Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Monday, November 5, 2012
One Day More...
Could it be that by this time Wednesday morning I will be celebrating the victory of President-Elect Romney? Or will I be bemoaning another four years of the Marxist-in-Chief?
Call me optimistic, but I think it'll be the former. My real fear at this point is that Obama will do something to halt Romney's victory, not that Romney won't actually win. Obama apparently has teams of lawyers poised across the country ready to challenge any result other than an Obama win.
So, essentially, Mitt's gotta get not just a win, but a decisive one, or we could be here all week just waiting for O's lawyers to somehow conjure enough fake votes to total a win.
If it sounds like I think that most Americans have turned away from Obama, that's because I do. Romney may not have been their number one choice to replace Obama. He certainly wasn't mine. But my fear of his campaign; that he would be soft, capitulating and unwilling to fight, like McCain, have proven to be ungrounded. Romney/Ryan have run a very good campaign. If they'd run a fantastic one, like Allen West or others who didn't run probably would have, there would be no one questioning Obama's loss. The race would already have been called for the Republicans. As it stands, Mitt could still end up with a comfortable victory. America is sick and tired of Obama, and it's only uncertainty that Romney can be trusted more that keeps him from slaughtering Obama in the polls.
How can I say that when the polls either show a tied race or show Obama slightly ahead? Simple; most, if not all, of the polls that say that are following the electoral model from 2008, and in many cases juicing it up even moreso.
The Dems enjoyed a D+7 electorate in 2008. They've never had a turn-out like that, and it's not too hard to see what brought them out; they weren't just voting for a president but for the first black president, who was made out by the media (and his own campaign) to be the second coming.
Nobody thinks this electorate is really gonna be D+7. For one thing, the 2010 gubernatorial and congressional electorate was D+0 (even), and we shellacked the Dems' hold on Congress and our state governments, which should say something. Anger toward the left has only risen since then. Disgust with the current administration has climbed and climbed. Bottom line, though, is that Republican turnout is predicted by many pollsters to be MUCH higher tomorrow than in 2008, and that's very easy to believe since even these juiced polls are recording that Romney is leading Obama by double-digits among independents, and enthusiasm among those voting for Romney is a good 15% higher than among those voting for Obama. So how do these polls still manage to call Obama the winner, or at worst, say they're tied or it's too close to call?
Simple; because all these polls are over-sampling Democrats. Some of these polls have gone as wingnut-crazy left as to deliver a D+11 or even D+13 sample! That's insane. No one, not even these pollsters, honestly believe that's the electorate we're gonna get. But they keep touting it. Nate Silver, former Kos blogger (bias? surely not), is deliberately using the 2008 model to predict, uh, predictably, a comfortable Obama win. Huff 'n Puff Post and MostlySaysNothingButCrap can't stop chatting up Silver's predictions and the handful of juiced polls, mostly from Reuters, AP, CNN, CBS and other news outlets that couldn't be more obviously hoping for an Obama victory, just certain that because these polls, along with Public Policy Polling and Marist, both run by left wing think tanks like Media Matters for America, show victory for their side, that they simply can't lose.
They also tout the assurance of Joe Biden, David Axelrod, Stephanie Cutter, Jen Psaki, et al, that they feel confident of victory, as if that means something. What else are campaign officials going to say? Oh, we're so scared, we think we might lose?
Meanwhile, Gallup polls and Rasmussen polls, neither of whom over-sampled Democrats, show a pretty clear Romney victory. Michael Barone, a pundit who predicts polls as part of his job and is rarely wrong, predicts a landslide Romney victory. Ditto George Will, Karl Rove (say what you will, he predicted Obama's 2008 win), Joe Scarborough (he's never liked Romney) and numerous others, many of whom have no horse in this race, and some who were even saying they want Obama to win but have to be realistic. Those saying just as surely that they think Obama's going to win? The anchors from MostlySaysNothingButCrap. Bias? Surely not.
Right now, the "battleground" states are New Hampshire (4 electoral votes), Virginia (13), North Carolina (15), Florida (29), Pennsylvania (20), Ohio (18), Iowa (6), Colorado (9) and Nevada (6).
