Electoral Math -- Obama Sure Could Use A Bump

It's time once again to take a look at how the electoral math is shaping up for Barack Obama and John McCain. While the news this time around isn't all that great for Obama, I wanted to take another of these snapshots of the polls -- before the running mates are announced and before the conventions happen -- in order to provide a statistical baseline to see how big a "bump" in the polls either candidate will get in the next few weeks. My analysis in short: while the news isn't dire quite yet, Obama could certainly use such a bump at this point.

Now, there are caveats to taking such snapshots, which I fully outlined in earlier electoral math columns (6/30/08, 7/21/08, and most recently 8/6/08). In a nutshell, all data is from electoral-vote.com, and you can't trust every poll you read. See the first paragraphs of my previous article on the subject for a full list of these caveats.

Without further ado, let's take a look at the overall electoral vote, expressed as a percentage.

As you can see, Obama is losing ground. In the last two weeks, he has gone from almost 54% of the electoral vote, down to just over 49%. In the same time period, John McCain has gone from around 44% of the electoral vote up to 48.5% (state polls which are tied are not counted, meaning the numbers don't add up to 100% unless there are no current ties). This is the continuation of what I called a worrisome trend last time around. Obama has slipped below the magic 270 number for the first time since he became the Democratic presumptive nominee, and McCain has just about caught up with him.

But these numbers don't tell the whole story. For that, we have to look at the relative level of support for each candidate, starting with John McCain. As always, "Strong" means a ten-point lead (or better) in the polls, "Weak" is five percent or better, and "Barely" means less than a five percent lead.

To be honest, this is mostly good news for McCain, although there is one metric which somewhat goes against this general march upwards.

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McCain's "Strong" numbers improved by over a third (from 97 to 131 electoral votes), but this was due to firming up support in just one state -- Texas -- which was probably out of reach for Obama anyway. But because Texas has a whopping 34 electoral votes, this means a lot of movement on the chart.

The really big news for John McCain is the movement in the "Barely" section of the graph, though. Three states (Nevada, Colorado, and Florida) are now in McCain's column, although just barely. But again, Florida is a biggie (27 electoral votes), so this translates into improving his number in this column from 44 two weeks ago to 85 now. This should be worrying the Obama camp, as these are the states where the contest will be won or lost.

But there is some bad news for McCain in this chart. The real measure of his solid support comes from adding the "Strong" numbers to the "Weak" numbers, and McCain has actually lost ground here as compared to two weeks ago. Because both Florida and Texas used to be in this column, McCain went from 95 "Weak" electoral votes down to 45 this time. This line just went up today, though, with a new poll out of Indiana, switching the state over to the "Weak" column for McCain. Still, overall, McCain's "Strong" plus "Weak" went down from 192 to 176.

With McCain out of the way, let's take a look at Barack Obama's details.

First, the bad news. Obama's support is generally weakening. Because state polls aren't done as often as national polls, this follows the news for the past few weeks of Obama's weakening nationwide, so it comes as no real surprise. And while it is not great news (obviously), there are a few counter-trends to be award of here. In other words, it's not time to panic... yet. Obama is still in good shape to win this thing, but he's got to reverse a few of these trendlines in order to comfortably do so.

Obama's "Strong" support shows significant weakening over two weeks ago. He lost four states from this category (Iowa, Wisconsin, New Jersey, and New York), and only gained back one (Massachusetts, where he's back to a double-digit lead). Obama just lost New York a few days ago, which is the last big dropoff on the graph line (New York has 31 big electoral votes). Now, I don't realistically think any of those states are going for McCain (at least at this moment), but it would be a lot more cheerful to look at this chart if they moved back into the dark, dark blue of "Strong" once again. Which means Obama could use a poll bump from the convention here. In the past two weeks alone, Obama's "Strong" support dropped from 185 electoral votes to 134.

The other (and more troubling) trend is Obama's loss of support among the "battleground" states of Indiana, Nevada and Colorado. They all switched from Barely Obama to McCain in the last two weeks. Obama's "Barely" numbers fell from 46 electoral votes down to 14, which is why he has slipped below the winning 270 number overall.

But there is a silver lining here. One very important state bucked the trend of the last few weeks, and it's an important one -- Michigan. Obama has widened his lead in the Great Lakes State, which will be crucial to his success in November. Of course, if John McCain picks Romney this could change (Mitt's father, George Romney, is a former Michigan governor), but for now it's looking better and better for Obama here.

