Presidential election minus 10 days

Since our previous episode we’ve had individual polls from red states Georgia and Montana showing Barack Obama narrowly in front, so they’re now included in the polling aggregates. However, John McCain leads in both due to the overall polling picture from the past few weeks. The other remarkable development has been an Obama blowout in Ohio, underscoring a picture of Democratic strength in the rust belt states.

Obama McCain Sample D-EV R-EV
Michigan 54.7 39.4 3005 17
Washington 54.9 40.1 3379 11
Maine 54.5 40.0 2185 4
Minnesota 53.3 41.8 3677 10
Iowa 52.6 41.7 3530 7
Pennsylvania 52.2 41.7 5505 21
Wisconsin 51.5 42.1 3490 10
New Hampshire 51.5 42.3 3305 4
New Mexico 50.5 43.3 2927 5
Colorado 50.8 44.3 3450 9
Virginia 50.9 44.7 3777 13
Ohio 48.7 43.0 4337 20
Nevada 50.0 45.4 3418 5
Florida 48.2 45.3 5021 27
North Dakota 45.5 44.7 1206 3
Missouri 47.4 46.5 4050 11
Indiana 47.4 47.0 3828 11
North Carolina 47.2 48.9 4564 15
Montana 44.8 48.7 2628 3
Georgia 45.6 50.0 3530 15
West Virginia 42.7 51.0 3622 5
Others – – – 175 137
RCP/Total 49.9 43.9 – 363 175

So who’s going to win then? The polls of course leave little room for doubt. However, there are a couple of items of conventional wisdom floating around which suggest they might not be telling the full story, one way or another.

• The Bradley effect. A compelling paper by Dan Hopkins of Harvard University examines the popular notion that polls overrate the performance of black candidates in biracial contests due to white voters’ reluctance to appear illiberal when interrogated by pollsters. Hopkins finds the effect was a serious factor into the 1980s, most famously when black Democratic candidate Tom Bradley failed to win the Californian gubernatorial election in 1982, but has ceased to be so. Pew Research charts a corresponding decline in the number of respondents willing to admit they would not vote for a black candidate, from 16 per cent in 1984 to 6 per cent. Hopkins notes a very sudden decline in the Bradley effect (he prefers the “Wilder effect”, after Virginia Governor Douglas Wilder) “at about the time that welfare reform silenced one critical, racialized issue”.

• The reverse Bradley effect. Strictly speaking, a “reverse Bradley effect” would involve voters telling pollsters they were voting for McCain or were undecided when they were in fact set on Obama, which is plainly not on the cards. Far more likely is that turnout of black voters is being underestimated in pollsters’ determinations of “likely voters”, which in many cases go on whether they voted last time rather than what they say they will do this time. Whatever methods are being used to account for the certainty of higher black turnout, I’m pretty confident they are overly conservative. When a pollster is required to explain inaccuracy after the event, “I was going on past experience” makes for a more professional sounding excuse than “I made a wrong guess”. I haven’t studied this systematically, but the one example I have looked at has proved to be an eyebrow-raiser: the most recent SurveyUSA poll of Pennsylvania has 10 per cent of black voters among its overall sample, whereas this paper from the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies tells us it was 13 per cent in 2004. Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight provides support for this and related impressions in taking to task pollsters who have gaps of 4 to 6 per cent between results for “registered” and “likely” voters.

• The late Republican surge. I recently heard it said that Republican candidates tend to come home strong in the last week or two of campaigning. Remembering how much of Bill Clinton’s lead vanished shortly before the 1992 election, I thought this sounded plausible and went burrowing through the archives for evidence. The following chart plots the last 15 days of polling at presidential elections from 1992 onwards, day 15 being the election result. I have used composites of polling obtained from Real Clear Politics for 2000 and 2004; Gallup tracking polls for 1996; and a list of various pollsters’ results I found in the New York Times for 1992.

