As the weekend progresses, things are looking up for our hero. Why, just a little while ago, Nate Silver tweeted the following:
It seems that as election day approaches, more and more people are drifting over to the Obama column. Did these previously-undecided voters rub their eyes this morning, stretch their arms after an hour-longer sleep, and suddenly decide to start paying attention? Was it fact-checking? Attack ads?
For those of us with deeply-held political beliefs, or for those of us who stay informed on the issues that matter to us, these undecided voters are baffling to us. I mean, how can you be on the fence about this stuff? How can you, two days until the election, still think that these guys are so similar you can't tell them apart?
It's not that- secretly, they're waiting to find out who is going to win. And then... they're going to vote for that person.
"Halo 4" comes out on Election Day, and it's in Halo where I've noticed this function at work. In Halo's online multiplayer, players get to vote for the arena in which they'll compete. They have ten seconds to cast their vote- but you can see everybody else's, so you can switch your vote if you're the odd man out and want to cast the deciding vote in a deadlock of other options.
What I've noticed is, when one venue has the overwhelming majority, where individual votes no longer matter, players will switch their vote, at the last second, to the venue that has that majority. They've abandoned their own desires just so that they can say "me too."
The funny thing is, nobody knows who is voting for what. They just see the numbers. So it's not like they're doing it so they can get along with everyone. Nobody else knows! The only thing they've accomplished is making themselves feel better, knowing that they picked the "winning" venue.
And that's why Obama is gaining ground this weekend. That's why Mitt Romney fought so hard to maintain the narrative about his momentum. Because in a race this close, those few thousand people - those few thousand idiots- who only care about having picked the winner - those people could be the deciding factor here.
Obama is going to win these swing states because people in these swing states think he's going to win.
Think about that.