This also helped the one bit of good news for Obama in this chart. Because while his support is softening here and there, when you add together the "Strong" and "Weak" states, Obama has actually gained ground over where he was last time we looked. Obama's "Weak" number alone went from 58 to 116 electoral votes in two weeks, making the total for "Strong" plus "Weak" a healthy 250 (up from 243). So, like I said, there's no need to panic yet. 250 is only 20 electoral votes away from victory.

 

For another view, as a check on my own charts, we turn to Sam Minter of abulsme.com, who provides daily tracking graphs and maps which aren't as volatile as mine (he takes the last five polls in each state into account, while mine only reflect the most recent available). [Full disclosure, with blatant and gratuitous plug: Since I only do this about every two weeks or so, I have provided Minter's maps and charts on my webpage for those seeking up-to-date info.] His chart combines my three charts above into one. Obama starts from the top, McCain starts from the bottom, and wherever the double pink/baby blue line is determines who is ahead.

His take on today's graph is similar, as on his Ohio switches from Obama to McCain today. His full comments are worth a read. An excerpt:

New summary:

McCain Best Case - McCain 298, Obama 240

Obama Best Case - Obama 384, McCain 154

If everybody gets their leans (and Obama gets DC) - Obama 273, McCain 265.

. . .

This is yet more McCain momentum. He's been on a roll for a month now. In mid-July Obama had McCain on the ropes. We were almost at the point where Obama could win without ANY swing states. McCain was in a position where he would have to essentially completely sweep all the swing states to win.

No longer. Obama still has a better best case scenario than McCain's best case scenario. But the situation is MUCH more even. Yes, Obama needs far fewer of the swing states to come to his side. But McCain is ahead in almost enough of those states.

. . .

[Obama] can not keep letting Solid states move to Weak states and Weak states move to Lean states, and Lean states to McCain Lean states... which is what he has been doing for the last month.

That does sound a little passive though. This isn't just happening to Obama in isolation, McCain is doing it to him. McCain was a little late getting spun up and started in this campaign, but for the last month he has been firing on all cylinders, while Obama has been sputtering.

 

OK, enough with the graphs. Here's my admittedly subjective view of the way the race stands now. Taking all these poll numbers, churning them around in my fevered brain, and adding a goodly dollop of gut feeling, I've come up with rankings for all states into likely states for Obama and McCain (broken down into "safe" and "probable"), and the tossup states (broken down into "leaning" or "too close to call"). More details can be found in the "data" section at the end of this article.

 

Likely States -- Obama

Obama loses one state (Minnesota) from the safe category, due to more than one poll showing McCain making ground here. Obama currently has 16 safe states, for a total of 204 electoral votes -- CA, CT, DC, HI, IA, IL, MA, MD, ME, NJ, NY, OR, RI, VT, WA, WI.

There are six probable states for Obama, adding two from last time. Minnesota moved down from safe, but Michigan moved up from lean, which as I said is good news indeed. These six states have a total of 60 electoral votes -- DE, MI, MN, NH, NM, PA.

This still gives Obama a total of 264 likely electoral votes, only six shy of winning the whole caboodle. So while the trendlines have been down for Obama this week, he still needs only one medium-to-large tossup state (or two smaller ones) in order to be our next president.

 

Safe States -- McCain

John McCain, due to solidifying support in Texas, improved quite a bit from last time around. He now has 15 safe states, totaling 131 electoral votes -- AL, AR, AZ, ID, KS, KY, LA, MS, NE, OK, SC, TN, TX, UT, WY.

McCain's probable states lost Texas, however, and only added Missouri (up from leaning McCain last time around). He now only has three probable states, for a total of 19 electoral votes -- AK, MO, WV.

Adding these together still only gives McCain 150 electoral votes, though. Although McCain has been doing better, he hasn't even begun to match Obama's lead in this category. When you compare the two, Obama's still got 114 more electoral votes wrapped up than John McCain does. And McCain has to win 120 more electoral votes from the tossup states in order to squeak out a win. Just to put things in perspective.

 

Tossup states

Unfortunately, Obama has no battleground states really leaning his way right now. Until today's poll, I had considered putting Indiana here, but decided to leave it in "too close to call" since there hadn't been a poll done there for almost two months -- and then today's poll confirmed my decision (note: there's a new line in the data section at the bottom which shows the states that haven't been polled in more than a month -- in other words, the states that might be more questionable). Obama lost two states in this category from last time. One was good news (Michigan firming up for him) and one was not (McCain is now ahead in the last poll from Colorado).