Now, of these "battleground" states, Romney is leading or tied (according to those Dem-heavy polls) in Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Ohio and Colorado. 80% of Coloradans have already voted, and the state is looking decisively Romney-red, so I'm giving it to him. Again, those Dem-heavy polls have Obama just squeaking by with a narrow victory in New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Iowa and Nevada. Some polls put him behind in Iowa and ALL polls show Romney leading independents there. Personally I think Obama will lose Iowa.
I also think that the evangelical vote, which a lot of pollsters have ignored, will swing widely in Mitt's favor, thanks to Obamacare's contraception mandate, which could easily deliver Ohio and Iowa to Romney. Obama's hold on New Hampshire is tenuous enough that it could easily slip through his grasp, as many are predicting.
So of those "battleground" states, the smart money is on Mitt taking all of those states with the possible exceptions of Pennsylvania and Nevada. HOWEVER! New polling, plus the fact that the Obama campaign sees the need to still campaign and run ads in Pennsylvania, as well as (I'm not kidding), Michigan, Wisconson and MINNESOTA (again, not kidding!) shows that those states are in play as well! Romney/Ryan are campaigning and running ads in those states, which they would not do if they didn't see those states as being in play. Even realclearpolitics.com lists them as toss-ups, even if some pollsters won't go that far. Mitt leads independents in all these states comfortably, plus Wisconsin's recall vote last year went to Scott Walker, when most polls showed him behind, says that Wisconsin may be going more red than we've previously thought. Could Mitt take those states as well? I'm not counting on it, but he could take one or two of them.
But let's be generous. Let's just say that all the states currently leaning O's way (even though his lead in all of them is less than 5 points, or he's losing or tied, even in the juiced polls) will go to him. Let's just give him Pennsylvania, Nevada, and the Northern Firewall of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. That still leaves 146 electoral votes up for grabs and Mitt seems to be heading toward winning 72 of them, while Obama has 30 of them within his grasp. 18 of them are still genuinely up for grabs, and whoever wins them, wins the election. For those keeping count, I've just awarded Obama 257 electoral votes and Mitt 263. If O takes Ohio, he'll win with 275 electoral votes. If Mitt does, he wins with 281. Hell, let's be super-generous and give Iowa to Obama. Still it all comes down to who wins Ohio.
And Mitt is easily in a place where he could.
I'll be honest; I think I'm being too generous to Obama. I don't think he'll take Iowa OR Ohio. I also think he stands to lose Wisconsin and New Hampshire. His lead in NH, even with juiced polls, is too slim, and anecdotal evidence like crowd size at speeches, number of Romney/Ryan signs vs. Obama/Biden signs, lead among independents, and other stuff it's hard to totally calculate, we could potentially be looking at a Romney landslide. For that matter, knowing how juiced the polls are in Obama's favor, if we give Romney every state where Obama's lead is less than 5 points, Mitt wins with 337 electoral votes! Some pundits are even predicting it WILL happen.
I won't go that far. I'll stick to a Romney win with 281 electoral votes, 275 at minimum, with minimum 53% of the popular vote. But I know if the vote is any closer than that, Obama will contest it. He will not go quietly.
Four years ago, I started blogging because I was angry that America could have fallen so far that we would willingly vote in a man so obviously hateful of America and all she stands for, just because he was black. Wednesday morning, when I type either a large "YES!" I will probably stop blogging, or slow down significantly. Life just keeps getting in the way of blogging. I'm getting married, I have children, and I have a career. But if O keeps his stranglehold on America, I will not give up the fight. If anything, my blogging will increase.
I will leave you with one thought; Right up to the day of voting, the 1980 race was dubbed "too close to call". Reagan won 485 electoral votes. In 1984 the media speculated that he might have more of a challenge, and lose some states. He won again, this time with 524. George W. Bush, who was neck and neck with Gore, won with 285 electoral votes. The media suggested he would be trounced by Kerry, but he won again with 292. Every time a Republican wins, it's to the surprise of the media, who insisted the polls proved a Democrat win, or at least a toss-up.
