrat Party was denied a place on the political stage through the mechanisms of Reconstruction despite their popular appeal. This circumstance is unlikely to repeat.
If the electoral college was dropped, no candidate would venture out of the biggest 5 states to campaign. It would hurt the republic even more.
I do not support any change to the Electoral College and this article makes no argument in that regard. History shows that candidates for the Presidency must win both the popular vote and the electoral vote and therefore must mount a nationwide campaign that speaks to both urban and rural America. Only three cases in our history were exceptions.
There can be local variation where you have redistricting in the recent past, but that usually doesn't last long either.
That's why over time almost all races show a tendency to come closer to 50/50 than not.
Currently electoral politics are in flux as several different subsets of voters (factions as they're known) find themselves relocating from the Democrats to the Republicans ~ in the House races, but otherwise continue to vote Democrat for President.
We could get back the 30% of the black vote Barry Goldwater threw away in 1964, and possibly the Catholics we lost in 2008 (who imagined Obama was going to give them Obamamoney for their hospitals or something ~ very confusing view over there eh).
One of the major problems with this race is that both candidates are going to have serious difficulty getting out the vote. For the Democrats it will be a loss of interest ~ Obama is no longer a novelty. For the Republicans it will be a decided disinterest in running our 6th loser in the last 50 years.
Although most of the analysts are well versed in the standard analytical techniques, few of them have much experience dealing with declining situations. They can usually imagine the candidate 'inspiring the base' and 'attracting Democrats' or 'attracting Republicans' with various policy pronouncements.
In this race Obama is losing supporters left and right, but where are they going? Will they vote for the Republican or just sit out the election. Romney is maintaining a slight lead on Obama by losing potential supporters left and right at a slower rate, but where are those lost voters going? Will they show up for the down ballot races, or will they vote for Obama, or will they just sit this out?
One of the things not helping us is the Pollyanna-ish attitude of so many of the Mittbots who cannot imagine their boy could have any bad luck in this race.
A realistic view is he has a tough fight and the Republican base isn't behind him.
In general the electoral voting system tends to amplify the general national consensus, and force the inclusion of outlying areas in the determination.
Though the President is almost always elected with a majority of the popular vote, it matters crucially how that vote is distributed geographically.
To take a national poll [especially of registered voters] as a predictor of a presidential election strikes me as foolish. Cook may be correct that some state polls aren't well-crafted, but I'll still be looking at 'em this year.
Serious question; Do we know for sure this is true? If I am not mistaken, votes are counted in each state only to the point where the uncounted ballots, even if they all favor one candidate, could not swing the election in that state. Since uncounted ballots are mostly absentee, and since absentee ballots typicaly favor Republicans, could it not be that there were enough uncounted votes for G.W.Bush that the popular vote overall would have been his?
I believe that we do not know this for certain for reasons that you have explained as well as others including almost certain voter fraud. It doesn’t matter, let the history books show that Gore won the popular vote. That helped them in 2008, but will not in the future.
Republicans continue to have a cadre of professional politicians who imagine that there are "independent" voters ~ and that they are a significant number. A more realistic appraisal is that Southerners and Catholics have been gravitating to the Republicans for a couple of decades. They'll turn on the Republicans on a dime on certain issues, and have done so.
Which proves those descriptors are not adequate ~ we probably need to view them as truck drivers, big box store managers, accountants, and church goers.
That way we can better target their economic and social motives ~ which really makes more sense than trying to think of Baptists and Catholics as being remarkably different, and "independent'.
I believe that Cook’s point was to point to the traditional national polls as a better barometer of voter sentiment than the suspect state level polling that we are currently seeing. You will note that these state polls mostly favor Mr. Obama and Cook is raising his eyebrows given the other indicators that are out there.
I predict that future Cook columns will point out the historical record of incumbents running in poor economic times. It will be a message that the Obama camp does not want to hear.
The Electoral College is just another vestige of the old Republic.
It was created to protect sovereign states from having a president foisted on them by other more populace states.
But with the now all powerful federal government, it is an anachronism. How long until state governors become POTUS appointments? After all, what real power do they have, except to implement federal law and mandates?
Horse puckey.
"Past performance does not predict future results."
That may resonate with folks who are already inclined to vote for Obama. Others in 'middle America' can be convinced to vote against him based on the state of the economy, and the looming tax increases, if Obamacare takes full effect.
It's not hard to find someone who has either, 1) lost a job, or KNOWS someone who has lost a job, 2) is looking for a job, or knows someone who is looking, and is finding it increasingly difficult to get one. BOTH of these issues can be laid directly at the feet of President Obama, his accusations against George W. Bush notwithstanding.
Genarally speaking, Americans vote their wallets.
That means that other issues - such as foreign policy and various domestic issues - take a back seat to how Americans feel about their personal and family budgets.
This has been true time and time again.
At this particular point in history, the number of Americans on the government dole via Obama’s many give-aways is huge.
Obama (and his congressional power junkies) knows that in such a hugely corrupt system, votes can easily be purchased by legislative largesse.
On the other hand, the number of Americans taking it in the chops on payday is also huge.
The only real question is which number is larger.
If I had to guess, I’d guess that Obama will be voted out in November; on the other hand, and as Lenin early discovered, the “Give-Away Government” is a powerful narcotic for the masses.
The lessons of history could NOT be more clear: socialist (i.e., communist) nations fall in both productivity and power, while rising hugely in social unrest and discontent which, ultimately, can only be suppressed by the Police State.
So the two directions are quite distinct, and the only question to be answered as November nears is precisely this: Will the Leftists succeed in bribing their way into another term and force an American socialist Police State, yes or no?
If no, America may rediscover its former greatness. If yes, then America descends into the Sewer of Lost Causes.
Couldn’t be more simple.
I believe that your analysis is spot on. If the election were held today, it would be a coin toss because of the large numbers of Americans who still credit Obama with stopping the economic decline and who believe that he will shower them with free stuff. But, fortunately the election is in November when it will be more apparent that the economy continues to get worse and that Obama bears some responsibility. On Obamacare, the hope of free stuff will likely morph into the reality of a tax increase or health insurance premium increase. A truth that Obama does not want the country to know. They will know it. I believe that the trends are in our favor.
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