Status of the Electoral College

We have two sets of polls released this morning, and either Obama has suddenly shot well ahead in some states, but are some of these numbers off?

First, let’s look at the pretty reasonable numbers.  Quinnipiac surveyed Florida, showing Obama up 5%, 49-44%.  That’s a bit higher than most recent polls, but it’s still within the realm of possibility.  Both pollsters also surveyed Pennsylvania, with Quinnipiac showing Obama ahead there by 13% while the Big Ten Network shows him up by 11%.  Again, both of those polls are well within reason.

The Big Ten Network also surveyed Illinois, which shows a 29% lead for Obama, Iowa, whish shows a 13% lead for Obama, Michigan, which shows a 22% lead for Obama - that’s quite large, but plausible given that McCain has completely pulled out of the state now - and Wisconsin with a 13% lead.  All of those are at least inline with current polls or plausible given the situation.

Now, I’m separating out Ohio.  At first I thought the Ohio numbers - Quinnipiac showing Obama up by 14% and Big Ten showing Obama up by 12% - were both wrong.  But then when I looked at the recent Ohio numbers, Suffolk also had a recent poll showing Obama up 9%.  the problem is that several other recent polls show numbers such as Obama by 4%, McCain by 2%, and McCain by 1%.

So what’s going on here?  It looks like we’re now having the same problem in Ohio as we’ve had in the past in both Florida and North Carolina: two different sets of likely voter models, one of which is very favorable to McCain and one of which is very favorable to Obama.  As a result, we have one grouping of three polls where the results range from +9 to +14 for Obama, and another grouping of three polls where the range is from +2 McCain to +4 Obama.  Which is right?  There really isn’t any good way to know.  And we have reputable pollsters in each group as well.

My hunch is to actually agree with the polls showing a near-tied race.  The first reason is because Quinnipiac has tended to show larger margins for Obama than other pollsters anyway.  The second reason is that, at least this time around, the Big Ten polls appear to be greatly favoring Obama as well, as you’ll see in a second.

Next, on to the states where the polling definitely seems off, and both of these are Big Ten polls.  There are a couple of states which seem just way off when looking at their numbers.

This poll shows Obama up 19% in Minnesota.  This lead just seems way too big.  Most polls in the state show the lead to be between about 6 and 12%.  The Star Tribune at the start of the month was really the only recent poll showing such a margin, and their more recent numbers have narrowed it down to a more realistic margin.

Second, this poll shows Obama up 10% in Indiana.  Now, having a poll showing Obama ahead in Indiana isn’t unheard of: the most recent PPP poll showed Obama up by 2% there.  But by and large, most polls in the state have shown a consistent McCain lead in the state, not an Obama one, to say nothing about a double-digit Obama lead.

So I think Quinnipiac is either right or at least plausible on 2 out of 3 polls, but Big Ten blows it on at least 2 and as many as 4 of their 8 polls.  Since I don’t make judgement calls about what polls I stick into the database, these are still going in, but I thought I would express my thoughts about these polls as I do.

Again, some of these states right on the border can flip and flop between a status (more on that in a second), but for the time being, Wisconsin has moved into Strong Obama territory (with Michigan and Pennsylvania right on it’s heels), putting Obama back over 200 “strong” Electoral Votes for the first time since July 8th and marking the most “strong” electoral votes he has ever held at 207.

Another state that has flopped is Virginia, back down to Too Close To Call thanks to the Mason-Dixon poll showing him on up only 2%.  As is the case with many Mason-Dixon polls this year, this is the first time Obama has ever held a lead in this state with them, so even though it looks close, it’s actually a 5% improvement for Obama since earlier in the month.

That’s right, with the addition of Colorado to the club of states officially counted for Obama, he has now reached 273 Electoral Votes where he leads by at least 5%.

The last time Obama had over 270 Electoral Votes in his official count was on July 22nd when he had 280 vs. McCain’s 154.  This means that not only has the count with leaners surpassed Obama’s high that he reached over the summer, but that the official count has nearly matched Obama’s high from over the summer as well.

This is an amazing turn around from a mere month ago when McCain was leading the official count after the Republican Convention and at one point tied up the count including leaners.

The change was thanks to a pair of Quinnipiac polls out which also pushed Michigan and Wisconsin to the brink of switching to Strong Obama states.

Overall, this leaves 9 Too Close To Call states left worth 110 Electoral Votes.  Not only are there not enough Too Close To Call states for McCain to win the election, even if he won them all, but he trails in 6 of the 9 states, with one - North Carolina - tied.  Indeed, McCain trails by at least 2% in states accounting for 65 of the category’s 110 Electoral Votes.

