Electoral Map - Remember, it's what matters
 

Electoral Vote Predictor

http://www.electoral-vote.com/jul/jul16.gif

http://www.electoral-vote.com/images/darkblue.gif Strong Kerry (120)
http://www.electoral-vote.com/images/lightblue.gif Weak Kerry (113)
http://www.electoral-vote.com/images/whiteblue.gif Barely Kerry (79)
http://www.electoral-vote.com/images/white.gif Exactly tied (11)
http://www.electoral-vote.com/images/whitered.gif Barely Bush (36)
http://www.electoral-vote.com/images/lightred.gif Weak Bush (44)
http://www.electoral-vote.com/images/darkred.gif Strong Bush (135)


The fellow running this is a partisan, but the information he puts up isn't - he just goes with whatever the latest poll data indicates. And as of July 16th, we've got:

Kerry 312 Bush 215

I had fun checking out this resource (going through the Excel spreadsheets, etc), and I haven't seen another like it so I thought I'd share.

It always amazes me when you see blocks of states all voting the same way.

Like from Texas straight up to N.Dakota and over to Idaho.

Or basically the whole N.E. states.

Then in the middle of the sea Redyou have like N. Mex. being Blue.

It's just very interesting to me.

Thank you for posting this, perhaps you can update it periodically.

I truely pity those poor souls in Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, Tenessee, Missouri, and Minnesota. I would advise you avoid the TV and Radio for the next few months :D

Just thought I'd note this, from that site:

I'm glad I live in MD. At most we're getting token action from Bush, and I haven't seen a single ad from Kerry.

I like it this way.

interesting....thanks for posting it.
i am curious about the way the various pollsters frame their questions--maybe when i have more time to research--but if anyone has looked into this already, post some links please.

yea, its an interesting chart to look at, and while it definitely makes me feel better about kerry's chances, i also am not sure how accurate that data is. While Im hoping that things will work out the way predicted by that chart, a lot of the swing states are very much a tossup.

That is an interesting map. One thing I notice is that while Kerry has more votes, more of his are in "weak" and "barely" states. I wonder what those classifications mean...

barely Kerry - 79 - 25.3% of Kerry votes
barely Bush - 36 - 16.7% of Bush votes

weak Kerry - 113 - 36.2% of Kerry votes
weak Bush - 44 - 20.4% of Bush votes

strong Kerry - 120 - 38.5% of Kerry votes
strong Bush - 135 - 62.9% of Bush votes

I wouldn't draw any sweeping conclusions about what this might mean since a "barely" state will still give all of its votes to one candidate - like CA with 55 of them. Just from eyeballing those numbers though, it seems that Kerry's states may be more vulnerable than Bush's. If I added wrong, let me know - but I did check about 8 times.

Why not pity the poor souls in Wisconsin? It's already bad enough we have to live here

It's a pretty close election, but it will be interesting to see the real thing, considering the voting turnout over the past few elections.

It also show the power of the system and how important it is to understand how to play which states. If CA (a "weak" Kerry state) were to go to Bush (which is unlikely, I know) the numbers would be really different.

instead of this: Kerry 312 Bush 215
we'd have this: Kerry 257 Bush 270

So basically, the Dakotas, Montana, and Wyoming (not to mention Alaska and Hawaii, with few votes and no neighbors) can go F themselves for all of their importance in a campaign...

Some definitions:

Tied: durr...
Barely: <5%
Weak: 5-9%
Strong: >9%

For example, California, with 55 electoral votes:

Kerry 46
Bush 38
Nader 7

So even though it looks like Bush has a shot with the "weak" label, there aren't a lot of votes to steal (he isn't likely to take them from Nader's column...)

Thanks for the definitions. I didn't mean to imply that CA was up for grabs... I was just pointing out that the weight of states is important...

If I were on the Bush campiagn team, I'd be adveritisng the hell out of Florida and Ohio right now. Come to think of it, I'd be doing the same if I were on the Kerry team..

