It looks like the relaunch of Election Projection will proceed as planned tomorrow. It has been a tremendous task that will
come in pretty much on schedule but way over budget in terms of hours spent hacking away on the keyboard! One caviat: I said earlier that the
redesign would be unvieled on June 1, but I didn't say what time. Don't be surprised if it doesn't appear on a computer screen near you until well
into the evening!
The tie that wasn't. I've posted this week's presidential projection update. What was a tie just two days ago
has changed dramatically in Barack Obama favor. The most recent batch of polls out show him gaining in several states. As a result, he
has captured the upper hand in Wisconsin and New Hampshire, retained Ohio, and vaulted out to a 48-vote lead (293-245) in the Electoral
College. Ironically, national polls have tightened the gap between him and John McCain. The projected popular vote now stands at 51.18%
to 47.83% in Obama's favor. That's almost a full percent closer than the lead he had last week.
Here is the list of race rating changes for this week's Election Projection Update:
Changes in Obama's favor
Massachusetts: Strong Obama -> Solid Obama
Minnesota: Mod Obama -> Strong Obama
New Hampshire: Weak McCain -> Mod Obama
Wisconsin: Weak McCain -> Weak Obama
Changes in McCain's favor
Arizona: Mod McCain -> Strong McCain
Maine: Solid Obama -> Strong Obama
New Jersey: Solid Obama -> Strong Obama
These changes reflect polling data gathered through today. Official projections for Senate, House, and Governors races have not been tabulated.
Also, I have not posted the formulae for this cycle yet. All of this is coming together and will be posted shortly, on or before Election Projection's website
relaunch scheduled for June 1.
If the numbers don't change between now and then, Election Projection will show a 269-269 tie between Barack Obama and John McCain when this
week's projection is posted on Sunday evening. Recent polls have pulled Ohio into McCain's column and Wisconsin into Obama's.
Barack Obama needs just over 100 delegates to claim a virtual majority in the race for the Democratic presidential nominee. At stake
today in Oregon and Kentucky are 103 delegates. He stands to lose in Kentucky by a wide margin and win in Oregon by a lesser, but still comfortable, one.
You can monitor the results as they come in tonight here.
I've posted this week's presidential projection update. Barack Obama has added New Mexico to his list of states, stretching out his
projected electoral vote margin to 20, 279-259. Eight other states saw rating changes which did not result in a party switch. Four favored Obama, and
four favored John McCain.
Here is the list of race rating changes for this Election Projection Update:
Changes in Obama's favor
Hawaii: Strong Obama -> Solid Obama
New Mexico: Weak McCain
-> Mod Obama
Oregon: Mod Obama -> Strong Obama
Pennsylvania: Weak Obama -> Mod Obama
Virginia: Mod McCain -> Weak McCain
Changes in McCain's favor
Alaska: Mod McCain -> Strong McCain
Arkansas: Weak McCain -> Solid McCain
Iowa: Mod Obama -> Weak Obama
Michigan: Mod Obama -> Weak Obama
These changes reflect polling data gathered through today. Official projections for Senate, House, and Governors races have not been tabulated.
Also, I have not posted the formulae for this cycle yet. All of this is coming together and will be posted shortly, on or before Election Projection's website
relaunch scheduled for June 1.
Notes on the relaunch: Mrs. Blogging Caesar and I enjoyed a wonderful two hours chatting with former Blackhawk helicopter pilot Melanie Taylor on
Saturday. What an amazing lady and what an amazing story! You won't want to miss her interview when I post it as part of the relaunch. As for the
Senate, House and gubernatorial race updates, I've decided that, due to the fact that so few primaries have been completed at this point, I will wait until the
relaunch to post updates on those races.
I am very excited to be developing a new look for Election Projection. I plan to go live with the changes on June 1st. In the
meantime, you can expect to see the first official projections for Senate, House and gubernatorial races. This weekend the official Senate Election Projection
will be posted. Next weekend, I'll post the House Election Projection, followed by the governor's race projections the next. Also, I'm excited about
my interview with Blackhawk helicopter pilot, Melanie Taylor, this Saturday. I'll be posting that interview as part of the relaunch on June 1st.
