Just a note to the Kossacks: I've actually been doing this on my own blog since the first week of June, but since I've broken my posting embargo here, I've decided to start cross-posting these here.
Here is the map for July 22nd. Notes are below (click map for bigger version):
Numbers:
This Week's Notes
This week is a mixed week for both candidates, though the week, ultimately, still resulted in a gain for Obama.
Four states had a change of status this week, both marking an improvement for Obama, but also highlighted some possible cracks in the armor (more on that soon).
The big state to change status this week was Ohio, which moved from Too Close To Call to Weak Obama, and thus pushing Obama over the 270 electoral vote threshold using only Weak and Strong states. This means, if we assume that Obama wins every state in which he is currently leading by at least 5%, he could lose every single "lean" state and still win the presidency. This is a huge line to cross for Obama though, of course, he still has to maintain it as well.
McCain also gained another state as two polls in Alaska pushed it back from Too Close To Call to Weak McCain, improving his total to 154, the first time McCain actually ends a week with more electoral votes than he started with.
The two other states which had a change of status are the ones that show a possible weakness in Obama's armor. The first is Maine, where a new poll only shows Obama up by 8%, even though two polls a month ago had him up 14 and 22 points respectively. Since the last Maine polls were nearly a month ago, the new poll was just enough to drop Maine from Strong Obama to Weak Obama (though by only 0.2%).
The other state is New Hampshire, where a new poll this week showed Obama head by only 3%, again despite polls from a month ago showing Obama ahead there by 11% and 12%. Again, since the last polls in the state were so old, this new poll dropped New Hampshire all the way from Strong Obama to Too Close To Call.
So, what is going on here? If I took these new polls individually, without paying attention to the other, I would tend to dismiss them as outliers. Especially the New Hampshire one since it is done by a non-standard polling firm, in this case the University of New Hampshire. However, one should note about new Hampshire that, in the polls before Obama clenched the nomination, he was ahead by 5% and 3%.
Does this mean that the two polls from June just showed an Obama nomination bounce of 6% to 9%, a bounce which has since receded? Possibly. We'll need another poll to confirm whether this is the case or not.
The situation is not so clear in Maine, where Obama has never led by less than 10%. Of course, a lead of 8% could just be float within the margin of error, and it still makes Maine a pretty safe state, but it is possibly telling that two states bordering each other both show sudden drops in polling at the same time. It could be real movement, or it could just be a fluke of coincidental outlier polls. We'll only find out when new polls for those states come out.
This also marks a weakness, though an acceptable one from my point of view, in my methodology, that a poll a month old is worth as much in a state with 20 polls as it does in a state with 3 polls. If I don't want a poll from 30 days ago to overly influence a set of newer polls if there are a lot of new polls, then why would I want it to influence the polls if there is only one new poll? That's part of the idea. The calculations do best when there are more polls, and if 2004 is any indication, we will start getting a lot more polls, especially after the convention.
The only other movement this week was within the Too Close To Call Category as Nevada flipped from lean McCain to lean Obama while Virginia flipped from lean Obama to lean McCain. This resulted in a net gain of 8 electoral votes in the Count with Leaners for McCain, changing it to Obama 301, McCain 234, Tied 3. Obviously Obama would still enjoy the fact that he has over 300 electoral votes.
In the end, the official count for this week is Obama 280, McCain 154, Too Close To Call, 104. As I noted, this marks the first time a candidate has gotten over the 270 mark, this marks the largest lead for any candidate, as Obama takes a 126 electoral vote lead, and it also has the fewest number of outstanding electoral votes so far, at 104.
Historical Graph
The Historical Graph will be back next week (yay!)
Polling Wish List
Finally, my polling wish list for this week is:
States which haven't had a new poll in over a month:
DC, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Maryland, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, Wyoming.
Sister states
These are states for each candidate where the margin in those states are within 1% of each other and are within 3 total electoral votes or 33% of electoral votes of the smaller state of each other.
July 22, 2004: Kerry 332 (+80), Bush 195 (-91), Tied 11 (+11)
Changes by election day: Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Missouri, New Mexico, Ohio, Tennessee (tied)
Today: Obama 312, McCain 199, Tied 27
Total with same EV shift as 2004: McCain 306, Obama 232 (all 27 tied go to McCain)
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