Looking at the "barely" states, If Bush grabbed Kerry's top "barely" state, Kerry would have to take Bush's top two "barely" states to recoup the loss. If TN swings to Bush (if they voted against the hometown boy last time, I don't see why we shouldn't expect it to happen again,) he only has to worry about Florida (which he has a chance of winning again, going on the assumption that a majority that would vote for his brother as governor would vote for him as president,) and one other of Kerry's "barely" states to win it.

In case the map changes before the election, I'm saving a copy so we can see how it compares to the real thing.

^^That sites map gets updated daily. Here are a few more resources while I'm at it...

Wall Street Journal does polling twice a month, done by Zogby Intl in the 16 "Battleground" states, here's the link:

http://online.wsj.com/public/resourc...-frameset.html

Here's another site, called Rasmussen Reports, and they do pretty constant polling, both nationally and by state:

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/Pres...cking_Poll.htm

One last one, from the Center for Politics at UVA, a nonpartisan group that tries to get young folks interested in politics:

http://www.centerforpolitics.org/cry...ctoratemap.php


These are all great resources for those of us who love the great horserace of a campaign, and want to look at the Big Picture. Enjoy the next 107 days, I know I will.

Fully seven percent of California is voting for Nader?!

That seems huge, especially in such a polarizing election.

I think a lot of CA already believes its going to go Kerry anyways - not to mention we do have our nuts in here ;)

It seems odd to me that after California had so much trouble with its Dem govener and ousted him in favor of a Reb that they would still end up voting for Keri.

Because most people here know that it wasn't the party that screwed us over, it was the person. If people can see that it isn't about the party, but the person, then maybe the country would be better off.

Arnold is also fairly liberal, California would never put even a compassionate conservative in office.

seems like quite a few of the barely bush's have either become weak bush or weak kerry (that's quite the jump skipping barely kerry). The rest is still the same though.

offtopic a little: Why do ALL of the electoral votes from a state have to go one way or the other? If a state is split pretty good, why can't the electoral votes get split? Wouldn't this give a better representation of the overall vote? Just curious, and I'm too lazy to look it up, so I thought I'd do it the conveniant way :D.

Very much on topic, imo... Basically, it is up to state law how they individually divide their electors. Two states do this, Nebraska and Maine. The total vote winner in the state gets 2 electoral votes automatically, and the rest are divided by the winner of each congressional district.

If every state did this, then, using 2000 as an example, neither Gore or Bush would have reached 270 electoral votes (Nader would have siphoned some off), and the election would have been sent to the House of Representatives, with each state delegation casting one vote. With Republicans having a majority of state delegations, the election would have been won by Bush. This isn't just constitutional theory, either, it happened twice back in the early 1800's.

thanks sparhawk, being from nebraska, I probably should've known that part, but since this is the first presidential election I can vote for, I guess I just didn't care before.

I knew about it going to the house before though (thanks to my summer amer history class :)). I'm also learning that this election isn't that different than some of the elections around that time (despite everyone saying how bad this one is).

Also, the electoral voters do not have to vote for the person the state elected.

Each electoral voter can choose whom to vote for, but that I don't think has ever happened (in modern day elections) because each party selects a slate of "electoral" delegates, who in turn vow to vote for the candidate of the party they represent.

So in essence when you vote for president you actually vote for the party's delegates to represent your vote.

I remember hearing of one case where an elector from West Virginia (I think) cast his vote against the rest of the state in protest, but I don't remember which election.

Yeah I think I have heard of the protest vote before...

Certainly it would make elections more interesting :lol:

the worst part about the electoral voters not having to vote for who the public vote for is the fact that the electorals are all appointed and have no fear of reprisal from the public....

Imagine what would happen if the next president won the election because of something like this.

Eleanor Holmes Norton, the DC elector in the 2000 race, cast a "protest vote," as a way to bring attention to the lack of representation DC has. Hasn't had a lot of impact though (you think a republican controlled congress has any interest in adding a democrat congressmen and 2 senators? I don't think so...)