John McCain now has three states leaning towards him: Georgia, North Carolina, and South Dakota. Georgia could still be volatile (due to Bob Barr's effect on the race), but McCain has kept his lead here for long enough that I have to put it into the "lean" category for McCain at this point. North Carolina might still be possible for Obama to pull out, but so far he hasn't put it over the top in a single poll yet. Likewise South Dakota. McCain's three states leaning his way have a total of 33 electoral votes among them.

Which brings us to our final group -- the "too close to call" states. There are eight of them, for a total of 91 electoral votes -- CO, FL, IN, MT, NV, ND, OH, VA. Since last time, Colorado was added to the list. If Barack Obama holds all his other states and wins any one of these (with the exception of Montana, Nevada, and North Dakota, where he'd have to win two), he is on his way to the White House. McCain, on the other hand, will have to win every single one of these (well, OK, he could lose either Montana or North Dakota, but still...) to win the election.

So while some of the trendlines are down, and while Obama could certainly use a big bump next week, he should still be seen as the odds-on favorite to win this thing. As long as he can hold on to what he's got, and reverse some of these ominous trendlines.

 

[Electoral Vote Data:]

Barack Obama Likely Easy Wins -- 22 States -- 264 Electoral Votes

Safe States -- 16 States -- 204 Electoral Votes
California (55), Connecticut (7), Hawaii (4), Illinois (21), Iowa (7), Maine (4), Maryland (10), Massachusetts (12), New Jersey (15), New York (31), Oregon (7), Rhode Island (4), Vermont (3), Washington (11), Washington DC (3), Wisconsin (10)

Probable States -- 6 States -- 60 Electoral Votes
Delaware (3), Michigan (17), Minnesota (10), New Hampshire (4), New Mexico (5), Pennsylvania (21)

 

John McCain Likely Easy Wins -- 18 States -- 150 Electoral Votes

Safe States -- 15 States -- 131 Electoral Votes
Alabama (9), Arizona (10), Arkansas (6), Idaho (4), Kansas (6), Kentucky (8), Louisiana (9), Mississippi (6), Nebraska (5), Oklahoma (7), South Carolina (8), Tennessee (11), Texas (34), Utah (5), Wyoming (3)

Probable States -- 3 States -- 19 Electoral Votes
Alaska (3), Missouri (11), West Virginia (5)

 

Tossup States -- 11 States -- 124 Electoral Votes

Tossup States Leaning Obama -- 0 States -- 0 Electoral Votes
(none)

Tossup States Leaning McCain -- 3 States -- 33 Electoral Votes
Georgia (15), North Carolina (15), South Dakota (3)

Too Close To Call -- 8 States -- 91 Electoral Votes
Colorado (9), Florida (27), Indiana (11), Montana (3), Nevada (5), North Dakota (3), Ohio (20), Virginia (13)

 

States Not Polled In Over A Month

AR (7/14), DC (1/1), DE (2/28), HI (2/28), MD (2/28), RI (6/30), SD (9/9), TN (6/24), UT (6/19), VT (2/28), WV (6/2), WY (5/21)

 

Chris Weigant blogs at: ChrisWeigant.com

 

Comments

[Mildmannered]

Chris:

IMHO, Obama/Biden should focus their time and resources on OH, VA, FL, CO, NM, and NOT in GA, NC, SD, IN, MT, NV and ND. (Biden should be a big help especially in OH, VA, and FL.) (Maybe Richardson can campaign with Obama in CO and NM.) (If Hillary wants to help, OH and VA appear to be great venues.)

See http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-halperin24-2008aug24,0,4111695.story

Time is too short now, the race is too close and 270 is all that is needed.

[RumiSouth]

Now, let me see: McCain and surrogates threw the kitchen sink at Obama, and still couldn't "close the deal." Obama stayed out of the public eye for two weeks while the Olympics had everyone distracted -- that's a strategy to avoid fatigue, straight out of branding workshops -- and now he's going into the convention still ahead, with McCain's convention a guaranteed snooze.

I'm still putting my money on a 150-vote electoral college blowout.

[mvy]

The real issue is that we shouldn't have battleground states and spectator states in the first place. Every vote in every state should be politically relevant and equal in a presidential election.

