The Official Absentee & Early Voting Reports Thread

[Vosem]

CO looks ok so far for Obama.

Remember that the final early vote in 2010 was R+6 and Bennet won by 1.

In 2008, the final early vote was D+1.5 and Obama won by 9.

Currently it's R+3 in the early vote. Which would point to a Obama 3-4% winning margin.

Remember that CO Indies are an Obama-leaning folk.

I'd just made my own thread before noticing this...why do Colorado Republicans vote early so much more than their counterparts in other states?

[Vosem]

CO looks ok so far for Obama.

Remember that the final early vote in 2010 was R+6 and Bennet won by 1.

In 2008, the final early vote was D+1.5 and Obama won by 9.

Currently it's R+3 in the early vote. Which would point to a Obama 3-4% winning margin.

Remember that CO Indies are an Obama-leaning folk.

I'd just made my own thread before noticing this...why do Colorado Republicans vote early so much more than their counterparts in other states?

They don't. Republicans are outperforming voter registration in Nevada, Florida, and North Carolina.

Colorado is such that it has more Republicans than Democrats and they are soaring to the polls this time.

Tender Branson is saying in 2010, the early voting was R+6 but ultimately Bennet won by 1%...nobody's disputing right now it's R+3, which seems to imply a narrow Obama victory. I'm listening very intently, krazen.

[Vosem]

CO looks ok so far for Obama.

Remember that the final early vote in 2010 was R+6 and Bennet won by 1.

In 2008, the final early vote was D+1.5 and Obama won by 9.

Currently it's R+3 in the early vote. Which would point to a Obama 3-4% winning margin.

Remember that CO Indies are an Obama-leaning folk.

I'd just made my own thread before noticing this...why do Colorado Republicans vote early so much more than their counterparts in other states?

They don't. Republicans are outperforming voter registration in Nevada, Florida, and North Carolina.

Colorado is such that it has more Republicans than Democrats and they are soaring to the polls this time.

Tender Branson is saying in 2010, the early voting was R+6 but ultimately Bennet won by 1%...nobody's disputing right now it's R+3, which seems to imply a narrow Obama victory. I'm listening very intently, krazen.

Of course. He and you both presume that independents will vote the same in this election as they did in those. Why would that be so?

In that same 2010 election Republicans won 3 statewide offices and the aggregate house vote  by 5 points. Of course they had better candidates in those races than Mr. Buck.

...the Secretary of State victory was just 51-49...but Suthers won by double-digits and Gessler won decisively despite a third party 'American Conservative' candidate getting 7% of the vote. Checking that made me feel better, but I'm still nowhere near confident.

[Vosem]

Iowa early vote turnout has now surpassed 2008's early vote turnout.

What do you think of the change in Dem proportions in the state, then? The polls certainly seem to bode well for Obama, but the swing in finalg gap isn't wondrous. Enough to hold, do you suppose, considering that Obama won by 9 in '08?

He won the early vote by 18, so a lot of McCain's vote was on election day. 

Indeed, McCain won Iowa on E-Day, but Obama's EaV (EaV = early vote, as opposed to ElV = electoral vote) margin was strong enough to overwhelm McCain's E-Day voters.

Iowa early vote turnout has now surpassed 2008's early vote turnout.

What do you think of the change in Dem proportions in the state, then? The polls certainly seem to bode well for Obama, but the swing in finalg gap isn't wondrous. Enough to hold, do you suppose, considering that Obama won by 9 in '08?

Well in 2008 the Republican campaign didn't focus on early voting at all. It makes sense that now that they do, at least to an extent, some of their election day voters are moving to early vote and thus the Democratic margin is shrinking. But if Democrats can get their margin up to 70,000 by the end of early voting in Iowa (5 more days), then I think we're in a good position.

So far, the D numbers are dropping on a daily basis in IA.  

No, the D raw vote margin has been increasing basically every day. It's now at about +62,000.

Which seems to translate into a narrow victory for Romney (though I'll admit an Obama win isn't out of the question). Keith Backer says between 60K and 120K is a tossup; that's overly optimistic (certainly, if Obama's past 90K he's got this state in the bag, I think), but I'm pretty sure the cutoff is more like 80K, not 70K. Certainly, Lief, I think you can agree at 62K Romney's more likely to win IA than Obama.

[Vosem]

I mean, if early voting ended today for some reason and we only led by 62k then that wouldn't be great. But there are five more days to go.

Obviously, I mean if EaV concluded with Democrats ahead 62K. We'll see what the final margin is. But you shouldn't count on last-minute swings towards your candidate. Pretty sure that's one of J.J.'s rules, isn't it?

Out of curiosity, why do you think the Democrats will build on their 62K? I recall it was 58K like a week ago; but that swing doesn't seem to me to be large enough to indicate some sort of sudden last-minute surge in Democratic EaV support. Or is it?

[Vosem]

Well Democrats have been steadily building on their support since early voting began. I assume the heaviest early voting is at the end, so the number of daily voters should increase in the final days.

Even if the swing from the last week is doubled over the next 4 days (or 5 if J.J. is wrong, doesn't really matter), you only hit 70K, which still, I think, translates to Romney being mildly favored. But most of my reading on Iowa EaV has been from rather right-wing sources, so I could be wrong.

60K, I think, is the Romney cutoff; if Obama's held below that, Romney's victory in IA is essentially certain.

[Vosem]

Considering the heavy dissonance between EaV and E-Day in Iowa in 2008 (if I remember correctly, EaV was O+18, but E-Day was M+2) and that independents generally have been breaking to Romney, I'm not sure a high-single-digits Romney victory on E-Day is unlikely, though I'll admit your math illustrates it's likely to be necessary.

[Vosem]

I mean, if early voting ended today for some reason and we only led by 62k then that wouldn't be great. But there are five more days to go.

Obviously, I mean if EaV concluded with Democrats ahead 62K. We'll see what the final margin is. But you shouldn't count on last-minute swings towards your candidate. Pretty sure that's one of J.J.'s rules, isn't it?

No, and you can get last minute swings.  The thing is that the share of the electoral that the D's are holding has been declining.

Ah, I'm sorry. What are your rules again (could you please provide me with a link)? I'd like to be able to refer to them over the next few days.