The case of 1996 stands out, but this might well point to a general inaccuracy in the Gallup series I was using rather than a late surge to Bob Dole (unfortunately I could only locate one poll from the final week). Beyond that, the chart provides pretty thin gruel if you’re in the market for a McCain comeback in the last 10 days. The 1992 Bush recovery was less dramatic than I remembered it once I removed Gallup from the equation, which exasperatingly shifted from “registered” to “likely” voters in the final week, eliminating much of Bill Clinton’s lead at a stroke. If anything the trends from 2000 and 2004 point the other way.

• Front-runner decline. The aforementioned paper on the Wilder/Bradley effect by Dan Hopkins informs us that polls “typically overstate support for front-runners”, which is demonstrated in the scatter plots under “Figure 3” (see right at the back). These suggest a candidate like McCain who is on about 42 per cent is probably being underestimated by as much as 2 per cent, while a candidate like Obama on 50 per cent is probably being represented accurately – unless he’s black, in which case he will suffer a Bradley effect of a bit over 1 per cent.

• Advertising. The Washington Post informs us that the cashed-up Obama campaign is fielding “as many as seven commercials for every one aired by Republican Sen. John McCain”.

My guess is that point one will be comfortably countered by point two; point three is worth little if anything; point four might help McCain close the gap by 2 per cent, but some of this gloss should be taken off after accounting for point five. In sum, there seems little reason not to take the polls more-or-less at face value. That being so, my final prediction is that Obama will win every state where my polling aggregates currently have him ahead except North Dakota, where the result is derived from two small sample polls, one from an agency of little repute. The margin in Florida is narrow enough that front-runner decline might be expected to account for it, but I find it hard to believe Obama would fail to carry so marginal a state when he’s up by eight points nationally. That makes it 375 electoral votes for Obama and 163 for McCain.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,057 comments on “Presidential election minus 10 days”

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  1. ShowsOn

    You have touched on my only area of expertise, which is serial killers. There is a classic triad of warning signs of a serial killer in a child; pyromania, abuse of small animals and bed-wetting. They are pretty poor predictors of anti-social behaviour but killing small animals is the most strongly correlated with becoming a psychopath. Jail would not be a great place to improve their prospects though. It would make them more likely to commit violent crimes later.

  6. [Fox this morning – still talking to people about Bill Ayers and Obama’s “connections”. They’re dead set bored.]
    I’m interested to see how many Bill Ayers stories they run from November 5th onwards.
    😀

  9. [I’m just surprised you would think I could do damage deliberately to sentient beings.]
    Does this mean you’d harm a flamingo?

    ..OK, I admit it, I just like writing “flamingo”.

  14. Hi everyone – its been a long time since I posted a comment (since the early primary days)

    A quick compliment to everyone here… as an Aussie in Sth Africa, found this site as a way of tapping into the Federal Election last year – but since then have religiously continued to read pollbludger on the US election addiction I suffer from as well. All your contributions here make for fantastic and well-informed reading! I’ve stoushed with the amigos on the Hilary/Obama thing, and have engaged with Glen… its really entertaining and for the most part time really well spent.

    Julie, you’ve joined since I last posted – but really appreciate your presence and contribution here. I want to enter the tipping contest, but am on the fence on so many states and can’t help but post my current state of agonising:

    Indeed its a no-brainer to give Obi all the Kerry States + Iowa + New Mexico + Colorado (273, I think). Lets be a little more bullish and mark down Virginia + Nevada + Ohio + Florida (gets him to 338, though I’m not as confident on Florida as I’d like to be!)… the swathe of “landslide” states (from MO/NC/IN/WV to unbelievables now like WV/GO/MT/NC) are where our tipping contest will be won, I reckon. Some of these places are the equivalent of Labour winning Nth Sydney and 100 seats back in November!! I suspect this is a Rudd-ish 53-47 comfortable win for Obi at this stage – so, right now will stick with JohnnyMac on Missouri but go out on a limb and give Nth Carolina to Obi. That puts me at 353… but reserve the right to change my mind on Missouri, Florida and Indiana by Sunday!! That means a peak of 375 and a min of 311. I am paralysed there for now – want to believe in Americans thirst for change and a positive candidate, but am too suspicious of it….