The new Survey USA poll this morning showing Obama up 8 has now switched Missouri over to lean Obama.  that now gives Obama a lead of 369 to 169 when including leaners.

This is easily the biggest lead Obama has had with leaners all year.  Indiana now becomes the only non-controversial battleground state that still leans McCain.  West Virginia is currently lean Obama, though that is depending on a weird ARG poll while North Dakota has dropped to lean McCain based on a North Dakota poll from a pollster I’ve never heard of.

Meanwhile, we may be soon see another wave of states moving to the Weak Obama category like we saw a couple weeks ago as Virginia and Colorado inch increasingly closer to the 5% mark.

So there’s this new Forum Poll (whoever they are) who released a poll this morning showing Obama up by 2% in North Dakota 45% to 43%.

I would have preferred that a more reputable pollster would have released a poll in that state - and even then I’d be asking for confirmation.  The last polls in the state showed McCain 9% and 13% ahead, but they were also taken nearly 4 weeks ago.  So is it possible that North Dakota has swung back to Obama?  It’s quite possible.  Will I believe a polling firm I’ve never heard of before which tells me Obama is ahead?  Not by itself.

Nevertheless, since most of the other polls are old, this poll is enough by itself to push North Dakota into Too Close To Call for the moment, though it’s still a lean McCain state.  Hopefully someone like Rasmussen will take a look at this state to see if it really has gotten that close.

Over the summer, Georgia was a deep south state which, while never really a true toss-up, was always close enough to put it in the Weak McCain column.  Then when McCain made his charge in the early fall, Georgia fell strongly in the Strong McCain column and looked lost to Obama.

However, recently, Georgia is once again looking more and more vulnerable with McCain.  The last 5 polls released in the state, all in the past week, have shown McCain leads of 6, 7, 7, 8 and 9 - enough to push it back down into the Weak McCain category.  That’s opposed to the polls before that which showed leads of 8, 11, 16, 18, and 21.  Is McCain still likely to win Georgia?  Yeah, probably so at this case, but given the news of very high African-American turnout in early voting in Georgia, Georgia is suddenly a state that McCain may want to worry about and try to mount some sort of get out the vote effort on Election Day.  If turnout on election day mirrors turnout in early voting, McCain’s win in Georgia may be in serious jeopardy.

While we’ve gotten many polls for lean Obama, Weak Obama, and lean McCain states, we haven’t had a lot of polling for Weak McCain states or either candidate’s strong states.  It’s been a week since we’ve had a poll in Montana.  It’s been two weeks since we’ve had a poll in West Virginia.  And we don’t have current data for a whole host of McCai states which had flirted with Weak McCain or even Too Close To Call status earlier in the year such as the Dakotas, Arizona, South Carolina, Texas, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Louisiana (current polling at this point being considered “being conducted in the past week or so”).

You can take a peak at the overview page and see the last time a poll was conducted for many of these states, and despite almost being a third of the way through October already, many haven’t had polls since the end of September - back when McCain was doing much better.

Obama pulls yet another Kerry state into his Weak Obama category.  This now pushes Obama’s official tally to 264 Electoral Votes, This once again marks Obama’s highest official number and margin over McCain since July 22nd.  It is also the first time Obama’s lead over McCain is over 100 Electoral Votes since then.

This leaves only 8 Too Close To Call states - all of them Bush 2004 states.

There are also two very good polls in Virginia out today, with Suffolk University giving Obama a 51%-39% lead in the state while Survey USA gives Obama a 53%-43% lead in the state.   This is on top of CNN’s 53%-44% poll out 5 days ago and Insider Advantage’s poll out 6 days ago showing a 6% lead.

The only polls holding Virginia back from probably being a full-fledged lean Obama state are Mason-Dixon and ARG, both of which, remarkably, have shown 3% McCain leads in the state in the past week.  However, a majority of polling shows Obama gaining in the state, if not running away with it now.

Thanks to a probably over optimsitic Minnesota Star-Tribune poll showing Obama 18% ahead (and Franken 9% ahead).  Even if this poll were off by 10% - over 2.5% more than the margin of error on both candidate’s numbers - Obama would still be up by 8%, so unless this is just a whopper of a poll, it still looks good for Obama.  (I should note that the Star Tribune was within 2% in 2004 in it’s final poll, so it has a reasonable record).

This puts Obama’s total back to 260, and once again makes New Hampshire the only Kerry state left in the Too Close To Call category - and it’s the closest one to leaving it as well.

Update

Looking at the polling history, the biggest problem with this poll probably isn’t overestimating Obama’s number as it is underestimating McCain’s.  McCain only gets 37% in this poll.  He hasn’t been under 40% in my poll in the state since the start of August and wasn’t in numerous polls at the same time since mid-summer - around June and July.  His numbers more recently averaged around 45%.

