This week has been yet another time of major change as we close in on Elec­tion Day. For the first time in a long time, my Elec­toral Col­lege pre­dic­tion has shifted.

What’s the lat­est news? Let’s dive in and see.

National Polls

In the national pop­u­lar vote matchup of Pres­i­dent Barack Obama ver­sus Repub­li­can nom­i­nee Mitt Rom­ney, the Repub­li­can has main­tained his Real­Clear­Pol­i­tics lead from a week ago, though it has shrunk a hair. Gallup’s track­ing poll is the only thing hold­ing Rom­ney above Obama, and Gallup is suf­fi­ciently far from the con­sen­sus as to be con­sid­ered an out­lier. His­tor­i­cally, when Gallup is far from the con­sen­sus, Gallup is the errant poll­ster. Investor’s Busi­ness Daily and Ras­mussen both indi­cate a tie at the national level. The President’s posi­tion is now two points behind Pres­i­dent George W. Bush’s on this date eight years ago, and eight points below his posi­tion four years ago.

After the first debate, half of Obama’s favor­a­bil­ity polls had him below 50 per­cent. In the past week (and all before the sec­ond debate), they rose again above that magic thresh­old. Romney’s favor­a­bil­ity polls have con­tin­ued to improve, and he now matches Obama. Obama held a three to five point edge over Rom­ney all year until this week. The two can­di­dates are now tied in this metric.

Obama’s job approval polls show him about 1.5 points worse than Bush was in 2004.

Like last week, the national polls sug­gest that Obama might lose the upcom­ing election.

As of yes­ter­day, Intrade had Obama at 62, unchanged from last week.

Over­all, things on the national level con­tinue look sketchy for the President.

Early Vot­ing

Early vot­ing has spread to 49 states this week. The green states are accept­ing absen­tee bal­lots, but not early in-​​person bal­lots, while the gold states are accept­ing both.

All states other than Penn­syl­va­nia are at least tak­ing absen­tee bal­lots. Six­teen states allow in-​​person vot­ing today; of the bat­tle­ground states, this includes Ohio, Iowa, Nevada, and North Car­olina.

The Elec­toral College

Here’s what the Elec­toral Col­lege looks like, based on cur­rent polling data*:

Here are the key states with new data since last time:

