TheAgitator.com
The Race Right Now
Monday, August 11th, 2008My last electoral map before the conventions below.
McCain seems to have forged a tie in Virginia, and eked out a small lead again in Florida. Overall, he looks to have picked up one to two points nationally over the last several weeks. The last several polls show Obama with a 1-3 point lead. I’m giving him both, and putting Montana and Indiana back in the McCain camp, too. Those states were already quite close, and neither has put out a poll in more than a month. Consequently, I’m guessing McCain is probably back in front (Indiana hasn’t gone for the Dems since 1964). Lame as they were, McCain’s attack ads seem to given him a tiny but perceptible bump. It’ll be interesting to see if the crisis in Georgia has any affect on the race.
Obama still maintains a deceptively large electoral vote lead. He’s up by 58 votes. But a flip in Michigan and Ohio would tip the election to McCain. Obama leads by 2-4 points in Ohio, and 3-4 points in Michigan. Yes, this is all pretty much useless right now. The race won’t start to take form until after Labor Day. But speculating is fun.
There are a lotta strange dynamics in this one… the vast majority of the posts about the election made by die-hard Redstaters are of the form “Obama sucks” and the notable absence of the “Wow, McCain really stands for the stuff that is important to me” kinda posts (heck, even Bush got a nice chunk of those kinda posts in 2004) tells me that this election is a lock for Obama… but there’s all kinds of dynamics going on that make me back up and say “hey, wait a sec”.
The PUMA folks. The Hillary supporters seem to resent Obama a lot more than the Bradley supporters resented Gore (or even the Dean supporters resented Kerry). Folks were able to coalesce around how awful Bush was. Bush ain’t running this time around and McCain doesn’t seem to generate the visceral response that Bush did… allowing for silliness such as the PUMA stuff.
That Ron Paul made such a splash (well, he made a something) makes me wonder if Barr might have an impact. As Libertarians go, he’s… well. He’s no Harry Browne. However, the fact that he’s almost a real politician might mean something. He’s capable of speaking on camera without sounding batcrap crazy (again, he’s no Harry Browne)… but that leads me to the whole issue of how the majority of the Libertarians I know (including myself) hate the guy. As in they can explain his good sides, if forced into a corner (hey, he can speak on camera without sounding crazy!) but, for the most part, would rather point out how he wrote the mother-loving Barr Amendment and he was behind the mother-loving DOMA and the mother-lover can go love his mother in heck for all I care.
But, of course, it’s important to vote and there’s no way I’m going to vote for this guy and there’s no way I’m going to vote for that guy… so you might as well hold your nose and vote for the Libertarian if only to communicate that there are voters out there who give a crap about smaller, less intrusive government… but the Libertarians I know vote Libertarian because they enjoy voting without having to hold their nose… let alone without feeling like they had to take a shower afterwards.
Eh, if he breaks 1%, I’ll be surprised. Sigh. Root in ’12!
As I said, lotta weird dynamics this election.
There’s is no hope for American politics. After all the crap Bush did, the democrats should be so far ahead in the polls that there almost wouldn’t be a need for an election. The Democrats should already be discussing things like who the cabinet members will be.
And I don’t care what people say about McCain not being another Bush. No one could be another Bush. But McCain is from the same club, goes to the same meetings, and is supported by a lot of the same money.
Whoever wins, I hope it makes the economy happy and my 401K recovers.
Bah… I disagree. Probably because this is the first election cycle where I actually give a crap, and my favorite candidate was knocked out a long time ago. Plus, I really don’t know enough about why people vote the way they do and the effects of campaigns on people. One would hope that you could just look at their policies, but most just like their rainbows & puppies or hard on terror speeches.
When the debates come around, I can’t see Obama losing to McCain – I foresee a Kennedy-Nixon like situation. Mr. young, tall, dark, and handsome (and eloquent) standing next to Mr. old, short, pale, and not usually so eloquent. Obama supporters seem fired up (I see their booths and stickers everywhere). McCain’s seem somewhat… less enthused.
I just don’t see this race being as close as I hear the pundits keep saying it will be.
The real issue is not how well Obama or McCain might do in the closely divided battleground states, but that we shouldn’t have battleground states and spectator states in the first place. Every vote in every state should be politically relevant in a presidential election. And, every vote should be equal. We should have a national popular vote for President in which the White House goes to the candidate who gets the most popular votes in all 50 states.
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC). The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral vote — that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
Because of state-by-state enacted rules for winner-take-all awarding of their electoral votes, recent candidates with limited funds have concentrated their attention on a handful of closely divided “battleground” states. In 2004 two-thirds of the visits and money were focused in just six states; 88% on 9 states, and 99% of the money went to just 16 states. Two-thirds of the states and people have been merely spectators to the presidential election.
Another shortcoming of the current system is that a candidate can win the Presidency without winning the most popular votes nationwide.
The National Popular Vote bill has passed 21 state legislative chambers, including one house in Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, North Carolina, and Washington, and both houses in California, Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Vermont. The bill has been enacted by Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and Maryland. These four states possess 50 electoral votes — 19% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.
See http://www.NationalPopularVote.com
Has there been any sort of analysis on how many seats the Dems are expected to pick up in the House and Senate?
The dems aren’t home and dry already because they’ve been 100% complicit in everything Bush has done. They’ve folded and facilitated at every turn. So that really leaves no place for everyone to go resulting in . . . everyone staying in the same spots as polarized as last election.
No way in hell McCain takes Michigan. This state has been trending blue, and has all the demographics that favor Obama. AA’s? Check. College hipsters? Check in Ann Arbor, check in Lansing. Disillusioned libertarian leaning Repubs? All the population centers of MI are the type that favor Obama heavily, and the conservative base in MI is of the evangelical leaning type that hates McCain. Yeah, ain’t gonna happen.
As for Ohio? One of my relatives is in the media there and opines that Ohio was hit very hard by the S&L scandals of the late 80′s. He states that Ohioans have very long memories and aren’t inclined to forgive one of the Keating 5. He’s of the opinion that Ohio will be close until late Sep or Oct, and then Obama will run away with it once the ads start flying.
…and don’t forget, Salvo, if you like what the libs have done in Michigan, you’ll LOVE what they can do for the rest of the country…..
Another shortcoming of the current system is that a candidate can win the Presidency without winning the most popular votes nationwide
Uh…that’s a feature, not a bug or “shortcoming”.
I suggest you read up on the mathmatical reasons that the electoral college is yet another roadblock against tyranny given to us by the founders.
Josh,
The Dems are expected to strengthen their hold on the House and Senate, but not to get the 60-seat stranglehold on the latter. Last I saw (now probably a month old) was that they would pick up 3-5 Senators depending on how the cards fall.
@ Susan, I’d just prefer to get rid of the electoral college altogether.
Electoral college or no, the process is a machine running with insufficient feedback. We need a way to show the wings of the national party that a vote against one is NOT a vote _for_ the other.
We need a “None of the Above” option in elections at every level.
I’ve believed this for a long time, and just ran across this group the other day: “Voters for None of the Above”, nota.org.
You can already purchase “NOTA Gear” from groups on cafepress.com (my own included).