Friday, October 24, 2008
I was hoping to make this a much more polished post, but I'm racing to get out of work so it'll have to do ;)
As many of you know, I've been following the statistical analysis of this election obsessively. And according to my calculations, in the worst case, as long as Obama wins Virginia (a state that he's consistently been leading by 6 points) then he can't lose the election.
Here's why:
(Dark Blue = Obama will win them
Light Blue = Obama will likely win them
Blue border= Swing states. 50% win chance)
Let's imagine the worst-case scenario where Obama loses all the swing states, and all the light blue states. In total, that's 115 Electoral Votes. Leaving Obama 260 EV's. However, if Obama wins Virginia or Colorado, then he wins.
This puts the news that McCain is pulling out of Colorado in a very interesting perspective. Why is he pulling out of Colorado? To focus on Pennsylvania -- a state where Obama leads by about 12%. This is an absolute last-ditch effort for McCain, and one he will very likely lose.
Even if he manages to get Pennsylvania, all Obama needs to do is get Colorado, Virginia, and any one swing state to win. Since Obama will likely get both CO and VA, then all he has to do is get one swing state.
McCain has to either pull a rabbit out of his hat, or cheat the election process. My next blog entry is going to be on how difficult it is to cheat in this election. Stay Tuned!
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2 Comments:
Awesome post! I just have one minor point to make:
If Senator Obama wins all the dark blue states and just Colorado, then we *should* have an electoral college tie: 269-269, which would favor Senator Obama because the decision would come down to Congress in January, which is likely to be dominated by Democrats.
I emphasized "should" above because there are some states in which members of the electoral college are legally allowed to switch their vote from that of what the majority of their state chose.
So, a member of a blue state could switch to their vote to Senator McCain, giving him the 270 he needs to win outright. It's very unlikely and would probably spell the beginning of the end for the electoral college as we know it, but it *could* happen.
I respect this post and its content but I feel compelled to point out one thing that I believe indicates an egregious flaw in your argument:
On maps, blue = water.
Sorry, try again.
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