Tipping Point States
The probability that a state provides the decisive electoral vote
|
1
Ohio
38.9%
|
6
Iowa
5.4%
|
11
Mich.
0.5%
|
|
2
Va.
16.8%
|
7
Colo.
5.0%
|
12
Ore.
0.4%
|
|
3
Wis.
9.9%
|
8
N.H.
3.0%
|
13
N.M.
0.2%
|
|
4
Fla.
9.3%
|
9
Pa.
3.0%
|
14
N.C.
0.1%
|
|
5
Nev.
6.0%
|
10
Minn.
1.1%
|
15
N.J.
0.1%
|
Return on Investment Index
The relative likelihood that an individual voter would determine the Electoral College winner.|
1
Ohio
9.3
|
6
Wis.
4.5
|
11
N.M.
0.4
|
|
2
Nev.
8.1
|
7
Colo.
2.7
|
12
Ore.
0.3
|
|
3
Va.
5.9
|
8
Fla.
1.4
|
13
Me. Dist. 2
0.2
|
|
4
N.H.
5.7
|
9
Pa.
0.7
|
14
Mich.
0.1
|
|
5
Iowa
4.7
|
10
Minn.
0.5
|
15
Conn.
0.1
|
The
trend in the presidential race has been difficult to discern lately.
President Obama has very probably gained ground since the conventions,
but it’s hard to say exactly how much, and how quickly his bounce is
eroding.
There are no such ambiguities in the race for control of the Senate, however. Polls show key races shifting decisively toward the Democrats, with the Republican position deteriorating almost by the day.
Since we published our initial Senate forecast on Tuesday, Republicans have seen an additional decline in their standing in two major races.
Two polls of Virginia published on Wednesday gave the Democrat, the former Gov. Tim Kaine, leads of 4 and 7 percentage points over the Republican, the former Senator George Allen. The FiveThirtyEight forecast model now gives Mr. Kaine roughly a 75 percent chance of winning the seat on the strength of the new polls, up from about 60 percent in Tuesday’s forecast.
The other problematic state for Republicans is Wisconsin, where their candidate, the former Gov. Tommy Thompson, had once appeared to hold the advantage.
Mr. Thompson’s Democratic opponent, Representative Tammy Baldwin, had published an internal poll earlier this week showing her pulling into the lead. The FiveThirtyEight Senate and presidential forecasts do not use internal polls released directly by the campaigns, as they typically exaggerate their candidate’s standing.
However, in this case, public polls have now confirmed that the race seems to have shifted. A poll by The New York Times, CBS News and Quinnipiac University showed Ms. Baldwin having drawn into a tie with Mr. Thompson, after trailing him by 6 percentage points last month.
A Marquette University poll, also published on Wednesday, showed a much sharper reversal, with Ms. Baldwin going from a 9-point deficit to a 9-point lead. The Marquette poll appears to be a bit of an outlier — it also had Mr. Obama leading in the presidential race in Wisconsin by a 14-point margin, a somewhat implausible figure. Nonetheless, the model now has Ms. Baldwin as the slight favorite, with about a 60 percent chance of winning.
It would be only a modest exaggeration to say that it’s been hard to find any strong Senate polls for Republicans in the past two or three weeks. Wednesday also brought bad news for Republicans in Massachusetts, where a fourth consecutive poll showed the Democrat Elizabeth Warren ahead of Senator Scott Brown; in Connecticut, where a poll gave the Democrat Chris Murphy a slight advantage over their candidate, Linda McMahon; and in Florida, where a Fox News poll gave the Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson a 14-point lead.
One exception has been in Maine, where two new polls on Wednesday showed a deterioration in the standing of the independent Angus King, who would probably caucus with the Democrats, at the expense of both the Republican, Secretary of State Charles Summers, and the Democrat, State Senator Cynthia Dill. The model now gives Mr. King an 84 percent chance of winning, Mr. Summers 11 percent, and Mrs. Dill 5 percent.
But this is small compensation for the decline over the past two weeks of the Republicans’ position in Virginia, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Florida and Ohio, all of which have broken sharply to the Democrats.
The Democrats’ chances of controlling the Senate have increased to 79 percent in the forecast, up from 70 percent on Tuesday.
Had we run the model a month ago, based on polls through Aug. 19, the Democrats’ chances of maintaining Senate control would have been listed at just 39 percent.
The velocity of the change is unusual. Although Senate races in different parts of the country can sometimes move in the same direction, there was never quite this rapid a shift in our Senate forecasts in 2008 or 2010.
