It's official. Election Day has finally arrived, and with it my deadline to report my take and prediction on what will be the outcome of this long and very intense 2012 election cycle.
I kept on pushing off my analysis of the race, since there's almost no chance that I should be right on every prediction that I will make, so why should I taint my sterling reputation as "the best predictor of 2012"? And why should I tarnish my success rate of 99% accuracy? (You can look up my past predictions on twitter @Chulentup)
But after a lot of pleadings of friends and relatives, I decided that I can not falter on my job and I'm not allowed to disappoint all of those waiting to refresh themselves with my perspectives.
I'll just state a clarification here: there will be a few of my prediction which basically hangs on just a guess, literally. This election has become such a tight race that I don't think there's any pundit who didn't rely on a few guesses here and there to make his predictions. Even lary sabbato from the crystal ball said that there are three states where he can't say who'll win there, and he basically devided it in half for Obama and half for Romney. But I will try to make my best educated guesses here.
And so, here it comes...
ELECTION 2012 FINAL PREDICTIONS!
I'll start of with the popular vote. I project that mitt Romney will win the nationwide popular vote with a margin of 1.5 to 2% points.
Lets walk over to the electoral college predictions. Ill start with the easiest states to predict, and finish with hardest and tightest contest. Obama is starting this race with 190 electorals VS. mitt romney's 191. But I'll right away put back Minnesota in obamas column. Even tho the Romney campaign has made a late play in that state, I don't think that he has any chance of winning it. My perspective is that they did it only to bring up some momentum talk and nothing more. I give for obama a 99% chance to win it. Which brings Obama up to 200 EV's.
after Minnesota, I'm putting back Michigan in the Obama column. Not so strongly as Minnesota, but its very hard for me to think that Romney will stage an upset there - a lot of this, because of the auto bailout which "supposedly" benefitted Michigan. I give Obama an 85% chance of winning Michigan. Which brings him up to 216 EV's.
now lets start with the real battleground states.
First up is North Carolina with its 15 electoral votes.
I project that this will easily go for mitt Romney. I actually predicted both North Carolina and Nevada long before the pundits decided in whose camp they'll place it. I think that this will be an easy pickup for Romney. 1. After all, Obama won the state with only 13,000 votes out of 4.3 million. 2. The early vote numbers there favor Romney. 3. North Carolina is a relatively republican state. 4. A few weeks before Barack Obama announced his support for gay marriages, voters in north Carolina flocked to the polls to defeat a marriage amendment with about 60-40%. 5. Obama basically conceded that state already. He wasn't there since the democratic convention which was held in Charlotte. I give mitt Romney a 97% chance of winning this state.
Second up will be the state of Florida with its grand prize of 29 electoral votes.
I'm easily awarding it for mitt Romney. 1. Early voting numbers favor him there VS. '08. 2. The polls are fairly strong for him there (the last couple of days it tightened a bit, but I think that it was just some sandy noise which started evaporating already. 3. The largest number of seniors live there, and they favor Romney with double digits. I give mitt Romney an 82% chance of winning it.
Third comes Nevada. I'll award it's 6 electorals for Obama.
Very early and quite easily I declared this state for Obama. Yes, it always baffled me how a state with a 14.1% unemployment rate, a sky rocketing foreclosure rates, and around 12% of Nevada is Mormons, can not possibly go for Romney with a landslide, but apparently that's not the case. I don't really know why, but the facts are that Obama won the state in '08 with a wide enough margin that he can afford himself to lose a lot of his voters and still hold the state. 2. Romney was tied in a few polls but he never led in any poll there. 3. Obama has enough of an early vote advantage that mitt Romney will need to have a rock solid turnout on Election Day to overcome it. Very hard. I give Obama an 83% chance of winning Nevada.
The prediction game is starting to get a bit harder. But we'll go on.
Next stop will be Colorado. I'm giving its 9 EV's for mitt Romney.
Not such an easy award, I know that Obama led in quite a lot of polls there. But I'll consider a few other things. 1. The republicans are leading in early voting there, a reversal of four years ago. 2. Colorado on the presidential level is quite a republican state. 3. Romney had his fair share of polls there. I'm giving a 60% chance for Romney to win this Rocky Mountain state.
Horses and bayonets here we come. Virginia.
When Suffolk university president came out with his statement that he won't poll North Carolina, Florida and Virginia anymore because its Romney countries, I laughed. I worried all along that Virginia will be tight, and I still believe that it will be very tight. But I will place Virginias 13 EV's for mitt Romney.