We'll see you back here Wednesday morning with the results.
Call me optimistic, but I think it'll be the former. My real fear at this point is that Obama will do something to halt Romney's victory, not that Romney won't actually win. Obama apparently has teams of lawyers poised across the country ready to challenge any result other than an Obama win.
So, essentially, Mitt's gotta get not just a win, but a decisive one, or we could be here all week just waiting for O's lawyers to somehow conjure enough fake votes to total a win.
If it sounds like I think that most Americans have turned away from Obama, that's because I do. Romney may not have been their number one choice to replace Obama. He certainly wasn't mine. But my fear of his campaign; that he would be soft, capitulating and unwilling to fight, like McCain, have proven to be ungrounded. Romney/Ryan have run a very good campaign. If they'd run a fantastic one, like Allen West or others who didn't run probably would have, there would be no one questioning Obama's loss. The race would already have been called for the Republicans. As it stands, Mitt could still end up with a comfortable victory. America is sick and tired of Obama, and it's only uncertainty that Romney can be trusted more that keeps him from slaughtering Obama in the polls.
How can I say that when the polls either show a tied race or show Obama slightly ahead? Simple; most, if not all, of the polls that say that are following the electoral model from 2008, and in many cases juicing it up even moreso.
The Dems enjoyed a D+7 electorate in 2008. They've never had a turn-out like that, and it's not too hard to see what brought them out; they weren't just voting for a president but for the first black president, who was made out by the media (and his own campaign) to be the second coming.
Nobody thinks this electorate is really gonna be D+7. For one thing, the 2010 gubernatorial and congressional electorate was D+0 (even), and we shellacked the Dems' hold on Congress and our state governments, which should say something. Anger toward the left has only risen since then. Disgust with the current administration has climbed and climbed. Bottom line, though, is that Republican turnout is predicted by many pollsters to be MUCH higher tomorrow than in 2008, and that's very easy to believe since even these juiced polls are recording that Romney is leading Obama by double-digits among independents, and enthusiasm among those voting for Romney is a good 15% higher than among those voting for Obama. So how do these polls still manage to call Obama the winner, or at worst, say they're tied or it's too close to call?
Simple; because all these polls are over-sampling Democrats. Some of these polls have gone as wingnut-crazy left as to deliver a D+11 or even D+13 sample! That's insane. No one, not even these pollsters, honestly believe that's the electorate we're gonna get. But they keep touting it. Nate Silver, former Kos blogger (bias? surely not), is deliberately using the 2008 model to predict, uh, predictably, a comfortable Obama win. Huff 'n Puff Post and MostlySaysNothingButCrap can't stop chatting up Silver's predictions and the handful of juiced polls, mostly from Reuters, AP, CNN, CBS and other news outlets that couldn't be more obviously hoping for an Obama victory, just certain that because these polls, along with Public Policy Polling and Marist, both run by left wing think tanks like Media Matters for America, show victory for their side, that they simply can't lose.
They also tout the assurance of Joe Biden, David Axelrod, Stephanie Cutter, Jen Psaki, et al, that they feel confident of victory, as if that means something. What else are campaign officials going to say? Oh, we're so scared, we think we might lose?
Meanwhile, Gallup polls and Rasmussen polls, neither of whom over-sampled Democrats, show a pretty clear Romney victory. Michael Barone, a pundit who predicts polls as part of his job and is rarely wrong, predicts a landslide Romney victory. Ditto George Will, Karl Rove (say what you will, he predicted Obama's 2008 win), Joe Scarborough (he's never liked Romney) and numerous others, many of whom have no horse in this race, and some who were even saying they want Obama to win but have to be realistic. Those saying just as surely that they think Obama's going to win? The anchors from MostlySaysNothingButCrap. Bias? Surely not.
Right now, the "battleground" states are New Hampshire (4 electoral votes), Virginia (13), North Carolina (15), Florida (29), Pennsylvania (20), Ohio (18), Iowa (6), Colorado (9) and Nevada (6).
