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OT: American Politics

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Rasmussen tracking moved 1pt towards Obama today, as did Gallup's. One more tracking poll (IBD/TIPP) left to come in today.
 
Campaign Moves into Final Phase, Driven by Electoral Math

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For months, Mitt Romney’s campaign has expressed confidence in its ability to restore North Carolina to the Republican column in November. The boast isn’t just bluster. With five straight polls showing Romney ahead by an average of 5.6 points in North Carolina — which Barack Obama carried by 14,000 votes in 2008 — the Romney campaign on Thursday signaled it would begin redeploying resources to tighter battlegrounds. On the day early voting kicked off in the Tar Heel State, RealClearPolitics shifted the state from toss-up status to “lean Romney.”
One can question whether such confidence is misplaced, but the shift is a sign we have entered a new phase of the campaign, marked by a final sprint around a shrinking battlefield. Since the start of the general election, and even amid the jagged vicissitudes of the past six weeks, the electoral map has been remarkably static. Romney and Obama have spent the vast majority of their time and money in just nine states: Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia, and Wisconsin. From time to time, polls have given rise to rumors that another state (Pennsylvania, Michigan or Arizona, for example) might come into play, but it doesn’t look that way. Now, if North Carolina is sliding to Romney’s column — a judgment the Obama campaign disputes — we are down to eight.


In fact, the number of up for grabs is probably even smaller. And while Romney has a narrow but steady lead in the polls, Obama boasts the advantage in the electoral college math.

Romney’s problem is he has fewer pathways to 270 electoral votes. As National Journal’s Major Garrett explains:

"Romney, according to RCP, has 191 electoral votes. If you add Florida (29), North Carolina (15), and Virginia(13), that brings his total to 248 electoral votes. Add Colorado (9) –which neither campaign is prepared to claim or concede–and Romney’s total rises to 257 electoral votes. If Romney wins Ohio (18) in addition to these states, he would have 275 electoral votes. If Romney loses Ohio, he would need to win Iowa, Nevada, and New Hampshire to reach 273 electoral votes. There is a scenario where Romney could lose Ohio and New Hampshire but win Iowa and Nevada and one electoral vote from the 2nd Congressional District in Maine (the state allocates electoral votes by district vote) and capture the bare minimum of 270 electoral votes."


If you give Romney North Carolina, he has 206 — but he still needs to carry Virginia and Florida, plus wrest away several from a grab-bag of swing states Obama won in 2008 to vault his campaign over the hump. These include two Mountain West tossups (Colorado and Nevada, the latter of which seems to lean toward Obama); New Hampshire (where Obama is a 70% favorite, according to Nate Silver’s algorithm); and three Midwestern states –Iowa, Wisconsin and Ohio — where the incumbent has held slim but steady leads.

The Buckeye State, a perennial presidential bellwether, is again the linchpin for both sides. If Romney doesn’t win Ohio, Obama senior adviser David Plouffe said recently, “he’s not going to be President.” And for all the Republicans’ talk about surging enthusiasm and strong early voting and rosy internal polls, Ohio — where one in eight jobs is tied to an auto industry Obama nursed back to relative health — will be a hard get for the GOP.

Read more: http://swampland.time.com/2012/10/1...phase-driven-by-electoral-math/#ixzz29ljuKa5t


Real Clear Politics have Obama with a 1.1% bump this week in Ohio, now up 2.4% over Romney in their aggregate poll.
 
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With some old polls dropped, RCP's average now has Obama back up 0.1% - i.e. dead heat. The Gallup Romney +6 being the only one in Romney's favour within the last week.
 
New Buzzword from the Obama campaign, but it's a pretty dang good one, IMO:

We have got to name this condition he is going through. I think it is called Romnesia. I think that's what it is called. Now I'm not a medical doctor. But I do want to go over some of the symptoms with you because I want to make sure nobody else catches it.

If you say you're for equal pay for equal work but you keep refusing to say whether or not you will sign a bill that protects equal pay for equal work, you might have Romnesia.

If you say women should have access to contraceptive care, but you support legislation that would let employers deny contraceptive care, you might have a case of Romnesia.

If you say you will protect a women's right to choose but you stand up in a primary debate and say you'd be delighted to sign a law outlawing that right to choose in all cases, then you have definitely got Romnesia.
 
Zeke's begala style spinning aside, new documents have been released today about Benghazi and they are pretty damning as to what the administration knew and to what Amb. Stevens was requesting for almost two months.

Imo Obama is making a big mistake not going back to Washington to do a presidential address on this. He could take some air out of it. If he doesn't the speculation alone will be damning come Monday.
 
With some old polls dropped, RCP's average now has Obama back up 0.1% - i.e. dead heat. The Gallup Romney +6 being the only one in Romney's favour within the last week.

What's interesting is that Gallup still has him up by 6 nationally after today's one point drop. They are really sticking their reputation on the line, even though there are still two and a half weeks to go. If Romney actually wins the popular vote by at least 3-4%, I can't see how he could lose. I don't think anyone has ever won the popular vote by that margin and not won the electoral college as well.
 
And why is it crumbling?

Liars are solid politicians no?
It's crumbling because the world is changing, and the States refuse to get with it. We're talking about a country that still won't use the metric system, even though basically the entire world has embraced the nice and simple base ten system.
It's crumbling because a two party system doesn't work...it's crumbling because it's citizens are getting fat and lazy(if you create a drive-through system for voters watch your turnout increase).
It's crumbling because you are fighting wars that cost money and don't make you any.

And to be clear, I didn't mean WE are arguing semantics(even if we are) , I meant the politicians and your people are obsessing over semantics, instead of looking at how to fix the mess you're in.
 
The Orlando Sentinel endorsed Romney today. They are in the all important I4 corridor.

Last election they endorsed Obama.
 
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