Can Democrats run House off-season haul to three? - Updated3
In two special House elections so far this year - Illinois CD-11 and Louisiana CD-6 - Democrats have been able to defeat the GOP on its own
turf. Another GOP seat sits precariously today as Mississippi holds a special runoff election in CD-1. This is a very red area, yet the Democratic
challenger, Travis Childers, finished ahead of Republican Greg Davis, 49%-46% in the special election in April. Since he didn't eclipse the 50% mark, today's
runoff is required. A win today by Childers will further build the impression that the anti-GOP mood we've seen since 2006 is still in full swing. Check
here for election results tonight.
Update2: Childers is the projected winner. At 10:30pm, with around 80% of the votes counted, he leads 51% to 49%. This victory is a
considerable upset given the district's heavily Republican makeup. It gives the Democrats a 236-199 majority in the House.
Update3: The final 20% of the vote must have been overwhelmingly for Childers because the final margin ballooned to nearly 8 percent. Stuart
Rothenberg has an insightful look at why the GOP couldn't hold
this strong Republican seat.
Poll: How many electoral votes will John McCain win in November?
The latest edition of Election Projection's Weekly Poll is up. Now that I've posted an official presidential election projection, I
want to see what your prediction is for the presidential race. How many electoral votes will John McCain secure on Election Day? Remember, it takes
270 EVs to win. The poll is located in the right sidebar. Please be sure to cast your vote.
The first official presidential election projection is posted. Up until now, my projections have been preliminary in nature and opinion-driven. The
prelims are now over, a new formula has been created, and the first official numbers included in the calculations. The result? If the election for president were held today, Senator
Barack Obama would win an electoral squeaker over Senator John McCain (274-264) and claim the White House for the Democrats.
Colorado, Iowa and Ohio are projected to go for Obama in this first iteration, giving him enough additional electoral votes to offset George W. Bush's 2004 advantage and McCain's projected victory in
New Hampshire. The projected popular vote favors Obama by a 51.52% to 47.48% margin. Many changes to my preliminary guesses resulted once real numbers were included for calculation.
Four states actually flipped colors. Of them, one - Ohio - switched to Obama and three - Nevada, New Mexico, and Wisconsin - switched to McCain. The net result is no change to the total
preliminary EV count. Ohio's 20 EVs exactly match the combined 20 EVs of the three states moving from blue to red.
Here is the full list of race rating changes in this first projection:
Changes in Obama's favor
Alaska: Solid McCain -> Mod McCain
Hawaii: Mod Obama -> Strong Obama
Illinois: Strong Obama -> Solid Obama
Iowa: Weak Obama -> Mod Obama
Louisiana: Strong McCain -> Mod McCain
Maine: Strong Obama -> Solid Obama
Maryland: Strong Obama -> Solid Obama
Michigan: Weak Obama -> Mod Obama
Minnesota: Weak Obama -> Mod Obama
Mississippi: Solid McCain -> Strong McCain
New Jersey: Mod Obama -> Solid Obama
North Carolina: Strong McCain -> Mod McCain
Ohio: Weak McCain
-> Weak Obama
Oregon: Weak Obama -> Mod Obama
Tennessee: Strong McCain -> Mod McCain
Washington: Mod Obama -> Strong Obama
Changes in McCain's favor
Massachusetts: Solid Obama -> Strong Obama
Nevada: Weak Obama -> Weak McCain
New Mexico: Weak Obama -> Weak McCain
Virginia: Weak McCain -> Mod McCain
Wisconsin: Weak Obama -> Weak McCain
These changes reflect polling data gathered by yesterday afternoon. Official projections for Senate, House, and Governors races have not been tabulated. Also, I have not posted the
formulae for this cycle yet. All of this is coming together and will be posted shortly, on or before Election Projection's website relaunch scheduled for June 1.
Due to drastic shifts in the polls coming out of Louisiana of late, I am changing my preliminary projection in the Senate race there.
The Blogging Caesar now projects Mary Landrieu will manage a Weak DEM Hold in her contest with Republican John Kennedy. While
Kennedy polled ahead of Landrieu late last year, the incumbent senator has recovered nicely and has a comfortable lead in two polls conducted within the last few
weeks. I still believe the race will be close, but Landrieu definitely has the upper hand right now.
We've come to the end of our fifty-state tour. Our last stop is one of the reddest states in the nation. However, peculiar
things have happened here recently which have cast a shadow of faint purple haze across the political panorama. While this state won't be voting for a
Democratic presidential nominee in the foreseeable future - probably not in my lifetime - it did provide reasons for Democrats to smile in 2006. Witness
Democrat Dave Freudenthal's re-election to the statehouse and Gary Trauner's startlingly close loss to Republican Congresswoman Barbara Cubin in the race for Wyoming's
lone House seat.