The forecast model is not doing anything particularly fancy; it’s just that an overwhelming number of Senate polls recently have shown the Democratic candidates’ standing improving.
Republicans could also have some reason to be concerned about Nevada, which has not been polled recently but where their candidate, the appointed Senator Dean Heller, maintains a slight advantage over the Democratic Representative Shelley Berkeley. Mr. Heller is a fairly strong candidate, but if there is some sort of national tide against Republicans, he could become the underdog in that race as well.
There’s one comforting thought for Republicans, however. It’s plausible that at least some of the Democrats’ gains reflect a boost from their convention, which could wear off. I have not studied whether conventions produce bounces in Congressional races and the model makes no assumptions about it, but it is a reasonable hypothesis.
However, at least some of the shift appeared to predate the conventions. The model would have had Democrats’ chances of retaining the Senate improving to 50 percent from 39 percent over the course of the week beginning Aug. 19, before the Republican convention started.
I can think of two major theories to explain why the shift is occurring, one focused on Mitt Romney, and another on the overall positioning of the Republican brand.
Theory No. 1: Is Romney a Downballot Drag?
Polls show that Mr. Romney has middling personal favorability ratings but that many voters will choose him anyway because of the deteriorating economy.
Senate races, however, are less dictated by national economic conditions. Instead, they often turn more on the strengths and weaknesses of the individual candidates, and then by their stances on fiscal and social policy.
Mr. Romney has not dictated much in the way of detailed programs in these areas, and some of the policy stances that he has articulated are unpopular.
Mr. Romney has also been less able to campaign effectively against an unpopular Democratic initiative, the Democrats’ health care bill, because he passed a similar bill as governor of Massachusetts.
Finally, some voters who disapprove of Mr. Obama, but who also have lukewarm feelings toward Mr. Romney, might lean toward voting Democrat for Senate in effort to ensure divided government, especially since Republicans also have control of the House.
Theory No. 2: G.O.P. Conservatism Is Hurting
An alternative hypothesis is that the shift has to do with overall perceptions of the Republican platform.
Our research has shown that statistical measures of candidate ideology are a reasonably powerful predictor of the outcome of Senate races, with candidates who are rated as holding “extreme” views performing poorly.
But in practice, ideology is in large part perceptual for voters, and may depend on which issues seem most salient at any given time.
August, at which point the shift toward Democrats in Senate races appeared to begin, was dominated by two major news items: Mr. Romney’s selection of Representative Paul D. Ryan as his running mate, who has very conservative views on fiscal policy, and by the comments about rape made by the Republican Senate candidate in Missouri, Todd Akin, which may have reinforced the idea that Republicans hold very conservative positions on social issues.
These factors may have made it harder for Republicans to position themselves toward the ideological center. And in several states, including Missouri, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio, Republicans nominated sub-optimally conservative candidates.
More moderate Republican candidates, like Mr. Brown of Massachusetts and Mrs. McMahon of Connecticut, have increasingly sought to distance themselves from the national Republican brand, and sometimes also from the Republican presidential ticket.
Some of these theories are speculative, to be sure. A large number of Senate races remain in play: of the several states in which there has been a shift against Republicans in the polls in recent weeks, perhaps only Florida seems completely lost.
But if the trend continues, the question may no longer be whether Republicans can win the Senate — but how vulnerable they are to losing the House.
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=wm#inbox/139e4858794309eb
There are no such ambiguities in the race for control of the Senate, however. Polls show key races shifting decisively toward the Democrats, with the Republican position deteriorating almost by the day.
Since we published our initial Senate forecast on Tuesday, Republicans have seen an additional decline in their standing in two major races.
Two polls of Virginia published on Wednesday gave the Democrat, the former Gov. Tim Kaine, leads of 4 and 7 percentage points over the Republican, the former Senator George Allen. The FiveThirtyEight forecast model now gives Mr. Kaine roughly a 75 percent chance of winning the seat on the strength of the new polls, up from about 60 percent in Tuesday’s forecast.
The other problematic state for Republicans is Wisconsin, where their candidate, the former Gov. Tommy Thompson, had once appeared to hold the advantage.
Mr. Thompson’s Democratic opponent, Representative Tammy Baldwin, had published an internal poll earlier this week showing her pulling into the lead. The FiveThirtyEight Senate and presidential forecasts do not use internal polls released directly by the campaigns, as they typically exaggerate their candidate’s standing.