I think that varies from state to state as well... "Technically, in 25 states, an elector may vote as he or she wishes, and such votes have usually been validated by the federal congress."

http://members.fortunecity.com/vjs1/electoral_coll.htm

The electoral college is a throwback to the days when it tooks months for messages to travel, and the average citizen had little information about the candidates. In our world of the internet, global television, and instant communications we no longer need electors to make our decisions for us. A popular mandate is the only form of mandate our government should be using.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Vote, but don't be suprised with the outcome.

Isn't polling data skewed about 10 points to the left? I think it has something to do with the fact that pollers get more data faster from large cities, which happen to lean left. It's a lot harder and more time consuming to poll the heartland.

I'm not 100% sure that is true Peetster.

While theoretically it is easier to contact those in the city, the theoretical method of polling is to get a sample size (say 1000) people by randomly choosing 1000 people in an entire state. They just randomly choose and so, theoretically, it should be representative of the state's distribution as well (as in if 5% of the people live in rural areas, then 5% of the 1000 should be represented).

Of course this is all theoretical but that is why there is a margin of error. That is why anything <9% is considered weak because a 4% margin of error means in a state where Kerry leads by 8%, he could actually be tied with Bush.

And much of poll work is now done via phone for instance and so it's not particularly hard to just call someone living in the heartland.

Besides, how would anyone ever contact someone in Kansas :lol:

Sorry, but given the choice between your opinion and Alexander Hamilton's I'll take Hamilton's every day and twice on Tuesday.
No offense intended.

I remember when I was just a young single egg skillet (wasn't a full fledged pan yet), and I went to my pappy and asked him:

Dad what happens if the people elected Bozo the clown president?

To which my wise but young father answered: "that is why we have the electoral college. It is a way to prevent the masses from electing someone like that."

There is truth in that, although the masses at the time maybe extremely upset over it. The electoral college protects us from ourselves, at least theoretically.

Electoral College is BS.

Why not just let the majority vote win? If people want Bozo the Clown, then people want Bozo the Clown!

Seriously, why does it exist? I thought the whole point of democracy was majority wins? Why not just tally up the total votes?

But we aren't a democracy. Never were. We're a republic. There are significant differences between the two.

peetster--why do imagine it is more difficult to poll rural areas than it is to poll urban areas if the polling is done entirely by telelphone (which nearly all of it is)?

Using this map its possible we may have a tie in the next election. All it would take for this to happen would be West Virginia going to Bush throwing us into a 269/269 tie. Stayed tuned for another potential election mess.

http://www.centerforpolitics.org/cr...ectoratemap.php

A tie is the same, constitutionally, as someone getting a plurality but not a majority - the vote is thrown into the new House of Representatives, and each state gets one vote. I already mentioned above what happens in that event....

I find the Electoral College very frustrating, living in Indiana my vote for president doesn?t matter. Congressional distracts have been gerrymandered in such a way that it makes it hard for dems to seats, even seats they have held for years. However, the alternative, "One man - One Vote" disenfranchises just and many people, if not more people. Most people in the US live in major metropolitan areas. This makes votes from largely rural areas less important.


It excites because the US has a respective represent government. This means that we, as citizens elect people to represent us at every level of government; local, state, and national. If this were a democracy each person would have to vote for every law. This is not a good way for people to send time. We elect people to do this for us, so that we can be productive. The public school system (where you should have learned all of this) comes out of this idea that in order for the public to make good decisions in voting they have to be educated.

I could've sworn one state split theirs in 2000, voting 3 and 3 instead of all 6 going one way.

The only two states that do the splitting is NE and ME, and both were completely won by Bush and Gore, respectively. It has happened in past elections, however...

I think the last time it happened was in 1960. Alabama split its votes between Kennedy and Byrd. In 1956 Mississippi gave up some votes and indipandant. Not sure of his name.

It was a much more common practice in the 1800s for state electors to split.

wow, kerry has his strongest lead since the polling started in may today.

kerry 332
bush 195

there's been a pretty steady increase of kerry's and steady decline of bush's since the beginning of july.

