Electoral Guesstimates

Cross-posted on my personal blog

I went conservative. I don't know the totals, but keep all the Kerry states (including PA because of GOTV in Philly barely countering the rural vote), and add on FL, VA, NV, NM, IA, and CO. NM, CO, VA, IA, and NV I'm confident on. FL I was torn between it or OH. Then decided against OH for the reason I almost put PA for McCain.

Last week I spent a lot of time reading about the question of a second dimension in American politics (based on NOMINATE scores). The conclusion is that if there is one, it involves race and only matters when race appears on the agenda. Guess what -- race is on the agenda right now.

All the talk on the Bradley Effect really is hype. The undecided numbers are about 7-9 percent in polls, which tells me these people aren't undecided but actually closest racists. Instead of whites reporting they'll vote for a black candidate, they just claim to be undecided. This is only a hypothesis, but I'm basing it on a mix of what I could expect from good old political science theory and some of what I've seen on the ground. And by on the ground I mean from my family.

That's why I'm so low on the electoral count. Everyone else is predicting a blowout for Obama, which would make sense if the racial dimension weren't active. That's why my moving swing states are the ones they are. NH is New England and I don't care what McCain thinks, it's just not going to go to him because it's New England. CO, NM, NV, and FL all have high minority populations that are going to break Obama. Even the Cubans in FL don't seem pleased with the Rs right now. My reasoning behind VA and IA going Obama explains my placement of PA as an Obama state -- high turnout in liberal areas counteracting the racist sections. Basically, Obama's got a superior ground game in those three states. And that will make all the difference.

What I didn't include for Obama were OH, NC, MT, the Dakotas, MO, GA, and IN. For starters, MT and the Dakotas are driven by Ron Paul pipe dreams. They think he'll play the Nader role but for some reason in the past decade voters have become incredibly sophisticated and when they see competition they go safe. For these states, especially MT, that means McCain. I'd have said the same thing for NV except for the minority population being greater than the rural Paultards. OH and GA have problems with voters being challenged in urban areas. Though the courts seem favorable to allowing more people to vote, something tells me that will be challenged and changed. OH and GA also face the same problems that I cite for NC, MO, and IN -- race. What role is it playing in these states? I'm assuming the white undecideds will break evenly between McCain and Obama, giving McCain the edge. Typically, they should break more towards Obama since the economic conditions favor the Dems.

In the end I still have an Obama victory. And I put the Senate at 59 caucusing with the Ds, assuming (quite confidently) that the inevitable GA runoff goes to the D and Liebermann stays D (less sure on that last assumption).