However, in this case, public polls have now confirmed that the race seems to have shifted. A poll by The New York Times, CBS News and Quinnipiac University showed Ms. Baldwin having drawn into a tie with Mr. Thompson, after trailing him by 6 percentage points last month.
A Marquette University poll, also published on Wednesday, showed a much sharper reversal, with Ms. Baldwin going from a 9-point deficit to a 9-point lead. The Marquette poll appears to be a bit of an outlier — it also had Mr. Obama leading in the presidential race in Wisconsin by a 14-point margin, a somewhat implausible figure. Nonetheless, the model now has Ms. Baldwin as the slight favorite, with about a 60 percent chance of winning.
It would be only a modest exaggeration to say that it’s been hard to find any strong Senate polls for Republicans in the past two or three weeks. Wednesday also brought bad news for Republicans in Massachusetts, where a fourth consecutive poll showed the Democrat Elizabeth Warren ahead of Senator Scott Brown; in Connecticut, where a poll gave the Democrat Chris Murphy a slight advantage over their candidate, Linda McMahon; and in Florida, where a Fox News poll gave the Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson a 14-point lead.
One exception has been in Maine, where two new polls on Wednesday showed a deterioration in the standing of the independent Angus King, who would probably caucus with the Democrats, at the expense of both the Republican, Secretary of State Charles Summers, and the Democrat, State Senator Cynthia Dill. The model now gives Mr. King an 84 percent chance of winning, Mr. Summers 11 percent, and Mrs. Dill 5 percent.
But this is small compensation for the decline over the past two weeks of the Republicans’ position in Virginia, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Florida and Ohio, all of which have broken sharply to the Democrats.
The Democrats’ chances of controlling the Senate have increased to 79 percent in the forecast, up from 70 percent on Tuesday.
Had we run the model a month ago, based on polls through Aug. 19, the Democrats’ chances of maintaining Senate control would have been listed at just 39 percent.
The velocity of the change is unusual. Although Senate races in different parts of the country can sometimes move in the same direction, there was never quite this rapid a shift in our Senate forecasts in 2008 or 2010.
The forecast model is not doing anything particularly fancy; it’s just that an overwhelming number of Senate polls recently have shown the Democratic candidates’ standing improving.
Republicans could also have some reason to be concerned about Nevada, which has not been polled recently but where their candidate, the appointed Senator Dean Heller, maintains a slight advantage over the Democratic Representative Shelley Berkeley. Mr. Heller is a fairly strong candidate, but if there is some sort of national tide against Republicans, he could become the underdog in that race as well.
There’s one comforting thought for Republicans, however. It’s plausible that at least some of the Democrats’ gains reflect a boost from their convention, which could wear off. I have not studied whether conventions produce bounces in Congressional races and the model makes no assumptions about it, but it is a reasonable hypothesis.
However, at least some of the shift appeared to predate the conventions. The model would have had Democrats’ chances of retaining the Senate improving to 50 percent from 39 percent over the course of the week beginning Aug. 19, before the Republican convention started.
I can think of two major theories to explain why the shift is occurring, one focused on Mitt Romney, and another on the overall positioning of the Republican brand.
Theory No. 1: Is Romney a Downballot Drag?
Polls show that Mr. Romney has middling personal favorability ratings but that many voters will choose him anyway because of the deteriorating economy.
Senate races, however, are less dictated by national economic conditions. Instead, they often turn more on the strengths and weaknesses of the individual candidates, and then by their stances on fiscal and social policy.
Mr. Romney has not dictated much in the way of detailed programs in these areas, and some of the policy stances that he has articulated are unpopular.
Mr. Romney has also been less able to campaign effectively against an unpopular Democratic initiative, the Democrats’ health care bill, because he passed a similar bill as governor of Massachusetts.
Finally, some voters who disapprove of Mr. Obama, but who also have lukewarm feelings toward Mr. Romney, might lean toward voting Democrat for Senate in effort to ensure divided government, especially since Republicans also have control of the House.
Theory No. 2: G.O.P. Conservatism Is Hurting
An alternative hypothesis is that the shift has to do with overall perceptions of the Republican platform.
Our research has shown that statistical measures of candidate ideology are a reasonably powerful predictor of the outcome of Senate races, with candidates who are rated as holding “extreme” views performing poorly.
But in practice, ideology is in large part perceptual for voters, and may depend on which issues seem most salient at any given time.
