One of the ways in which the state of the Presidential race is often gauged is by analyzing the number and population of the states in which they're competitive. Often, an election will seem to have been decided even before the votes are counted because one of the candidates (usually the challenger) appeared to have a much narrower path to winning the Presidency. That is, the number of states in which they were competitive simply shrank to where they could not afford to lose ANY the remainder and still hope to win.
Before the first presidential debate, Wednesday, it was beginning to look like this was happening to Mitt Romney. But oh how things can change over night!
At the beginning of the race over a year ago (I have a serious issue with that) the Republican primary race was already under way. Pollsters don't really poll the individual states so far in advance before the nominee is chosen because the choice of opposition candidate can make a difference. By the time pollsters really began to poll the candidates strengths against Obama, it seemed the President was a shoo-in for re-election.
Once Romney had secured the nomination, however, the focus shifted to the President and Romney quickly became competitive, even taking the lead in the national popular vote, though not in the battleground states. As you'll find out in later posts here, I am often suspicious of polls, as not all of them are of equal quality (you have to look at who is doing the polling) and many can be deceiving when it comes to predicting the final election results. A fact that is not surprising because the results of different polls seem to contradict each other, though interestingly enough, they do so in consistent ways. What this means with regard to the reliability of polls is that even though you can't really trust them to predict, they do give one a sense of the momentum of the race; in what direction the race is going.
If we start at the beginning of Summer we find that about 11 states were competitive between Obama and Romney, including Pennsylvania and Michigan which haven't voted Republican in 20 years, as well as North Carolina which the Democrats were so intent on winning they held their Convention there. The complete list was Nevada, Colorado, North Carolina, Florida, Virginia, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Iowa, and New Hampshire. There were polls early on that indicated Missouri could be as well, however those didn't last, which means this traditional swing state is tilting to the right. (In fact, until McCain won it by a fraction of 1 percent over Obama it voted for the November winner in every election for half a Century.)
Polls began to stabilize during the Summer with the President holding consistent leads in Ohio and Virginia both of which came closest to mirroring the final winning percentage for Obama in 2008. This despite polls that showed Romney highly competitive in the national popular vote; even winning it ins some cases. It's important to add however, that in none of these 11 was either candidate over 50%, not even Ohio and Virginia. So the sense began to develop that the race was essentially tied.
Romney led in Florida probably about as often as the President which, given the tendency of undecided voters to break late for the challenger probably gives Romney the advantage. In some cases Romney performed better in Michigan and Pennsylvania than he did in Ohio, though I always found this highly suspect given Ohio has always been more Republican going back more than half a century. Romney moved briefly into the lead in Wisconsin after he chose Paul Ryan as his running mate and then settled into competitive territory with Obama ahead but with less than 50 %.
In conformity with the 2008 results Obama maintained a lead in Colorado and even seemed to nearly put Nevada away by holding there at 49%. In stark contrast, and in a surprising development both Iowa and New Hampshire gave Romney polling leads as often as Florida. North Carolina seemed to move out of range for Obama once Romney had secured his nomination, but re-emerged as competitive during and after their convention. A win there would ensure the President's election.
Just before the conventions, Michigan and Pennsylvania passed 50% for Presdient Obama, concerning Republicans who worried that Romney's path was narrowing, though oddly enough several polls had Romney taking the lead in Colorado and Nevada at the same time.
The Conventions were a turning point, with the Republican gathering seen as somewhat of a dud and the Democratic convo with Bill Clinton a major boost to Obama. By the end of September the election seemed nearly over as Ohio went to 50% for Obama. In fact, just before the debate, Obama appeared to pass 50% in every swing state except Florida, Colorado, and New Hampshire; North Carolina, again giving Romney a strong lead at nearly 50%.
What a difference a couple days make! In fact, this happened so quickly, it makes me wonder if the President's lead wouldn't have diminished even without Romney's debate performance. The night of the debate Romney was even in Florida and Virginia. As of Friday, Rasmussen came out with polls showing Romney leading in both and essentially tied at 49-50% in Ohio. Haven't seen any polls in Wisconsin or Iowa yet, however did see TWO that showed Romney at 50% in Colorado.
It's just amazing how these polls can swing so drastically, which only reinforces my belief that polls don't really accurately predict the final result until voters are fully re-engaged with the views of the political parties. How else to explain the return of what looks like the Bush maps of 2000 and 2004, with Ohio in the dead center, both candidates fighting over less than a fraction of 1 percent, tied at 50?
Simply amazing.
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