Electoral Vote Update

First an update on reactions to the 1st Presidential Debate.

As mentioned yesterday, although to me, it seemed like the debate could be called a draw in many ways, more people seemed to think Obama won the debate. This is really bad news for McCain. As mentioned in yesterday's post on The 1st Presidential Debate people tend to see in debates the result they want. In a debate that most neutral experts consider fairly even, if more people believe that Obama won, that is a reflection of their opinions of the 2 candidates.

Another good signal for Obama is how the Electoral College is looking based on recent polling. This polling was all completed before the 1st debate, so it might be even more promising for Obama later this week.

Thanks to Electoral-Vote.com here is the way the Electoral Vote count looks if we only include states in which a candidate is 5% or more ahead of their opponent:

As of today, Obama has returned to a level close to his largest total of the year with 259 electoral votes (270 needed to be elected). John McCain has returned to a level close to the lowest total he has had (163). Notice how things changed shortly after polls began reflecting the impact of the Republican National Convention and then subsided a week later and have now returned to pre-RNC levels.

Another interesting view comes to us from EVStrength.com which graphs and analyzes the numbers from Electoral-Vote.com. One of the daily stats calculated here is the totals for each candidate if they were to win all the states there THE OTHER candidate is leading by LESS than 5%. Today's total for John McCain is only 279 electoral votes. While that is 9 more than would be needed to win, that total could only be reached by McCain winning all states in which Obama is currently leading by less than 5% which includes Minnesota, Colorado, Virginia and New Hampshire (as well as all states in which McCain is also currently leading by less than 5% such as Nevada, Ohio, Missouri and Florida). While not impossible, that is a very tall order. By contrast, if Obama were to win all of the states McCain is leading by less than 5%, his vote tally would be 375.

While it is possible for a candidate to win a state in which they are currently 5% or more behind with a little more than 5 weeks remaining, that is a big challenge. It really means that McCain has few paths to victory. McCain really needs to win Virginia and New Hampshire. It is unlikely that he will win Minnesota, because some of the reason why he is only 4% behind in that state is related to the Republican Convention taking place there and that impact is continuing to decrease. This also would mean McCain has to hold on to all states in which he is barely ahead including those by just 2% (Nevada, Missouri, Ohio, North Carolina and Florida).

By the way, if that outcome were to occur, it would be a 269-269 tie. There have been many articles on this, but the Washington Post had an interesting take on it earlier this week.