Status of the Electoral College

We’re starting to see the huge move towards Obama in the national polls finally filter down to the state polls now as the second state of the day - Minnesota - goes into Obama’s official count.  That moves the official count to Obama 233, McCain 163, Too Close To Call 142, with states like Michigan and Wisconsin who haven’t had very recent polls which could push those states to Weak Obama if polls come out for them.

In the meantime, more polling has pushed both Nevada and Florida over from lean McCain to lean Obama within the Too Close To Call category.  Now out of the eight 2004 red states in the Too Close To Call category, Obama now holds a lead in five, with Indiana, Missouri, and North Carolina still holding for McCain at the moment, though all three have been inching closer themselves recently.

Overall, these flips have now moved the Count with leaners to Obama 338, McCain 200.  That is the most Electoral Votes Obama has held ever, and by extension the fewest McCain has held ever and the biggest lead over McCain ever (previous high for Obama was 320 on July 8th, when McCain had only 218 and it was the only other time the lead was greather than 100 EVs, at 102.)

It is rather difficult to believe that Obama and McCain were tied in the Count with Leaners as recently as a week ago.

Obama still has a ways to go to reach his record in the official count, however.  Obama had 280 electoral votes in his official count on July 22nd.  McCain’s low in the official count was 151 on both July 15th and August 19th.

Five new CNN polls show possible movement back towards Obama in several states, as Obama has his first tie or lead in Florida in 5 polls, his first lead in Ohio in 9 polls, and the 3rd poll within 4% in North Carolina in the past 6 (as compared to the other three which all give McCain double-digit leads.  What’s going on in North Carolina?)

Despite general movement towards Obama, McCain’s numbers are the ones which improved on the official board as his 6% lead in Indiana was just enough to move it from Too Close to Call to Weak McCain.  No other states changed status, however.

We have so many polls coming out now that it is quite difficult for any single poll to switch a state which, of course, is good since it’s better to have a broad sample of several polls instead of a situation where a single outliar poll pushes states like Illinois or Louisiana into “Weak” territory when they probably have no business being there.

I should note (and I should add this to the Methodology page sometime) that CNN did release results for both Obama vs. McCain head-to-head as well as polls including third parties.  Obama either had the same margin or improved in every state when 3rd parties were included, going so far as going from a tie in Florida with the head-to-head to being 4% ahead with 3rd parties.

My policy has been that if a polling agency releases a poll where there is one with 3rd parties and one without, I take the straight head-to-head because of my belief that most polls overstate support for 3rd party candidates.  Of course, if they only offer a poll which includes 3rd parties, I’ll use it, but I don’t record the results for the 3rd party candidates.