The electoral college was put in effect with the hopes from our founding fathers that the House would elect the gov. They figured that candidates from each state would run, win their respective state, and no one would get enough votes letting the house decide the president. They just didn't trust the people. However, little did they know they were just giving birth to what is known as the two party system. It's not the best way, but it's still a pretty damn good one. By splitting up states we'd only be making it harder for one of the main 2 to get elected by the people if the country was divided 50-50 like the last election.

In New Jersey, where Kerry will win, i have seen numerous Bush ads but no Kerry ads. Not sure if its the programs i watch or just he figures he's already got it won.

I look at polls but essentially they're always changing and the only ones that matter are the ones in November...

Then there's the issue of low population states being over represented by the electoral college. Each vote is equal to x number of voters. States like (I think) OK and SD that have fewer than x voters still get 1 electoral vote.

Don't know that it makes that much difference, but it's not 100% representitive.

that's a very good point.

http://www.electoral-vote.com/info/states.html

here they show the number of voters per electoral vote. California has the highest and then it basically goes down as population goes down. There's nearly 4 times as many voters for each californian electoral vote as there are for each wyoming electoral vote!

Also remember that states like SD typically have no influence on the election. In fact even though the voters in SD have more voting power than voters in california the people in SD get almost no campaining.

How do SD voters have more voting power?

these are just generic statistics.

State X has 30 million people and has 15 electoral votes

State Y has 500,000 people and has 1 electoral vote.

State X overally affects the election more, but every voter in State Y is basically four times as valuable as every vote in State X.

Electoral votes aren't dolled out evenly for a set amount of people, Each state has a different number per vote, (depending on turnout) In the end the smaller the state, the more heavily weighted your vote is.

With polls changing daily, maps like these are interesting, but not truly accurate. For example, Arizona is listed as stongly Bush. This is probably based on a poll done a couple of weeks ago showing Bush with at 12% point lead (+/- 4%) . Yesterday the same group released figures putting Kerry at 42% and Bush 41%. All in all this looks like it is going to be a nail biter.

actually if you go to the website they talk specifically about that poll and they have updated the map accordingly :).

and they are moving to a new map format that gives the percentage results when you rollover a state with the mouse.

It would be really cool if they did a 'radar loop' animation of the changes over time, but that would probably be more bandwidth than they could afford.

http://www.electoral-vote.com/jul/jul22.gif

July 22: Kerry 332 Bush 195

I'm feeling pretty confident going into the convention with the spread like this - hopefully Kerry will be able to tighten up those weak states, and pull the barely's more firmly into his column.

I have almost no faith in this map. Polls are ridiculously flawed and have no real relevance. They are simply highly subjective gauges of where attention should be focused.

If the daily change is THAT significant, I'd have to agree with onetime2. The change must be showing sampling anomalies as much as actual change. I don't think there are that many people making up changing their minds on a daily basis. Of course, I'll still be watching with interest.

I think the changes are more attributable to using different polls' results and not respondents' giving different answers at different times.

Here's my biggest concern about polls: the self-selected sample. I know that when I get a phone call that starts "Hi, I'm doing a survey on behalf of...", I get off of the phone as quickly as possible. So, the polls are only those people who are bored enough to tell a complete stranger their beliefs.

Or those eager enough to spend the time to show their support for their guy.

Yes, they do try to keep up, but my point is that we are still 3+ months out and the electorate is not decided. We usually see these maps in the closing days of the election, but now we seem to live by them. The mere fact that they have to constantly change the information supports my point that while they are interesting, you should not live or die by the info.


All that being said, today they say that Kerry is winning the electoral college, so I think all Bush supporters should just give up and not bother voting, I mean what is the point, Kerry is winning. '

something that was not mentioned about the electoral college was that while it is used to enforce the rights of the majority it is also to protect the rights of the minority

(i wish my rights were better protected i'm not allowed to walk backwards after 2 am)

/shakes head

Start of the thread: 7/16/04, Kerry = 312, Bush = 215

From the same website that started this thread:

Today (9/20/04): Kerry = 211, Bush = 327

That is rather dramatic for a two month period.

Even more interesting is the commentary below the map written by this guy

Edit: Already been done