Electoral Math

I wanted to wait long enough after the Democratic Convention to allow whatever "bounce" the Democrats got to stabilize in the polls. That has happened, and now the consensus of the credible polls is in line with my real-time analysis of the conventions.

The Republican ticket got nothing of value from its convention; the Democrats have gained a considerable lead from theirs, mainly courtesy of the fabulous speech by Bill Clinton, easily the best political speech of this election cycle to date.

When I write posts like this one, even for my very tiny audience, I first want to assure any reader that my analysis is free from bias or wishful thinking. When I switch into my straight journalist mode, my own feelings have no place and so remain at the side.

Instead I rely on my math skills. I go through all of the polls, crunch the numbers, and give you my best mathematical guess as to how this thing is developing.

So here it is. Obama has a commanding lead in the Electoral College, as of today. The most credible polls agree it is 237-191 over Romney, with 110 in play. But when you dig into those 110 more closely, Obama is ahead in every one of those states.

He need only win, say, two of them, to reach the magic number of 270 needed to win the election.

But if he wins them all, the final tally will be 337-191, which would qualify as a slaughter.

I doubt that will happen. We have a weak economy, which traditionally hurts incumbent Presidents. It seems logical that at least some of the swing states will swing to Romney. So I predict a closer finish that today's polls suggest.

A caution I must add to this analysis is that any major developments could change the electoral math. It's still early.

But in this race between two centrists, who differ far less from each other on ideology or policy than the extremes of those in their bases, Obama clearly has the advantage for now.

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