Best Guess: 312-226

I have read every article and studied every poll I can find. As of today, I believe Clinton will win the electoral and the popular votes by relatively comfortable margins.

Above is my current assessment of the all-important Electoral College tally. I think Clinton will win the popular vote by between 2.5 and 3 percent.

Both campaigns and the major media organizations will probably know the likely outcomes by mid-afternoon on Tuesday, due to exit polls. Everyone else will have to wait until the polls close in one of the four major time zones (sorry Hawaii and Alaska.)

The race probably will be called at 5, 6, 7 or 8 pm PT. I'm guessing 7, when certain mountain state polls are closed.

p.s. My electoral prediction for Clinton is 15 points higher than when I started this post, because I am now calling North Carolina for the Dems, based on new polls.

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Birthday Boy

 Oliver is five! Claire drove Peter and me down to San Jose through a heavy rain today. We stopped at Target to get the little guy presents, then proceeded to Sarah's new house.

 Laila and family arrived just before we did, including Betsy.

 Sarah and kids have a new kitten, "Silver Streak," who is six weeks old. She is the smallest kitten any of us has ever seen.

Sophia and all the kids held Silver Streak.

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Rain and Techno-Politics

New green shoots of grass cover the backyard after a storm this week. More rain hangs in the air, and the air smells delicious as a result.

But I've been focusing on the election cycle as ten days remain until voting day. I think Clinton will win but she is wounded by the continuing controversies around her use of email.

In several ways, this election has strangely become one based on different ways of using communication technology.

Clinton and Trump are of a generation (mine) that formed our habits long before email or Twitter. So we had to adapt ourselves to new technologies when they appeared. Most of us did so imperfectly.

Clinton screwed up her email big time and Trump has certainly screwed up on Twitter -- practically beyond belief. Have you noticed he has stopped late night Tweeting recently? That mst be the result of pressure from his wife, kids or campaign chair -- more likely all of them.

It comes down to two old folks uncomfortable with using technology. They both would have been served better had they hired a campaign engineer!

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Birthday Party

 My lovely and brilliant youngest daughter turns 18 in a few days and last night we had a small gathering for dinner in honor of her.

 Peter and Claire were there.

 She loved her presents and gave a short speech.

Dylan also drove up from Santa Cruz for the event.

A wonderful night!

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Financial Aid Forms

Out on a rainy Sunday to help my youngest as she filled out her FAFSA form. Unlike her brothers at this age, she does it herself, just asking for a bit of help. Her school counselor also got her going earlier in the week.

The proactive role she takes on applying to colleges impresses me. She is applying to at least 14 schools all over the country, including five here in California, though she disclaims any interest in those five.

She prefers the smaller private colleges at this point over large schools. That might or might not reflect the fact that the only schools she has attended -- Synergy, Oxbow and Gateway -- are all relatively small schools.

Her mother, who recently was laid off :( again, also thinks she should go to a small school. Part of me thinks she should experience a larger educational institution, but I will defer to my daughter's judgement.

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The Building Blowout

Studying the polls and the math, I'm convinced that if the election were held today, Clinton would win with some 330 electoral votes and probably close to 50 percent of the popular vote to about 42 percent for Trump.

It could easily get worse for Trump at this point. The multiple allegations of sexual misconduct against Trump are eroding his support among many sectors of the electorate, not just women. This kind of behavior offends many men as well.

The mainstream media -- CNN, Washington Post, New York Times -- have definitively turned against Trump, not so much out of a liberal bias but out of concern that he represents a dangerous authoritarian streak that threatens American democracy.

As always, the people will decide, not the media.

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Lunch and Tour

For the first time in ten years, Peter is back here living in San Francisco and today, after a job visit here in the Mission, he came by KQED and we had lunch. Then I gave him a tour of the office, where he met my staff members, saw television and radio control rooms, and got a sense of the energy in our newsroom.

What a wonderful thing to have my oldest son nearby again!

We also got a dusting of rain today, very welcome, with a promise of much more on the way...

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