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 by states possessing a majority of the electoral vote (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states will be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states.

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.

The National Popular Vote bill has been approved by 21 legislative chambers (one house in CO, AR, ME, NC, and WA, and two houses in MD, IL, HI, CA, MA, NJ, RI, and VT). It has been enacted into law in Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and Maryland. These states have 50 (19%) of the 270 electoral votes needed to bring this legislation into effect.

See http://www.NationalPopularVote.com

[Chris Weigant - Huffpost Blogger]

mvy -

What happened in Rhode Island (I think it was RI, could be wrong)? I thought it was passed by the legislature and put on the governor's desk... but never heard whether he vetoed it or signed it?

-CW

[Mildmannered]

Wonder if the National Popular Vote bill would pass constitutional muster if tested.

[perk]

With Sebelius, Ohio blue collar, women and older voters will tilt to Obama. She would be the tipping point here.

[EinChicago]

How come Zogby was all over this site for the past 6 months but is mysteriously absent following yesterday's poll?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26308429/

[Chris Weigant - Huffpost Blogger]

EinChicago -

See comment below to HansUnfeit. I will check out the poll you linked to, but I am mostly interested in state-by-state polling rather than national polling. But I watch them all... maybe I need a twelve-step program or something...

-CW

[Budokan]

This is normal. O will get a bump from the convention then in the week before the election things will narrow down again. What you need to watch for is the weekend before the election; that's when the numbers will start breaking.

This is only August. August is meaningless when it comes to what will happen in November. And so is September for the most part and most of October. You're giving Americans WAY too much credit, thinking that they are paying anything but the slightest attention to either of these campaigns right now.

[Chris Weigant - Huffpost Blogger]

Budokan -

But then what I am supposed to do for the next two months?

(heh heh.)

Seriously, I know that these are early polls, and that (sadly) there is a HUGE percentage of Americans who couldn't name both candidates running right now. But I wanted to see how the polls changed over time, so I came up with a few graphs. I pegged the start date as the last Democratic primary, and the end date as the election, just to see what would happen, for the slice of Americans who are paying (perhaps too much) attention to things now.

-CW

[TommyMcCarthy]

Oddly, I am heartened.....though worried re: slippage in Colorado.....hoping that'll be ameliorated by Sen. O's "convention bounce".

The BEST news? Michigan firms up! (absolutely crucial)...

Sam Minter's abulsme.com is a great resourse.....

However, Minter and I have a fundamental disagreement :

By my lights,... there has never been.. and WILL NEVER BE a point at which Sen. Obama can win without ANY of the battleground states, and I'm glad to see this foolishness exposed as such.

A related topic:....... Ohio swings to McCain is not big news to me........

What WOULD be news is if the Obamites begin to acknowledge a few inconvenient facts on the ground like it,....stowed away some of their vast hubris......

and decided that it MIGHT be worth it to maybe fight just a LITTLE for the votes of those icky people in those icky places that don't just automatically KNOW that Sen. O is THE ONE. Ya know' what the rest of us call America.

In a lefthanded way, the bad news IS the good news.........perhaps it will wake up Sen. O and his handlers to a couple of facts much on MY mind.

1) Next week .....Sen. Obama will be nominated as the candidate of the Democratic Party ....the WHOLE Democratic party..... including the fully ONE HALF of which originally supported someone else

2) "Bestest Most Charismatic NOMINEE EVER"...doesn't get to change ANYTHING in the McCain administration.

Clue: Even Bayh??? Tim Kaine??? Please....
Regards Chris
tm

[Chris Weigant - Huffpost Blogger]

TommyMcCarthy -

Sam Minter's site abulsme.com is pretty cool, which is why I begged him to let me post his graphics on my site as well. He's like me, just an independent guy who takes publicly available polling data and plays around with it to see the state of the race.

Hey, it sure beats watching Karl Rove tell us who is going to win on teevee...

Anyway, I will pass your comments on to Sam.

-CW

[Doofus]

It's stunning, really, that Obama (with 264 likely electoral votes) is six
votes away from assured victory, with an obvious way to get there.

Colorado (9), Florida (27), Indiana (11), Montana (3),
Nevada (5), North Dakota (3), Ohio (20), Virginia (13)

Will it be Colorado ???

Could be we're in a pre-Convention lull. Expect great
things from Denver, and from Colorado, when the time comes.