  • North Car­olina was polled once in the past week. Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling saw Rom­ney ahead by two points, but their left bias trans­lates to some­thing more akin to four points. Of those request­ing absen­tee bal­lots, 54 per­cent are reg­is­tered Repub­li­cans. North Car­olina moves to “Likely Rom­ney” as the clock winds down. The Rom­ney cam­paign feels the same way; they pulled their adver­tis­ing dol­lars out of the state ear­lier this week, in favor of spend­ing more money else­where. Intraders give Rom­ney an 80 per­cent chance of car­ry­ing the Tarheel State, up seven points from last week.
  • Florida got polled four times in the past week. Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling, Ras­mussen, CNN/​Opinion Research, and FOX News saw Rom­ney up by one, five, one, and three points, respec­tively. The over­all weighted and cor­rected aver­age trans­lates to a three point lead for Rom­ney, but they’re trend­ing in Romney’s direc­tion. Absen­tee bal­lots have been com­ing in; about four per­cent of the 2008 total have already been cast, with Repub­li­cans out­vot­ing Democ­rats by a four point mar­gin. Florida moves to “Likely Rom­ney”, based on the con­sis­tency of pro-​​Romney polls in the Sun­shine State, the trend in Romney’s direc­tion, and the sys­temic advan­tage Rom­ney already enjoys. Florid­i­ans have been able to vote for nearly three weeks. Intraders give Rom­ney a 65 per­cent chance of pick­ing up Florida’s 29 elec­toral votes, up four from last week.
  • Vir­ginia was polled this past week by Amer­i­can Research Group and Ras­mussen, who saw a one and three point Rom­ney lead, respec­tively. Rasmussen’s adjusts down to two. It’s not that Obama has been trend­ing down so much as the unde­cid­eds in the Old Domin­ion are break­ing heav­ily for Rom­ney, accord­ing to recent polls. All in all, it’s close enough to keep Vir­ginia a “Tossup”, in part because Vir­gini­ans have been able to vote by absen­tee bal­lot for a month now, and Obama was ahead for much of that time. The Intrade mar­ket has Rom­ney barely ahead, at 51 per­cent, down two from a week ago.
  • Col­orado had two polls pub­lished this week. WeAskAmer­ica found Rom­ney ahead by a point, while Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling, the only one to poll after the sec­ond debate, saw Obama up by three, which adjusts to some­thing more akin to a tie. There’s still no evi­dence that Romney’s debate bump has faded here. Col­orado stays a “Tossup”. Intraders agree with me; the Col­orado mar­ket is tied between the two can­di­dates. This rep­re­sents a four point shift in Obama’s direc­tion this past week.
  • New Hamp­shire was polled this week by Suffolk/​7News, who saw the race as tied, Ras­mussen, who saw Obama up by one, and Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling, who saw Rom­ney up by one. Rasmussen’s poll adjusts to a two point lead, and PPP’s adjusts to three, but on bal­ance the three polls aren’t enough to move the Gran­ite State a col­umn left; it stays “Tossup”. On Intrade, Obama has the lead at 62 per­cent, up four from last week.
  • Ohio was polled twice this past week. Sur­veyUSA, Ras­mussen, and FOX News saw leads for Obama by three, one, and three points, respec­tively. Includ­ing the house biases, that keeps Obama nar­rowly in the lead. Ohio still sits just on the “Leans Obama” side of the bor­der with “Tossup”. Buck­eyes have been able to vote for three weeks now. The Intrade mar­ket gives the edge to Obama, at 62 per­cent, up three from a week ago. But Ohio’s mar­ket is one of the few com­pet­i­tive states where the sum of the two can­di­dates don’t add up to 100 per­cent; this mar­ket adds up to 101.7.
  • Iowa was polled four times this week. Amer­i­can Research Group saw the race tied, while WeAskAmer­ica found Obama ahead by three, and NBC/​Wall Street Journal/​Marist saw an Obama lead of eight points. On the other hand, Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling saw a one point Rom­ney lead, which would typ­i­cally adjust to three.  This is a real mess to deci­pher. Marist and PPP are the only two to cover days after the sec­ond Pres­i­den­tial debate, and they dif­fer by nine unad­justed, and 11 adjusted, points. Both diverge from the his­tor­i­cal trend and each other, which sug­gests that they’re both out­liers, though Marist by a bit more than PPP. I think this con­verges on Obama up by two or three points, so Iowa remains “Leans Obama”, a posi­tion it has held dur­ing the entire time bal­lots have been able to be cast. On Intrade, Obama has the lead here, with a 63 per­cent chance, up three from last week.
  • Nevada got polled again this week, this time by the Las Vegas Review Jour­nal/​SurveyUSA and Ras­mussen. This time, both saw small Obama leads. Ras­mussen found the race tied. Obama’s lead crept up this week. This is a tough call for the model, which sees the fol­low­ing: grow­ing lead for Obama, lit­tle time before Elec­tion Day, and yet a rel­a­tively small lead. This is what has led to the whip­saw of “Leans Obama” two weeks ago, “Tossup” last week, and now “Leans Obama” again, and moves sev­eral states down this list. Intraders still have faith in the Pres­i­dent here; he is trad­ing at 69 per­cent, down a point from a week ago.
  • Wis­con­sin got polled this week by Mar­quette Uni­ver­sity, who saw Obama ahead by one point, and NBC/​Wall Street Jour­nal/​Marist, who came away with Obama up by six. This is a tough call. Every poll after the first debate, except for this lat­est Marist poll, showed Obama up by one to three points. But, like their Iowa poll, Marist’s is the only one to include peo­ple sur­veyed after the sec­ond debate. I’m leav­ing Wis­con­sin as “Leans Obama”, but we should look for a trend here and in Iowa. Intraders remain con­fi­dent in Obama here, trad­ing him at 68 per­cent, down one from a week ago.
  • Penn­syl­va­nia was polled three times this week. Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling, the Morn­ing Call, and Quin­nip­iac saw Obama leads of seven, four, and four points, respec­tively. That puts Obama in the lead by some­where between four and five points; that this lead has remained con­sis­tent as the debate bump faded in the Key­stone State means we keep it at “Likely Obama”. Penn­syl­va­nia does move one step up this list this week, though. The mar­kets at Intrade agree with this, putting the Pres­i­dent at 79 per­cent, down four from a week ago.
  • Michi­gan was polled once this week, the day after the sec­ond debate, by EPIC-​​MRA, who saw a six point lead for Obama. This is sig­nif­i­cant, because last week they found Obama up by only three. On the other hand, the con­sen­sus of the four poll­sters last week was more like five or six. Regard­less, Michi­gan stays “Likely Obama”, but not by enough to be off the list entirely. At Intrade, Obama is trad­ing at 85 per­cent here, up four from last week.
  • Con­necti­cut makes this list this week, not because the out­come is par­tic­u­larly in ques­tion, but rather because the out­come has been sug­gested at var­i­ous times to be in ques­tion. The two polls that came out this week should put this to rest. Siena and Hart­ford Courant/​UConn both show com­mand­ing leads for Obama. At no time this year has a poll shown Obama ahead by fewer than seven points, and these lat­est two show him ahead by twice that much. Con­necti­cut is “Likely Obama”, and bar­ring a huge shift between now and the end of the month, we won’t see Con­necti­cut on the list again. This heavy Obama lean is reflected at Intrade, where Obama is given a 90 per­cent chance of win­ning the state.

