Pennsylvania

National Popular Vote (11% Reporting): Obama 50%-40% McCain

Electoral College
Obama 264--147 McCain


Swing State Returns
All times eastern. First poll closing time listed.  read more »

As everyone who reads my OpenLeft.com posts know, I am never one to say it's done until the last hour of the last day. I'll be nervous and edgy until the end, worried that McCain will somehow manage to come back in Pennsylvania and win every single close and near-close state, worried that there is some kind of uber-Bradley effect on the Presidential level there is no way to measure worried about all the different ways elections can be stolen.

And I am too wary and too fricking superstitious to ever do the kind of "Obama's won" post Chris did the other day. Just seeing the headline sent superstitious shivers down my spine (trying saying that fast).

Having said all that though, unlike some folks who see evidence of a tightening at the end, the news over the last four days have got my optimistic, non-superstitious side of my brain thinking we might be heading toward a bigger rather than smaller victory. Here's the evidence I see:  read more »

Mark Penn joins fellow corporate pollster Doug Schoen, Peggy Noonan, Charles Krauthammer and Jon Meacham as the latest member of the Punditburo to insist that no matter what happens on election day, America is a center-right nation, and therefore a President Obama must not govern as a progressive. Here's the excerpt from Penn's screed in the Financial Times:

The history of 1992 contains a clear warning that a centre-left coalition can fall apart quickly if the policies are seen as too far left.

 read more »

Electoral College: Obama 291, McCain 160 Toss-up 87 (270 to win, 269 to tie)
National popular vote: Obama 51.6%--44.6% McCain


Dark Blue (273): Obama +6.0% or more
Lean Blue (18): Obama +2.3%-+5.9%
White / Toss-up (87): Obama +2.2% to McCain +2.2%
Lean Red (28): McCain +2.3%-+5.9%
Dark Red (132): McCain +6.0% or more

Relevant States Chart
Polls 10/28-11/02
States not shown are further either direction  read more »

During these final days of the 2008 election, Republicans are pushing ads that portray Wyoming as a reliably conservative state and one that distrusts East Coast Liberals. If you are a born and bred Wyomingite with conservative creds, you are good and trustworthy. If you were born somewhere else -- especially any East Coast state north of Virginia or (worse) California -- and you're a Democrat, you are bad, untrustworthy and probably a Socialist.
 read more »

Obama has inched up in the tracking polls for the third straight day, and he now leads by 6% according to Pollster.com with less than 77 hours before the polls close in all swing states. (Iowa is the last "swing state" to close, if you can call Iowa a swing state, anyway. Part of Montana closes at 11:00 p.m. eastern). So, McCain has to gain a full 1% on Obama every thirteen hours between now and then in order to win. That means that McCain has to flip about 100,000 voters every hour, or three every second, in order to tie Obama. Best of all, he can only target 70% of the electorate for these votes, because 30% is already spoken for.

More in the extended entry.  read more »

Here's the Halloween edition of the tracking poll average, now with seven daily trackers: Zogby, R2Kos, Rasmussen, Hotline, Gallup LVE (using expanded to offset more conservative LV models in other trackers), TIPP and ABC.  See Quick Hits for individual poll results. Bottom line: the gentle "tightening" appears to be over.

 

Really, even over the 12 days shown here, things have been very stable. Barack Obama's support only varied within one point from 49.7 to 50.7 while John McCain's support fluctuated a bit more, between 42.5 and 44.2. Over this period the average Obama lead has been 6.9 percent and today it is 6.7 percent.  read more »

Let's pile on the activism. If you haven't started a personal paid media campaign, get started on one now. If you are already running one, I'd love to hear about it in the comments. And, whether you are just starting one or if you have already started, check out this great guide on how to improve your campaigns--Chris

For the final weekend push, when most undecided voters will be searching for candidate information online, Natasha and I are now running the following ads:

--First, we started running a Presidential ad again:

 read more »

Since Chris has put out his predictions today (here and here), I think I should follow up with my own assessment, just to get you really jazzed. Some caveats on my predictions:

• I, of course, look at numbers- polling, early voting, etc.- when making my predictions. But I also rely on instinct and emotion, which is why I would never suggest people make big bets on my predictions. There are certain races where my head tells me one thing but my heart absolutely won't let me predict a loss.

• I find myself torn between not wanting to be too optimistic on the one hand, and on the other hand thinking all this enthusiasm and field work is going to allow us to really roll up some big numbers. My predictions here are more the former than the latter.

Here is my final assessment on the state of the elections right now:  read more »

I'm missing the Phillies parade for this, but I have to keep writing about it. I'm sticking by my Obama projection.

Explanation in the extended entry.
First, McCain has conceded 203 electoral votes to Obama. That is, in states where both Kerry and Gore won, McCain isn't running any ads in states worth 203 electoral votes. He is ran about 24K of ads in Maine last week, but the RNC pulled out and Pollser.com shows Obama ahead by 16.9% in the state. So, I'll mark Maine down in the Obama column, too, giving him 207. Here is a look at four other states that puts Obama up to 238:

IA, MN, NH, and WI Polls 10/24-10/30  read more »

Republican presidential candidate John McCain and running mate Sarah Palin are seeing dividends of their recent heavy campaign rotation in the state of Pennsylvania. Yesterday Palin completed event number 13 in the Keystone state while John McCain has had 10 events there in the last two weeks.

It's working. The McCain campaign is chipping away at the huge lead formerly held by "The One." McCain-Palin now trails Obama-Biden by about 11 points, down from about 13 a couple weeks ago. As a result, we are moving McCain's position in the state from "Being Slaughtered" to "Embarassing Deficit."  read more »

Barack Obama has won the 2008 Presidential Election.

Yes, you read that right. And no, I am not joking.

People will probably say that I am calling the election too early, which could depress turnout. People might say that I am taking too much for granted, which is especially bad for a committeeperson in West Philadelphia. People might say that I am simply being foolish, because there is time left and a lot can change in four days. For these people, I have five quick points (more in the extended entry).  read more »

Barack Obama is holding on to leads in the three major battleground states — Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania — though Florida is too close to call and the other two have tightened, Qunnipiac University's new polling data report Wednesday.

Electoral College: Obama 338, McCain 168 Toss-up 32 (270 to win, 269 to tie)
National popular vote: Obama 49.8%--44.0% McCain


Dark Blue (311): Obama +6.0% or more
Lean Blue (27): Obama +2.3%-+5.9%
White / Toss-up (32): Obama +2.2% to McCain +2.2%
Lean Red (37): McCain +2.3%-+5.9%
Dark Red (131): McCain +6.0% or more

Swing State Chart
States not shown are further  either direction  read more »

There is no question that the tracking polls have tightened compared to where they were from October 21st through October 27th (though not from where they were from October 15th through October 20th). However, I just did the 2:00 p.m. update to the Presidential Forecast, and state polling has pushed Obama out to his most secure lead of the entire campaign. And I added a lot of polls:

Five new Pennsylvania polls, four new Ohio polls, two new Florida polls,  plus one new poll each from Colorado, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Virginia and Wisconsin added. Obama drops slightly in Florida, holds steady in Ohio, and improves everywhere else.

Obama's state by state situation is improving, even as the Pollster.com national tracker has dropped from Obama +8.8% on Saturday (his all-time peak) to Obama +5.8% today.  read more »