1. Virginia is a republican state. 2008 was the first year since 1964 that they voted for a democrat. Although the demographics are changing there, I still firmly believe that it's still in the republican category. 2. There's not much early voting ongoing in Virginia. Therefore a benefit for Romney. 3. Obama got a lot of good polls there, but so did Romney have a very healthy share of polls there.
I give for mitt Romney a 56% chance on winning Virginia.
The independent state of New Hampshire is here.
NH has a small electoral prize of 4. And I also have a smaller confidence here, but my small confidence will award this small prize for mitt Romney.
A few reasons. 1. Romney had quite a few good polls there. Even UMUR-UNH which gave for Obama a 15% lead just a month ago showed the race tied last week. Yes, yesterday they rebounded with a 3% Obama lead, but this could be some sandy noise or just their unpredictable Obama lean. 2. Romney is a local there. He has a summer home there. 3. The results from dixville notch came in already, and it showed a tie 5-5. But Lets spin it a little. In 2008 Obama got 71.4% of the vote there versus this year which he only got 50 percent. The republican in 08 got only 28.6% there, vs. today where he got 50 percent. Looks cool, ha? 4. My favourite 2012 election surrogate was John sununu, former New Hampshire governor. And if he said that mitt Romney will win New Hampshire with 2-3%, he definitely will win it! 'Nuff said. I give mitt a 55% chance in NH.
We travel over to Pennsylvania. A big prize of 20 EV's
This state involves quite a lot of guessing. After all nobody talked of this state till 2 weeks ago, therefore there wasn't a whole bunch of polling there, and even less punditry talk. But let's maze our way around.
I will never know who gave to drink the Pennsylvania cool aid for the republicans. And the problem is that they keep on drinking it election after election, and by the same margin as their cool aid drinking they keep on losing it election after election. My suggestion to the republicans is: get it out of your head. Pennsylvania ain't a swing state! But... Here comes the but... This year it is a bit different. (Ye, i also drank some of that lately...)
1. The last few polls give for mitt Romney a considerably good chance there. From a tie to a minus of three points which is within the margin of error. 2. I think that Pennsylvania is the only state that Romney had more advertising there than Obama; because as I said,nobody looked on that state before the Denver debate a month ago, and then mitt Romney got flooded with cash much more than Obama. 3. We at Chulentup sent down a reporter in Pennsylvania this Sunday by the huge 30,000 person Romney rally, and we found an awful lot of democrats there saying that they plan on voting for Romney cuz there're disappointed of the last four years. The mood by the democrats is not upbeat at all overthere.
Hence, after all said I have to leave Pennsylvania in the democratic column. I just don't have THAT much evidence to move root it over to the Romney column. But I do think that there's a really good possibility for an upset there from mitt Romney. I'll give a 52% chance for Obama in PA.
Cover your nose, the farms are coming. Iowa.
A very very hard state for me to predict. The polls are all over the place with a majority giving a victory for Obama there, but quite a few giving it for Romney with a tiny lead.
But I'll consider a few more things. 1. All four big Iowa newspapers endorsed mitt Romney. Yes, I know that newspaper endorsements matter almost nothing if not nothing at all; but the Des Moines register endorsement was a bit different this year. First it made some waves with a mitt Romney statement before their editorial board that he does not know of any legislation regarding abortion that he intends to pass. It made the news, and of course the democrats -with no record to run on- pounced on this statement which allowed them to bring social issues like abortion and contraception Back to the campaign. Then came obamas turn. Obama gave his interview for their editorial board, but he insisted that they shouldn't release a transcript of it. Before you knew it, the papers chief editor scathingly criticised the Obama campaign on their blog, for not letting a worthful interview go public. After these two high profile debacles, they gave out their decision to endorse mitt Romney. And so it got quite a lot of attention. Everyone also noticed that its the first time in 40 years that they endorsed a republican for president! Which obviously made the rounds. So there's a very reasonable chance that these four Iowa newspaper endorsements did sway some voters to Romney. 2. The democrats have a lead there in early voting but its quite down from 2008. If Romney has a very healthy turnout today, he can win it very closely. I think that the contest will be very close there. Maybe even resembling the republican primary where they gave a 13 vote victory for rick Santorum.
With a 50.5% chance, I'll give the states 6 EV's for... Mitt Romney.
Buckle up... Theres A lot of turbulence coming up.
The time has come for the two most unpredictable states this year. Ohio, we mean you! Wisconsin, we mean you too!
We'll start with Ohio, cuz the conventional punditry wisdom goes that no republican can win the presidency without winning Ohio. I will dare to disagree.