Now, of these "battleground" states, Romney is leading or tied (according to those Dem-heavy polls) in Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Ohio and Colorado. 80% of Coloradans have already voted, and the state is looking decisively Romney-red, so I'm giving it to him. Again, those Dem-heavy polls have Obama just squeaking by with a narrow victory in New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Iowa and Nevada. Some polls put him behind in Iowa and ALL polls show Romney leading independents there. Personally I think Obama will lose Iowa.
I also think that the evangelical vote, which a lot of pollsters have ignored, will swing widely in Mitt's favor, thanks to Obamacare's contraception mandate, which could easily deliver Ohio and Iowa to Romney. Obama's hold on New Hampshire is tenuous enough that it could easily slip through his grasp, as many are predicting.
So of those "battleground" states, the smart money is on Mitt taking all of those states with the possible exceptions of Pennsylvania and Nevada. HOWEVER! New polling, plus the fact that the Obama campaign sees the need to still campaign and run ads in Pennsylvania, as well as (I'm not kidding), Michigan, Wisconson and MINNESOTA (again, not kidding!) shows that those states are in play as well! Romney/Ryan are campaigning and running ads in those states, which they would not do if they didn't see those states as being in play. Even realclearpolitics.com lists them as toss-ups, even if some pollsters won't go that far. Mitt leads independents in all these states comfortably, plus Wisconsin's recall vote last year went to Scott Walker, when most polls showed him behind, says that Wisconsin may be going more red than we've previously thought. Could Mitt take those states as well? I'm not counting on it, but he could take one or two of them.
But let's be generous. Let's just say that all the states currently leaning O's way (even though his lead in all of them is less than 5 points, or he's losing or tied, even in the juiced polls) will go to him. Let's just give him Pennsylvania, Nevada, and the Northern Firewall of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. That still leaves 146 electoral votes up for grabs and Mitt seems to be heading toward winning 72 of them, while Obama has 30 of them within his grasp. 18 of them are still genuinely up for grabs, and whoever wins them, wins the election. For those keeping count, I've just awarded Obama 257 electoral votes and Mitt 263. If O takes Ohio, he'll win with 275 electoral votes. If Mitt does, he wins with 281. Hell, let's be super-generous and give Iowa to Obama. Still it all comes down to who wins Ohio.
And Mitt is easily in a place where he could.
I'll be honest; I think I'm being too generous to Obama. I don't think he'll take Iowa OR Ohio. I also think he stands to lose Wisconsin and New Hampshire. His lead in NH, even with juiced polls, is too slim, and anecdotal evidence like crowd size at speeches, number of Romney/Ryan signs vs. Obama/Biden signs, lead among independents, and other stuff it's hard to totally calculate, we could potentially be looking at a Romney landslide. For that matter, knowing how juiced the polls are in Obama's favor, if we give Romney every state where Obama's lead is less than 5 points, Mitt wins with 337 electoral votes! Some pundits are even predicting it WILL happen.
I won't go that far. I'll stick to a Romney win with 281 electoral votes, 275 at minimum, with minimum 53% of the popular vote. But I know if the vote is any closer than that, Obama will contest it. He will not go quietly.
Four years ago, I started blogging because I was angry that America could have fallen so far that we would willingly vote in a man so obviously hateful of America and all she stands for, just because he was black. Wednesday morning, when I type either a large "YES!" I will probably stop blogging, or slow down significantly. Life just keeps getting in the way of blogging. I'm getting married, I have children, and I have a career. But if O keeps his stranglehold on America, I will not give up the fight. If anything, my blogging will increase.
I will leave you with one thought; Right up to the day of voting, the 1980 race was dubbed "too close to call". Reagan won 485 electoral votes. In 1984 the media speculated that he might have more of a challenge, and lose some states. He won again, this time with 524. George W. Bush, who was neck and neck with Gore, won with 285 electoral votes. The media suggested he would be trounced by Kerry, but he won again with 292. Every time a Republican wins, it's to the surprise of the media, who insisted the polls proved a Democrat win, or at least a toss-up.
We'll see you back here Wednesday morning with the results.
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