NBC/WSJ: Obama leads Romney by 7; Thune by 20; Palin by 22

[DS0816]

How weird! President Barack Obama — just 3 points up on a generic Republican but strongly or far outdistancing the three listed GOPers: Mitt Romney, John Thune, and Sarah Palin.

No map necessary.

I don’t buy into the Romney scenario because of voting patterns: 2008 Obama beat John McCain by 7.26%. He wouldn’t lose a quarter-percent. He’d have a gain. Like 1956 Dwight Eisenhower, 1996 Bill Clinton, and 2004 George W. Bush — 3 or 4 percent additional margins with their re-elections.

I want to give two [+2] points each to Thune and Palin and reduce Romney by four [–4].

• Obama beats Romney by 11%: My Scenario C (see below, “Four scenarios to consider”), in which Obama loses Indiana and Nebraska #02 but has pickups with bellwether Missouri, Montana (which has voted the same as Colorado from 1948–2004), and Georgia (the third of these 22-McCain-held states in which Obama won the female vote; it was a gender gap of 14% so he’d have to get males to give him about 44% at least). Mo. gave McCain a margin of R+0.13%, Mont. was R+2.38%, and Ga. was R+5.20%. Also: all winning Dems have won at least one of the two most southeastern states, Ga. and Florida. 1960s, 1990s, and 2000s winners went one-for-two. All the rest (backtracking with 1976 Jimmy Carter and, before him, 1948 Harry Truman, et al.) won both. Population growth in both states — likely to gain an additional congressional seat and electoral vote this decade — suggests these two will remain key to national trends. (Fla., which has backed the winner in all since 1928 except for 1960 and 1992, more so than Ga.)

• Obama beats Thune by 18%: Scenario D. Not a single 2008-Obama-pickup state gets lost. I will credit John Thune with holds of the Dakotas (including his home state), which carried for McCain between 8 and 9 points (after Bush had them well over 20% in 2004). There would be Democratic shifts in N.D. and S.D. — no worse than about 50%, letting him hold by, say, four or five in each. Obama would win a couple states that carried for McCain by 15% or better: I’m thinking Kentucky and Tennessee. In the latter he garnered 47% of females; with the former it was 44% (one less than Arizona; and he had 40% males, a match with Georgia). I’m more comfortable with the potential, with these two, than Arkansas and Louisiana (because the former, which was in the column of all prevailing Democratic presidential candidates prior to Obama, saw women reject him — going from 49% for 2004 John Kerry down to 39% for Obama; Hillary Clinton would’ve had, say, 59%). La. — supportive of all winning Dems but Truman, 1964 Lyndon Johnson, and Obama — lost such population in New Orleans area that it gives the GOP a clear advantage. So, here’s what I’m thinking: all single-digit McCain states (except the Dakotas): Missouri, Montana, Georgia, Arizona, South Carolina, Nebraska #01. A shift of D+10.74% would deliver Texas (R+11.76%) in part because the Lone Star state and S.C. have voted the same in the last ten elections (1972–2008); Tex. gave Obama females 47% and S.C. gave Obama females 48% (in S.C. the first two age groups, 18–29 and 30–44, gave Obama support in the mid-50s%).

• Obama beats Palin by 20%: Scenario D. An electoral vote nearing 500. Some states’ margins would pretty much max out. He’d carry my home state of Michigan by around 30%. He’d win 2-to-1 margins in Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, and probably in his and Vice President Joe Biden’s home states, Illinois and Delaware. He would get 70% of the vote in Hawaii, Vermont, and Rhode Island. So, like a tug of rope, what would this D+12.75% shift bring in? All the Thune losses including the Dakotas. Including Ky. and Tenn. Despite the shift of 12.75%, some would shift maybe half — like Indiana wouldn’t necessarily go from 1.03% to, say, 13.05%. So, at this rate, I’d add Nebraska (all five electoral votes) and Kansas — both were around R+15% (statewide). Palin’s best would be: Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, and Oklahoma. As well as Alabama and Mississippi.


Four scenarios to consider:
A: Election 2012 is the second such case in the past 100 years-plus that we flip political parties in two consecutive elections. The Republican candidate erases the 7.26% margin won by President Barack Obama in Election 2008. And enough states flip to make the difference.

B: Election 2012 results in President Obama re-elected but becoming the second commander in chief, following 1916 Woodrow Wilson, to suffer a loss in electoral votes in his re-election (1912 Wilson won 435 out of 531; in 1916 he had 277 out of 531).

C: Election 2012 results in President Obama having a modest shift in U.S. Popular Vote similar to re-elections of 1996 Bill Clinton and 2004 George W. Bush, both of whom garnered an additonal 3% in their margins. A few states trade colors, but President Obama has a gain in electoral votes in his re-election.

D: Election 2012 results in the first 400-vote [-plus] victory in the Electoral College since 1988. The Republican Party has a candidate who loses significant ground that’s worse than the party’s losing candidate from 2008, John McCain. In this case, no states get picked up by the opposition party. The incumbent party is the one that picks up states and, in essence, landslides challenging party and its candidate.

[DS0816]

This is about what a 55-45 split of the popular vote looks like in 2012, figuring that shifts are slightly stronger where Obama lost but generally not enough to swing any state that voted strongly against him in 2008. Figure that we are out of Afghanistan or are headed out on a timetable of our choosing, which is enough to swing Georgia (heavy military presence), and large growth in the Hispanic electorate shapes the vote in Colorado into a solid D state but almost swings Arizona and Texas.   

Beyond a 55-45 Obama win, strange things happen. I figure that many who had misgivings about Obama on "race" start voting for him.

I'd lighten up South Carolina.