Lets see what's going on over there. 1. Ohio got an awful lot of polling this cycle, and there was almost no poll that gave the lead for Romney. Yup, I know all those people who think that the polls are very inaccurate. I hate to agree with conspirators and those kind of stuff, but I have to admit that they have some really good points about these polls, and I indeed think that these people will come out as mostly right, but... When there's almost no polls giving the lead for Romney in Ohio, it is very hard for me to put this state in his column. 2. Even those articles who are quoting insider republican talk, are saying that their internal polls show a very tied race; vs. the public polls and the Obama campaign saying that their internals show a bigger lead for the president. 3. Romney got badly beaten about his auto bailout stance there, with Ohio benefitting from the bailout quite a bit. No, I don't mean romneys actual stance about the bailouts; I mean what the president lied about romneys bailout stances! But Obama tainted the Ohio airwaves a whole summer with fabricated lies about romneys bailout stances, and effectively it took a heavy toll on the Romney campaign, leaving it in a decline amongst white voters and independents vs his national stances among them. (BTW, I think that Romney benefitted a bit from his jeep ad airing in Ohio the last 2 weeks. Yes, the ad is a lie at worst or misleading at its best. But the Romney campaign finally learned that as they got knocked from the Obama bailout lies, so can they do the same. And so they did, but a bit too late) 4. There's no party registration in ohio's early voting. Therefore there's no chances of knowing who is stronger there. The republicans and the democrats continue to throw around numbers which favor them, and there's no way of knowing who is correct there. Yes, I actually stumbled upon some numbers today on Election Day which shows that turnout in Obama counties is down vs four years ago and vice versa, yet I still can't verify those stuff.
The election in ohio will be really close. It's really hard for me to choose a winner there, but if you push me... I'll have to give ohio's 18 EV's for Obama. A 50.1% chance for Obama.
Hello Cheese badgers, hello Wisconsin.
More difficulties coming up. We'll start with the case for Barack Obama. 1. The polls were awfully bad for Romney lately in Wisconsin. Except for Rasmussen showing a tie in this race, there isn't any pollster giving it to Romney. There are quite a few polls there giving for Obama a nice comfortable lead there. I don't think that there could be any twisting or turning around this. The polls will have to be very heavy skewed for Obama in order for Romney to win this thing. 2. Wisconsin hasn't voted for a republican president since 1984. Simple.
But let's move to the Romney case. 1. The polls very much under sampled the republicans in the 2010 walker recall. Almost no one estimated such a big lead for him. There's big reason to suggest that this is the case this year too. 2. The airwaves didn't get saturated all over the summer with anti Romney ads because nobody thought that Wisconsin will become a swing state, therefore romneys image didn't get so tainted there. When the realisation struck that Wisconsin is in play, mitt Romney had already more money than Obama did,after Obama spent much of his money during the summer. Thereby rendering unsuccessful obamas mission to paint Romney as a ruthless corporate big money guy. 3. The republicans have a superior ground game in Wisconsin which they built up during the walker recall and proved itself to be very successful. Their ground game there is much better than the democrats. The Obama camp invested most of its time in establishing a ground game in Ohio, but Wisconsin slipped under their radar. 4. Mitt romneys vice president paul ryan comes from wisconsin. plus he presents a big democratic district there, and hes well liked there. All which can bring an advantage for the Romney camp. 5. My guy thr RNC director rience priebus is from Wisconsin. I love him. Enough said?
These are two very good cases, both are not to be discounted easily, but I still have to make a pick; therefore I'll place wisconsin's 10 EV's in mitt romneys column. But only with a 50.1% chance!
http://t.co/1O312V6G
(You can very much turn around Ohio and Wisconsin. It's both THAT close)
This brings us to the last poor single electoral vote of Maine.
As known there are two states in the US which render their electoral votes as the outcomes of their congressional districts. Those two are Nebraska and Maine.
I don't think that there's ever been an instance where these electoral votes got split between the candidates, but there's a big chance that this year it will indeed happen.
Obama has a comfortable lead in Maine but not so much in its 2'nd congressional district. The second district voters resemble quite the New Hampshire style voter, (and if you still remember, I put NH into the Romney column) but there's almost no stuff on which I can count on regarding this. There wasn't any punditry talk on this lonely CD, there wasn't any public polls released either (except for PPP rubbish which doesn't count by me). Therefore I cannot make any clever assumptions on what will happen over there. There was no pundit whatsoever which took away this single EV from the Obama column, but I will diverge and say that it's an equal 50-50 chance for either of them to win this EV. But... My gut feeling will lift it over the gate,and put it quietly into the Romney column.
http://t.co/i0awsi5
Thereby giving for mitt Romney 278 electoral votes against 260 for Barack Obama, which will automatically render the presidency of the United States for Mitt Romney!!
FIREWORKS FOR THE 45'TH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA...
MITT ROMNEY!!!
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