538: Obama win probability rising

[brooklynite]

NY Times-FiveThirtyEight blog:

President Obama, who got good news in Thursday’s health care ruling, received more overnight on Friday when European leaders agreed to terms on a bank bailout. That sent the S.&P. 500 up by 2.5 percent on the hopes that this will reduce some of the downside risk in the economy.

Since the stock market is one of the economic variables the model considers, Mr. Obama’s probability of winning the Electoral College rose with the European news, to 67.8 percent, his highest figure since we began publishing the model this month.

The government also released data on personal income on Friday, another economic indicator the model uses. It rose by 0.2 percent in May, somewhat stronger than in most previous months and slightly beating market expectations. Still, personal income growth has been extremely sluggish for most of Mr. Obama’s term and remains the most pessimistic of the economic indicators the model uses.

The flow of polling has been comparatively strong for Mr. Obama of late, with leads in most battleground states in surveys published this week and national polls moving toward him, though some of this probably reflects statistical noise.

Projected Popular Vote count: 50.7 Obama, 48.2 Romney

[Robbins]

1. Not Only that

Nate projects only Indiana and NC would flip to Romney.

[mgcgulfcoast]

8. romney is a dumbass

empty suit.

[WI_DEM]

2. It's still too early. The jobs picture, conventions, VP pick, debates. Things look

ok right now but it's still a long way to election and they are going to have a lot of money to try and discredit Obama with.

[Robbins]

3. I agree with you

Each month's unemployment report Is Important.Economy Is all Romney has.

August will be determinded bu VP pick and the republican convention.Romney will get a boost from Convention.Expect Gallup and
RAS to give Romney a decent lead.Obama will have our convention to burst that boost.The debates will help determine the election.

Remember Romney will outspend Obama but this Isn't like the primarys Obama will be able to hit back somewhat and Obama Is
first competent opporent Romney has had.

[yellowcanine]

4. "though some of this probably reflects statistical noise." Yes and some of the moving away was

statistical noise so why is this worth mentioning now? There is always statistical noise. Statistical noise could also mean his lead is even larger than the polls says it is. And if the leads in most of the polls are moving toward Obama, that means the statistical noise is not very relevant - the more polls which are saying the same thing, the less important any statistical noise is.

[Gregorian]

5. I find it infuriating that it's anything but a total landslide.

There must be so many foolish Americans. What a drag.

[VWolf]

6. Same here

If we had a more educated/informed electorate it could be at 100%

[ailsagirl]

7. I can't help questioning the polls

That they're even this close makes me suspicious. Very. Nitt, who has nothing going for him, being so close to Obama (who has had many achievements, as we know) is astounding to me.

Plus, there are four more months of this BS upcoming and the repugs have quite an arsenal. I can only hope that it doesn't come down to the shenanigans of 2000/2004, which came so close to ruining the country altogether.

[Rosanna Lopez]

9. The reason it's close

The reason it's close is because there are only 2 parties to choose from in America. That always guarantees both parties a large chunk of the vote. Even in a bad year for Republicans after 8 years of Bush, in 2008 McCain still got 46% of the vote!

The problem is that whereas in other countries the anti-incumbent/anti-left vote might be split between several parties, in the U.S. it all conglomerates behind the Republicans. They automatically get all the voters who don't like the Democrats. If there was a viable 3rd party, as was the case in 1992, and to a lesser extent in 1996, the Republicans wouldn't get as much of the vote. Moderates who don't like the Democrats but think the Republicans are too extreme would go for a 3rd party. But when the only anti-Democrat vote is the Republicans, it's going to mean the Republicans are guaranteed a large chunk of the population.

[Wounded Bear]

11. There have been 3rd Party votes that hurt Dems, too. nt

[Rosanna Lopez]

13. Yes, but . . .

Yes, but that's not actually the phenomenon I'm describing. We know about Nadar taking a few hundred thousand votes here and there in a few states in 2000 (and to a lesser extent 2004), but I'm not talking about the situation of whether the vote itself hurts a political party by a small margin.

I'm talking about why a racist, misogynist, homophobic, anti-middle class, anti-poor party that belongs in the Dark Ages is still able to win such a large chunk of the American population. The fact is that many moderate voters don't have anywhere else to go if they don't like the Democrats - their only way of protesting or voting against them is to vote Republican.

That means that many moderate and independent voters get mixed in with people on the far right, the global warming deniers, Flat Earth club, racists, the Rick Santorum crowd etc.

A large percentage of the people who vote Republican really shouldn't be voting Republican. It makes sense for the right-wing nuts to do so, but not those in the center. That's what I'm getting at. They are all corralled into the same pen because of the structure of the 2-party system.

[SoFlaJet]

15. Yup

take my nephew for instance-he's a Paul guy who thinks he's actually some independent and he knows that the vote he will cast for anyone but Obama or Romney is essentially a vote FOR the GOP but he's going to do it anyway.

[a kennedy]

10. Hate to bring this up again.....Intarade is up today....

55.4%......and mitty is at 40.7%. http://www.intrade.com/v4/home/

[SoFlaJet]

12. And I have a feeling

that the new jobs report is going to be a good one. i can tell things are getting better down here in Florida-I can always judge it by my tip jar. I'm betting 185,000 new jobs. Oh yea but rest assured there WILL be a video montage of Boner and Cantor saying WHERE'S THE BEEF?

[SoFlaJet]

14. I think this thread has pissed some GOPers off

because I just went to click on it a minute ago and there was a virus that was caught by my protection service-good try asshole

[Rosanna Lopez]

16. CNN has Romney ahead 51-43% in battleground state poll

How accurate is this new CNN polling data? It acknowledges some of its limitations in that it doesn't know exactly where the numbers are coming from or which states Romney or Obama are actually stronger in, but are there any warning signs here?

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/07/02/cnn-poll-of-battleground-states-romney-51-obama-43/