Three states shifted this week. Only Nevada moved one col­umn to the left, putting six more elec­toral votes in the “Leans Obama” zone. Florida and North Car­olina moved from “Leans Rom­ney” to “Likely Rom­ney”. This is the first time states moved into “Likely Rom­ney” since we started this series. Based on the model, Obama has a prob­a­ble 281 elec­toral votes, down 22 from last week, but still enough to win. It’s been more than three con­sec­u­tive months in which Obama could lose all tossups and still stay in the White House.

The Vice Pres­i­den­tial debate didn’t have a vis­i­ble impact in the polls, and it’s still too early to dis­cern the broader impacts, if any, from the sec­ond Pres­i­den­tial debate.

Con­clu­sion

The national polls show the race effec­tively tied, while the state tal­lies con­tinue to indi­cate a com­fort­able Obama lead. His­tor­i­cally, the state-​​by-​​state tal­lies have been more accu­rate than the national ones, which leads me to believe that Obama still has the edge.

What if I’m wrong, and the national num­bers are right? If so, then we should shift the states about two points to the right. Rom­ney would pick up Vir­ginia, Col­orado, and New Hamp­shire, giv­ing him 261 elec­toral votes. Rom­ney would then need ten more elec­toral votes. In this sce­nario, Ohio would be an up-​​the-​​middle tossup, and would there­fore be to the 2012 elec­tion what Florida was to the 2000 elec­tion. While the sys­temic forces in Ohio aren’t as strong as they are in Florida, they are prob­a­bly enough to push Ohio to Rom­ney if the national num­bers are right, a fur­ther reflec­tion of 2000.

If I had to pre­dict an Elec­toral Col­lege result based on the model, which puts more empha­sis on the state polls, I’d shift things a hair from last week. Both tossups would move into Romney’s col­umn. This would give Obama 281, and Rom­ney 257, the first change in over two months.

How do you feel about these pre­dic­tions? Do you dif­fer on them? If so, how, where, and why?

Author’s note: The map erro­neously had New Hamp­shire as “Leans Obama” instead of “Tossup”. I regret the error.

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