Much like with long-term investments, I tend to anticipate in my gut how an election will turn out and then I generally stick with that view through various ups and downs. 2000 was an anomaly because my gut told me both candidates were going to lose, which oddly turned out to be true.
Matt Gross is asking bloggers to make predictions of how the election will turn out and my prediction is going to be fairly close to what it would have been during the Swiftvet nonsense and before:
Kerry 51%, Bush 46%, Nader 1%, misc 1%
I think large turnout in liberal states will boos Kerry’s popular vote total above the 50% mark and that Bush will have trouble breaking the 47% approval he’s been hovering around lately. I actually thought Kerry more likely to win with 49 or 50% but I don’t see Nader getting 2 or 3% and I’m not sure where those other votes are going to go. I suspect a number of weak Bush supporters will sit on their hands instead of voting, so that may boost Kerry’s apparent percentage.
In the electoral college, I think the victory for Kerry will be more decisive:
Kerry 304, Bush 234, Nader 0
(I calculated the totals using MyDD’s interactive poll watcher electoral vote tool.)
I’ve beens ensing Kerry would hover near or break 300 all along, so I’m going to stick with that. The specific way I get to it in the swing states includes conceding Florida and West Virginia to Bush, but asserting that the Democrats will take Wisconson, Ohio, Arkansas, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Nevada, and – really going out on a limb here – Louisiana.
The nice thing about this predicton is that I can give back LA, NV, and even OH and we’d still eke it out 270 to 268.
I’ll be doing my part to ensure Oregon stays blue when I go up there a week from now with fellow Edgewiser Cecil to encourage voters in Medford to get their ballots in.