Now, this could signify two things: the poll just oversampled undecideds who lean McCain but didn’t want to say they supported him, or the bottom has fallen out from under McCain in the state.

Remember I said McCain’s numbers hadn’t been that low in the state since the mid-summer?  Well guess what the current political situation feels most like?  The mid-summer, when Obama held a clear and indisputable lead over McCain.  I would be loathe to say that McCain has actually fallen that much without another poll to confirm it - and we’ve had two recent polls come out before this showing his support in the state as 47% and 43% - but if we really have gone back to where we were over the summer - or better - McCain dropping under 40% might be real.

As for Obama’s number of 55%, it’s a little high, but consistent with CNN’s poll which gave Obama 54% and Rasmussen’s poll which gave him 52%.  The last time that many polls gave Obama such a high number is such a condensed time period?  Mid-summer.

Nate over at FiveThirtyEight notes that the partisan breakdown in the poll is +16 for Democrats. with republicans having only 26%.  But GOP identification in the Survey USA poll was only 4% better at 30%.  In fact, those two polls, even though their results are 19% apart, have a net party ID difference of 9%.  I’m not sure what accounts for the other 10% of difference, but I have noted before that Survey USA has seemed to tilt towards McCain in Minnesota for some reason.

Even if the margin really is “somewhere in between” this poll and the Survey USA number - that’s still a 9% to 10% lead for Obama.  If a 5% lead in Michigan was enough for McCain to abandon it’s 17 Electoral Votes, I don’t see how he can justify going after Minnesota’s 10 with when Obama has twice the lead.

Minnesota is the latest state to have a set of highly conflicting polls, and we get yet another one from Survey USA showing McCain ahead in Minnesota by 1%.  I tend to think that this is off, but let’s look at the recent polling from Minnesota:

• Survey USA (9/30-10/1): McCain +1
• CNN (9/28-30): Obama +11
• Quinnipiac (9/14-21): Obama +2
• ARG (9/18-20): Obama +1
• Rasmussen (9/18): Obama +8
• University of Wisconsin (9/14-17): Obama +2

OK, so 4 of 6 polls show a tight race, suggesting that the two polls showing wide leads may be wrong.  However, there is one catch here:  Only the first two polls have been conducted in the past week and since this whole economic crisis really started getting into full gear, so it’s harder to compare the first 2 polls with the last 4 polls.  This is a situation where we’ll just need to wait for another poll to see where the state currently stands.  In any case, the latest poll has pushed Minnesota back to Too Close To Call.

And oh yeah, the last poll to show a McCain lead in the state?  A poll released in March by, you guessed it, Survey USA.  Indeed, Survey USA appears to have a tendency to show Minnesota much closer than other pollsters do for some reason.  In June, Survey USA showed only a 1% Obama lead again when other polls showed leads of 13% and 17%.  In August, Survey USA showed a 2% race with other polls showed a 4% and 10% race.  About the only time after May when Survey USA polls in Minnesota lined up with other polls was in September when most people had it very close.

The last time anyone had more than a 2% lead in the state according to Survey USA was in May, when Obama had a 5% lead, so Survey USA has tended to show this as a near tied race, including when Minnesota was listed as a Strong Obama state around June and July.

Meanwhile, two New Hampshire polls have come out showing Obama ahead by 10% and 12%, so it looks like New Hampshire’s brief flirtation with McCain is over.  These polls weren’t quite enough to push New Hampshire into the Weak Obama category, but we’re now in a situation where, out of the 10 Too Close To Call states, all of the closest 8 states are Bush 2004 states.

We have a full trio of states being pushed into the Weak Obama column today as Wisconsin moves from the Too Close To Call category to Weak Obama.  Today alone Obama’s count has risen from 202 Electoral Votes to 243 Electoral Votes - a gain of 41 votes and Obama’s biggest total since September 2nd, at the height of the Democratic Convention bounce.

This is also the biggest lead Obama has had in the official count since he had an 82 Electoral Vote lead on August 19th.

This continues a trend of lean Obama states becoming Weak Obama states and lean McCain states becoming lean Obama states, as Ohio, Florida, Nevada, and Virginia have already done in the past couple of days.

Iowa has also moved from Weak Obama to Strong Obama.

This reduced the Too Close To Call category to 10 states and 132 Electoral Votes - with 8 of those states and 111 of those Electoral Votes going for Bush in 2004.  Only New Hampshire and Michigan are Kerry states that remain Too Close To Call, and the only reason Michigan is probably still on the list is because no poll has been released there for close to a week.  New Hampshire also has not had any new polls for the same period of time.