August, at which point the shift toward Democrats in Senate races appeared to begin, was dominated by two major news items: Mr. Romney’s selection of Representative Paul D. Ryan as his running mate, who has very conservative views on fiscal policy, and by the comments about rape made by the Republican Senate candidate in Missouri, Todd Akin, which may have reinforced the idea that Republicans hold very conservative positions on social issues.
These factors may have made it harder for Republicans to position themselves toward the ideological center. And in several states, including Missouri, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio, Republicans nominated sub-optimally conservative candidates.
More moderate Republican candidates, like Mr. Brown of Massachusetts and Mrs. McMahon of Connecticut, have increasingly sought to distance themselves from the national Republican brand, and sometimes also from the Republican presidential ticket.
Some of these theories are speculative, to be sure. A large number of Senate races remain in play: of the several states in which there has been a shift against Republicans in the polls in recent weeks, perhaps only Florida seems completely lost.
But if the trend continues, the question may no longer be whether Republicans can win the Senate — but how vulnerable they are to losing the House.
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=wm#inbox/139e4858794309eb
FOUR REASONS WHY MITT ROMNEY MIGHT STILL WIN
Posted: 09/20/2012 8:44 am
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Can Romney possibly recover? A survey conducted between Sept. 12 and Sept. 16 by the Pew Research Center -- before the "47 percent victim" video came to light -- showed Obama ahead of Romney 51 percent to 43 percent among likely voters.
That's the biggest margin in the September survey prior to a presidential election since Bill Clinton led Bob Dole, 50 percent to 38 percent in 1996.
And, remember, this recent poll was done before America watched Romney belittle almost half the nation.
For the last several days I've been deluged with calls from my inside-the-beltway friends telling me "Romney's dead."
Hold it. Rumors of Romney's demise are premature for at least four reasons:
1. Between now and Election Day come two jobs reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics - October 5 and November 2. If they're as bad as the last report, showing only 96,000 jobs added in August (125,000 are needed just to keep up with population growth) and the lowest percentage of employed adults since 1981, Romney's claim the economy is off track becomes more credible, and Obama's that it's on the mend harder to defend.
With gas prices rising, corporate profits shrinking, most of Europe in recession, Japan still a basket case, and the Chinese economy slowing, the upcoming job reports are unlikely to be stellar.
2. Also between now and Election Day are three presidential debates, starting October 3. It's commonly thought Obama will win them handily but that expectation may be very wrong - and could work against him. Yes, Romney is an automaton -- but when the dials are set properly he can give a good imitation of a human engaged in sharp debate. He did well in the Republican primary debates.
Obama, by contrast, can come off slow and ponderous. Recall how he stuttered and stumbled during the 2008 Democratic primary debates. And he hasn't been in a real-live debate for four years; Romney recently emerged from almost a year of them.
3. During the next 7 final weeks of the campaign, the anti-Obama forces will be spending a gigantic amount of money. Not just the Romney campaign and Romney's super PACs, but other super PACs aligned with Romney, billionaires spending their own fortunes, and non-profit "social welfare" organizations like the Chamber of Commerce, Karl Rove's "Crossroads," and various Koch-brothers political fronts - all will dump hundreds of millions on TV and radio spots, much of it spreading lies and distortions. Some of this money will be devoted to get-out-the-vote drives -- to phone banks and door-to-door canvassing to identify favorable voters, and vans to bring them to the polling stations.
It's an easy bet they'll far outspend Obama and his allies. I've heard two-to-one. The race is still close enough that a comparative handful of voters in swing states can make the difference -- which means gobs of money used to motivate voters to polling stations can be critical.
4. As they've displayed before, the Republican Party will do whatever it can to win -- even if it means disenfranchising certain voters. To date, 11 states have enacted voter identification laws, all designed by Republican legislatures and governors to dampen Democratic turnout.
The GOP is also encouraging what can only be termed "voter vigilante" groups to "monitor polling stations to prevent fraud" -- which means intimidating minorities who have every right to vote. We can't know at this point how successful these efforts may be but it's a dangerous wildcard. And what about those Diebold voting machines?
So don't for a moment believe "Romney's dead," and don't be complacent. The hard work lies ahead, in the next seven weeks.
And even if Obama is reelected, more hard work begins after Inauguration Day -- when we must push him to be tougher on the Republicans than he was in his first term, and do what the nation needs.
ROBERT B. REICH, Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written thirteen books, including the best sellers "Aftershock" and "The Work of Nations." His latest is an e-book, "Beyond Outrage," now available in paperback. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine and chairman of Common Cause.
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