    Which state acc to CNN puts Obi over the top – I’m battling with this one, but its a function of what times polls close and the preparedness to call a state based on exit polling, and then which states get called into the counting process… will take a few more days on this one – but wouldn’t be surprised if it turns out to be Iowa or Virginia (need at outlandish tiebreaker pick!).

    This goes out to Glen and others on the conservative side – musings on JohnnyMac’s campaign, which has been dreadful imho. He was a bit charmed in the primaries, with Huckabee denying Romney in Iowa and then Thompson denying Huckabee in Sth Carolina, and then both Fred & Huck denying Romney in Florida. But I did think he was the nominee giving the Repubs their best chance this year. That he’s sold his soul to the right for the sake of the base has been a real disappointment… I reckon he should have maintained the independent streak but perhaps locked in the religious right base with Huckabee as his VP (much more likeable, and a proven govenor)? As such, he’s had nothing productive/intelligent to contribute to this campaign, and lost all cred on the experience/judgement argument that I think Americans were potential buyers of?

    I think his great opportunity was to oppose the bailout bill – firstly for the earmarks, and also because of its suboptimal structuring… a “not good enough” as opposed to a “permanent no” – I mean. That was his grounds for making a distinguishing economic position (though maybe too much russian roulette given the market jitters at the time)

    Would be interested in what others have to say on my pontification/ranting above. Will be enjoying reading more over the coming days, and will take a stand by Sunday Julie, I promise. I would dearly like to see Ron and the amigos’ predictions – would settle for them identifying who it is they would actually vote for on Tue!

    Expat Follower

  15. Well I have diced, sliced and minced it every which way and the worst I can come up with for Obama is:

    Everything from 2004 plus Colorado, New Mexico and Iowa- that gives him 273 and the win.

    Unless there is some overwhelming objection to him carrying those states I now declare him and Biden husband and wife.

    Amen

  17. [Would a long period of psychological counseling help them?]

    There’s not enough data to answer that question. It also gets into the “nature vs nurture” debate. Not surprisingly, I’m more on the nature side but both are important. Obviously, any mental health issues need to be addressed, such as schizophrenia, depression etc but they are quite rare in serial killers. The ones who show tendencies from an early age become “organised” serial killers, rather than “disorganised” serial killers who are often quite loopy.

    There is basically no treatment for anti-social personality disorder (which is the same as psychopath and sociopath) once it is established. If you keep a kid with bad tendencies away from an abusive home and drugs you improve the odds of a good outcome. There’s a theory that serial killers are a symptom of our society, as they are a recent phenomenon in decent numbers are about 80% are in the US.

    GG

    Sentient being can mean different things to different people.

  19. Diogenes,

    And I don’t know?

    I have a close relative who scolds me about tomatoes being people too.

    You encourage it, you deal with it.

  23. GP,

    Now that we are all agreed that John McCain will probably win, why do you think that Obama is spending all that loot to improve his image?

  24. Diogenes @ 967. I went to Primary School with a kid about 4 or 5 years older who went on to become a notorious Sydney gangster who was eventually shot dead in suspicious circumstances. Many people including some Police suspect the Police, because he was just too volatile and dangerous. I dont know if he was ever convicted of murder, but it was widely accepted that he had committed several including one of a young boy who he believed was the cause of one member of his string of prostitutes neglecting her business responsibilities.
    He was a real sadist at school, and had many of even the bigger kids scared stiff of him. He would do incredibly cruel things to cats, dogs and any other animals that he could get his hands on. His parents were lovely people and were embarrassed and despairing of him to the end.

