538.com's battleground states

[Josh/Devilman88]

This is 538.com Battleground states as for July.

Obama: 242
McCain: 160
Toss-up: 136

Link to topic

[Keystone Phil]

Take out MT, IN and NC. Add PA. MO probably shouldn't be listed as a toss up either but it's not a stretch.

[bullmoose88]

Take out MT, IN and NC. Add PA. MO probably shouldn't be listed as a toss up either but it's not a stretch.

I think NC is more likely a swing state than Florida is at the moment.

Also at the moment PA is probably more democratic than it might be after the conventions...but thats the problem right now...right now a lot of these states are in places (R/D/Swing) that they probably won't be when this gets into the final weeks.

[Flying Dog]

MI shouldn't be a tossup.

[Josh/Devilman88]

Take out MT, IN and NC. Add PA. MO probably shouldn't be listed as a toss up either but it's not a stretch.

Why take off MT, IN and NC? In MT, Rasy has Obama up by 5%, SUSA has Obama ahead by 1% in IN, and NC has been polling around 2-5% for McCain, just like NV and FL. I agree that PA should be added, also NH should be added too.

[Keystone Phil]

Take out MT, IN and NC. Add PA. MO probably shouldn't be listed as a toss up either but it's not a stretch.

Why take off MT, IN and NC? In MT, Rasy has Obama up by 5%, SUSA has Obama ahead by 1%, and NC has been polling around 2-5% for McCain, just like NV and FL. I agree that PA should be added, also NH show be added too.

Josh, Rasmussen's polling has been weak this cycle. Plus, it's the summer. Do you really believe Obama is up in Montona (and up by five)?

Obama isn't up in those other states either. You want to argue that you have an outside shot at NC? Fine. Don't believe that he's up now though.

[bullmoose88]

Take out MT, IN and NC. Add PA. MO probably shouldn't be listed as a toss up either but it's not a stretch.

Why take off MT, IN and NC? In MT, Rasy has Obama up by 5%, SUSA has Obama ahead by 1%, and NC has been polling around 2-5% for McCain, just like NV and FL. I agree that PA should be added, also NH show be added too.

Josh, Rasmussen's polling has been weak this cycle. Plus, it's the summer. Do you really believe Obama is up in Montona (and up by five)?

Obama isn't up in those other states either. You want to argue that you have an outside shot at NC? Fine. Don't believe that he's up now though.

He might be up 5 right now in MT...which is a little less Republican presidentially...but yeah its the summer...I dont think Obama's going to win there...and if he does, then this election was over long before Montana (aka 1992)

[Josh/Devilman88]

Take out MT, IN and NC. Add PA. MO probably shouldn't be listed as a toss up either but it's not a stretch.

Why take off MT, IN and NC? In MT, Rasy has Obama up by 5%, SUSA has Obama ahead by 1%, and NC has been polling around 2-5% for McCain, just like NV and FL. I agree that PA should be added, also NH show be added too.

Josh, Rasmussen's polling has been weak this cycle. Plus, it's the summer. Do you really believe Obama is up in Montona (and up by five)?

Obama isn't up in those other states either. You want to argue that you have an outside shot at NC? Fine. Don't believe that he's up now though.

Going by the polls NC, IN, MT, MO should be toss-ups. When the polls have them states avg. out 5% then they will not be toss-up.

[Boris]

Josh, Rasmussen's polling has been weak this cycle. Plus, it's the summer. Do you really believe Obama is up in Montona (and up by five)?

Obama isn't up in those other states either. You want to argue that you have an outside shot at NC? Fine. Don't believe that he's up now though.

Probably not, but this map is merely a reflection of the polls, not conventional wisdom. So there's no sense in really criticizing it.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

PA is not a battleground but Indiana, Montana, Missouri, and Florida are? NC is much more a battleground than Florida this cycle, and I hope no one outside of Josh believes that Montana and Indiana are possible swing states. Im tempted to add NH to the list of swing states with McCain's ties to the state even though polling has been bad there recently.

[Associate Justice PiT]

Josh, Rasmussen's polling has been weak this cycle. Plus, it's the summer. Do you really believe Obama is up in Montona (and up by five)?

Obama isn't up in those other states either. You want to argue that you have an outside shot at NC? Fine. Don't believe that he's up now though.

Probably not, but this map is merely a reflection of the polls, not conventional wisdom. So there's no sense in really criticizing it.

     Agreed. Though when one considers the inaccuracy of summer polling, it begs the question: why bother making the map? It'll probably be wrong in a bunch of different ways.

[Andrew]

I think that maybe some of the posters here don't realize the purpose of fivethirtyeight.com:  http://docs.google.com/View?docid=dhn8hrb6_4c43866dz .

It's not a snapshot based on today's polling.  It's a projection based on a lot of factors.

[Jacobtm]

For those who don't read the actual site, 538 has most of those "battleground" states leaning McCain. With more representative color coding, it'd look like this, which is far less unreasonable looking:

Light colors are <5% wins
Normal colors are 5-10% wins
Dark colors are >10% wins

Though it's important to note that Virginia is given to McCain by only a .1% margin, so it should really be looked at as a tie, according to 538 methodology.

[Josh/Devilman88]

For those who don't read the actual site, 538 has most of those "battleground" states leaning McCain. With more representative color coding, it'd look like this, which is far less unreasonable looking:

Light colors are <5% wins
Normal colors are 5-10% wins
Dark colors are >10% wins

Though it's important to note that Virginia is given to McCain by only a .1% margin, so it should really be looked at as a tie, according to 538 methodology.

I believe in the end this will be what the map looks like, maybe switch OH to McCain, but right now I that is how I see the race ending. If Obama don't screw up.

[minionofmidas]

These are their win probabilities, in order -

Democrat
DC, VT 100%
HI, RI 99%
CA 98%
NY, CT, ME 97%
MA 96%
IL 95%
WA 93%
MN 92%
OR 87%
WI, MD, DE 86%
NJ 85%
IA (to flip) 81%
PA 78%
NH 76%
NM (to flip) 72%
MI 69%
CO (to flip) 64%
OH (to flip) 63%

Republican:
UT, AL 99%
OK, KY 98%
KS, LA, TN 97%
WY, NE 96%
ID, AR 94%
MS 93%
TX 91%
AZ 89%
GA 88%
SC 8%
AK, SD 81%
WV 79%
NC 76%
ND 75%
FL 73%
IN 70%
MO 69%
MT 62%
NV 55%
VA 52%

So... irrespective of the exact percentages... which states would you move around?