Freudenthal is term-limited in 2010, but Trauner is back this year to make another run at the House seat now open as a result of Cubin's
retirement. Without the controversial Cubin in the picture, this seat should fall easily back into the GOP's hands. However, Trauner has proven the ability
to run effectively in hostile territory. The Blogging Caesar rates the race a Weak GOP Hold for now.
In the Senate, the passing of Senator Craig Thomas last summer has produced the unique situation of dual senate races in Wyoming this year. Both third-term
Senator Mike Enzi and newly-appointed Senator John Barrasso find their seats up for election. Not a problem, says The Blogging Caesar. After all, Wyoming
is still deeply red. Give both gentlemen Solid GOP Holds.
And that concludes your fifty-state tour. All the preliminary evaluations are in. The results are very positive for my Democratic friends. If
my current guesses prove true, Democrats will gain one governorship, three Senate seats, four House seats, and, most importantly, the White House. Let me hasten
to add here that these prognostications are just preliminary and rely on minimal hard data. Things will probably change often (in one direction or the other)
once I've instituted the formulas and begun calculating the numbers. Stay tuned!
Update: I mistakenly said initially that Freudenthal "captured" the statehouse in 2006 and is not up for re-election until 2010. In fact, he
win in 2006 marked the beginning of his second term in office. As a result he is term-limited and will not be able to seek a third term in 2010.
The post now contains the corrected information.
I've got several items to share with everyone this evening. Rather than separating them into different entries, I decided to put them
all in one. Here goes...
Bad night for The Blogging Caesar last night: It was a great night for Barack Obama who effectively shut the door on any realistic chance of Hillary
Clinton taking the nomination. In the process, however, his performance in both primaries (Indiana and North Carolina) landed the actual outcomes quite a ways
from my predictions. To top it off, my man Fred Smith lost his bid for the GOP gubernatorial nomination in North Carolina. Oh well, as I wrote a reader
who emailed in, now it's time to turn toward the general election in November - "GO PAT!!" (McCrory).
Emails from readers: I recently perused my large cache of emails and found that many of you have sent in emails that have gone unanswered. I
apologize for failing to respond. Over the next several weeks, I'm going to try to catch up. Don't be surprised if you get a response soon to an email you
sent me months ago - and then again, don't be surprised if you don't, heh heh.
Numbers tracking: With the conclusion of the fifty-state tour just a hair's breadth away, I will soon begin in earnest your Election Projection - 2008
Edition, complete with revised formulas (where needed), daily poll reports, and race tracking. Thanks for your patience as I've trudged my way through all the
preliminary evaluations. They will be complete by the weekend, and then the real election season commences!
Website redesign: This is something I'm very excited about. I've begun a redesign of the website that should be ready to launch very soon.
It will combine the good things about Election Projection with some additional cool features. Stay tuned...
Upcoming interview: As part of the launch of the new website design, I will be posting an interview with Melanie Taylor. Ms. Taylor is a
helicopter pilot who flew Blackhawks during multiple tours of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq. In fact, she was in Iraq when my parents went home to be with
the Lord. She has a fascinating story you won't want to miss!
I am looking forward with great anticipation to what is sure to be a thrilling ride to Election Day, November 4th. I hope you'll share it with me here at
Election Projection - 2008 Edition.
If you are a registered
Republican in my home state of North Carolina, I am asking you to vote for Fred Smith for Governor in tomorrow's primary election. He is a solid fiscal and
social conservative who will bring responsible and common sense convictions to the job of managing this great state. During his time in the State Senate, he has
sponsored the Taxpayer Protection Act which would require responsible, efficient use of the money North Carolinians send to Raleigh and co-sponsored the Defense of
Marriage Act which would preserve North Carolina's definition of marriage as between one woman and one man.
We here in North Carolina have a chance to elect a tried and true conservative as our governor. Polls are showing rival Republican Pat McCrory's
double-digit lead dwindling to a dead heat. A long-shot just a couple weeks ago, Fred Smith now has a real shot at the nomination. With your help, he can
win the primary and carry his legitimate conservative message on to the general election. Clear vision, straight talk. Proven conservative
leadership. That's what this man offers the people of North Carolina. So, please, get out there tomorrow and cast your vote for Fred Smith.