  29. Michael Cusack

    There’s plenty of evil bastards who had perfectly normal, decent parents. Almost every genocidal nutcase had a decent upbringing. The look on the faces of the parents of serial killers when they tell their stories is heart-breaking. To have your kid turn out like that would be unbearable. That’s evidently not far from what George Sr feels about George Jr.

  30. You can’t take money from Jo the plumber or invite him to an inauguration- his name isn’t actually Jo and he isn’t really a plumber.

    He is just a Republican phoney, kind of like GP is an not really an actual generic person just a whiny member of Australias neo-con minority.

    “The Ohio plumber, who has no license and is actually named Samuel Wurzelbacher”

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/28/foxs-shepard-smith-forced_n_138674.html

  33. No 980

    BBD, I would scarcely think you understand what neo-con means. It’s the phrase of the moment for perturbed lefties, but it is a meaningless platitude much like their source material, the Bolshevik Post.

  34. GG

    I couldn’t help it. It just slipped out. I’m tired. My apologies again.

    I have heard that H is very displeased with W though. W didn’t even ask him about going to Iraq.

  36. 983

    I apologise, I actualy meant Neo-Liberal, and typed Neo-con.

    Yes I do know what both terms mean and I do agree with you- neo-con is overused and often by people who dont understand the meaning.

    I am not a lefty, but it probably looks that way from where you are standing no doubt.

    The WA National Party are probably a bunch of lefties in your opinion

  37. Nobel Prize winners. What would they know.

    [Seventy-six Nobel Prize laureates in science endorsed Barack Obama yesterday — the largest number to ever express support for a presidential candidate — “citing his commitment to improving U.S. competitiveness by boosting science, technology, education and research.” The scientists also “criticized the Bush administration for damaging scientific development.”]

  38. Diogenw,

    I always thought medical research was about pioneering, bleeding edge technology. But, according to you it is all about money.

  41. GP @ 990
    I hardly ever agree with you on anything but you are spot on here. There is some absolutely disgraceful trash in the material coming from both sides in the US. It does neither side credit and helps to demean a once-great democracy.

  42. gg @ 988
    Ms Palin apparently thinks funding for fruit fly research is worth mocking. I can’t imagine anyone seriously interested in biomedical research, regardless of politics, supporting her approach. But then again, perhaps Palin makes a virtue out of necessity in her ardent support for ignorance?

  44. Expat @ 964,

    I joined a year ago in the leadup to the Federal Election but I was a silent lurker until sometime in early August prior to the DNC ……

  45. 990

    [
    Generic Person
    Posted Friday, October 31, 2008 at 2:03 am | Permalink
    No 989

    The left is no better. The attacks on Sarah Palin were despicable.
    ]

    If the shoe from Neiman Marcus fits, she needs to wear it.

  46. Expat,

    994 should read “was a silent lurker after the election until sometime in early August”.

    It’s still early ……

  49. [
    In an interview with Larry King that aired last night, John McCain admitted that he doesn’t think Barack Obama is a socialist, which runs counter to most of his campaign rhetoric for the past week. The admission is reminiscent of when McCain, after days of hammering Obama about a supposedly sexist remark, finally conceded that Obama probably wasn’t calling Sarah Palin a pig when referencing “lipstick on a pig” at a campaign speech.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/30/obama-not-a-socialist-mcc_n_139294.html
    ]

  50. [
    Here is a handy dandy guide to watching election night. The East Coast states will report first. If John McCain is going to win, then he will win Virginia, North Carolina, and Florida. And then it will take the rest of the night to figure out if he still has enough electoral votes. Obama’s victory could be a lot easier to figure out.

    If Obama wins Virginia – it’s over. That simple. He is comfortably ahead in all of the blue states that John Kerry won in 2004. He is very likely to win all of those. He is also comfortably ahead in Iowa and New Mexico. So, that means all he has to do to get an electoral majority is win Virginia, or Ohio, or Florida, or Colorado. Any of them will do. If McCain wins three out of the four, he still loses.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cenk-uygur/virginiawin-north-carolin_b_139336.html
    ]

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