[Mildmannered]

Hillary and her gang are the problem -- "For Obama, he receives the support of just one in two voters who backed Hillary Clinton in the primaries" See
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26314990/

[Johnnn]

Barack Obama would solve that problem by choosing Hillary for veep. Those of us who still
support Hillary see Obama as a deficient candidate for president on his own. So his running mate is important in any case.

[TommyMcCarthy]

Thanks to "Mildmannered" for the informative MSNBC link.
The most striking number for me??

Obama has a TWENTY POINT LEAD among voters under 35
AND trails by a point with ALL OTHER VOTERS

Repeat:
Under 35..........................Obama..+20
Everyone else ................Obama ..-1

Probably unprecendented...........at minimum............ these are McGovern numbers.
Very distressing........hope Sen. O doesn't pick Eagleton for VP or it's REALLY over.
I wonder if Chris was aware of this?
tm

[Chris Weigant - Huffpost Blogger]

TommyMcCarthy -

Eagleton? (shudder)

Keep in mind, the younger voters are the ones most likely to be undercounted in such polls. Now, normally, this doesn't matter because they don't turn out to vote. This time? Could make all the difference...

-CW

[EinChicago]

Then select HRC as Veep. The solution is simple.

[Johnnn]

The veep picks are going to be very important. Meanwhile, of the 8 too-close-to-call states I would
only give Obama Colorado, because of the water issue that McCain foolishly aggravated the other day, and maybe Virginia. Once again, Florida and Ohio will decide this election, and if Obama and McCain split them, then a few small western states will decide it, i.e., Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada.
I will stick my neck out soon and make my electoral call for you, Chris, as I see it! Good work as usual.

[TommyMcCarthy]

EXACTLY my thinking per "Johnnn" (just above) I believe Florida has been gone for some time...but in any event:
One sign that Obama actually intends to CONTEST this election in places like Ohio and Fla. has ALSO been detailed by "Johnnn" just above that...
Well said both times
tm

[Chris Weigant - Huffpost Blogger]

Johnnn and TommyMcCarthy -

I tend to agree that FL is probably in the McCain column. But I also think that if Obama wins OH, he will likely win the whole thing (even without FL). If Obama picks up MI, OH, and PA, then the race is likely over at that point. Of course, I could be wrong, but that's kind of how I see it shaping up. CO and VA would be great, but they'd be icing on the cake if Obama takes OH.

-CW

[sparkandy]

It's gonna be a very close race, but I think most people believe Obama will win. Even the many, many people I know who are not voting for him are convinced that he'll win. That perception alone may boost his numbers

[HansUnfeit]

All your fancy graphs and assumptions do little more than give legitimacy to the weekly AOL straw poll, which for some reason (elitism?) is ignored by you folks. Hundreds of thousands of computer literate people who use cell phones instead of landlines and cheerfully admit they are not geeks or policy wonks, take this poll. These are real bread-and-butter people. You know, salt of the earth types who get up each morning and go to tedious, uninspiring jobs in order to make ends meet.

Why do you guys ignore the obvious??

[Chris Weigant - Huffpost Blogger]

HansUnfeit -

I don't know who "you folks" are... I'm just me. While everyone has their favorite polls, I selected electoral-vote.com to have one source of data for these columns. But I watch all kinds of polls from all kinds of sources. Please provide a link to the AOL straw poll, and I promise I will check it out.

-CW

[BillZBubb]

Look at the 2004 election results. 2008 will be a replay of that. The same fear tactics the Republicans used then will work on the same red state chuckleheads. For all the dreamers out there thinking the red state / blue state divide is a myth, take a good look at the charts.

Again, Ohio is the key. If Obama can win it, he'll win a squeaker and get the White House. If McCain wins Ohio, we get four more years of McSame.

RIght now, Obama is doing everything in his power to lose this thing. Hopefully, he'll wake up before it is too late.

[Doofus]

For the moment, the point of the exercise is to find a way to win
without (say) Ohio. If it's true that the 'unknowns' are all on this list:

Colorado (9), Florida (27), Indiana (11), Montana (3),
Nevada (5), North Dakota (3), Ohio (20), Virginia (13),

that 264 votes are 'solid', so all it will take is 6 more votes to win, then
it might just as well be Colorado, and it won't matter about the others.

At least, that's my fantasy, and it's a good one.