There were two special elections held yesterday in Louisiana. Both seats were previously held by Republicans. After yesterday, only
one will be. The contest in Louisiana's CD-1 was not expected to be close, and such was the case. However, CD-6 was another situation. The polls
going into Election Day showed the Democratic candidate, Don Cazayoux, ahead of Republican Woody Jenkins. They were right, and the Democrats now enjoy a
House majority which has grown overnight. One after another, the Democrats are picking off close races in these off-season elections. Is the blue wave
from 2006 still going strong? Will it produce another GOP bloodbath in November? We'll see, but this conservative Republican is beginning to wonder.
Welcome to the "Rematch State." One of the most-covered, most-controversial races in 2004 was the gubernatorial matchup between Democrat
Christine Gregoire and Republican Dino Rossi. A nail-biter of the highest degree, that race wasn't decided until a substantial number of lost votes in Seattle's
King County were mysteriously found, pushing Gregoire ahead by just 133 votes. It took three recounts and a court battle to finally seal the outcome.
Shortly after she was sworn in, polls showed Rossi way ahead of her in a hypothetical rematch. But time has passed since then, and the Governor has performed
well in the minds of Washingtonians. There will be a rematch between Gregoire and Rossi, but this time the climate favors the Democrat. It will still be
exciting, but The Blogging Caesar gives Gregoire the slight nod - Weak DEM Hold.
The gubernatorial race is not the only rematch on tap. In 2006, another hotly-contested race took place in district 8. Republican Dave Reichert narrowly
bested former Microsoft executive Darcy Burner, becoming one of just a few GOPers nationwide to survive a strong Democratic challenge. Ms. Burner is back for
another go at it. Expect another very close race and another term for Reichert. The Blogging Caesar start this race out as a Weak GOP
Hold.
None of the other congressional races here should be very competitive. However, the rematch theme remains as no less than three other districts will
feature the same two candidates from 2006.
This state is moving inch by inch ever week away from the South and into the Northeast. Of course, I'm talking demographically here, not
geographically. As the population around Washington DC explodes, the increase has ushered in a much more liberal group of folks. If this trend continues,
Virginia will look more like its northern neighbor, Maryland, than its southern neighbor, North Carolina, in the future. In fact, it would probably the more
accurate to replace the word 'if' with the word 'as' in the previous sentence.
The question then becomes when will this transistion reach critical mass and flip Virginia to blue? We may see that point reached this year, although I
suspect we are still one or two election cycles away. You can count on Virginia to be a battleground state this year, but The Blogging Caesar thinks John
McCain will take it by a Weak GOP margin.
One thing that may prove me wrong on that one is what could be called a "reverse coattails effect." Down-ticket contests favor the Democrats, starting with
the race for retiring GOP Senator John Warner's seat. With uber-popular Democrat and former Governor Mark Warner trouncing his fellow ex-Governor Jim Gilmore
in the polls, the Democratic nominee for president could realize at least a slight tailwind from Warner's likely strong performance. Warner's presumed victory
is among the most certain Democratic takeovers of the cycle. Unless Gilmore finds a miracle on the way to the voting booth, this one will be a
Strong DEM Gain.
The good news doesn't stop there for Democrats in Virginia. Looking at the House races, the blue team has a good chance to cut into the GOP's 8-3
congressional advantage. District 11, situated in the increasingly liberal Northern Virginia area, is presently held by Republican Tom Davis. He is
retiring at the end of this term, leaving an open GOP seat vulnerable to a rising opposing demographic. This race will be very tight, but The Blogging Caesar
thinks the political landscape lends itself to a Weak DEM Gain here. Beyond 11, Congresswoman Thelma Drake in district 2
is also somewhat vulnerable, but she should retain her seat.
This should be an exciting year in Virginia, so you'll want to check out the Virginia state page frequently.
Even though Vermont is among the most liberal states in the country, GOP Governor James Douglas has been elected for two terms so far.
He seeks a third two-year stint in the Governor's Mansion this year and should easily succeed in getting it. His top-of-the-ticket GOP colleague, John McCain,
will not fare so well. Vermont will go for the Democratic nominee in a rout.
The latest edition of Election Projection's Weekly Poll is up. Now that John McCain has secured more than enough delegates to claim
the GOP nomination, I thought I'd ask this audience who you think would be (or would have been) the strongest opponent against either Hillary Clinton or Barack
Obama. I know some may have done better against one than the other, but I want to know who you think the best choice overall would be (or would have
been). The poll is located in the right sidebar. Please be sure to cast your vote.
