Electoral College: Arizona moves toward Romney again

Chart and map from the Abulsme.com 2012 Electoral College Prediction page. Both assume Obama vs Romney with no strong third party candidate. Both show polling as it currently exists. Things will change before election day. On the map red is Romney, blue is Obama, gold states are too close to call. Lines on the chart represent how many more electoral votes a candidate would have than is needed to tie under several different scenarios. Up is good for Obama, Down is good for Romney.

One change today. Movement in Romney’s direction again:

So with the latest poll in Arizona, Romney’s lead in the five poll average is once again at 5% which puts it back in the “Weak Romney” category, and makes me take the possibility of Obama winning off the table in my models. This diminishes Obama’s best case by 11 electoral votes:

Obama’s best case is still better than his 2008 result of 365 to 173, but just barely.

Also, all three models are at almost exactly the same places they were at the end of April. Almost two months further along, and effectively neither candidate has moved the needle at all. Some bouncing of the numbers up and down a little bit in between, but net… no change. (Well, Romney’s best case was SLIGHTLY better, by 3 electoral votes, back at the end of April… but close enough.)

One of the things I keep saying is that while Obama’s lead in these models is substantial, and if the election was held today, an Obama victory would be a pretty safe bet… it is important that the election is NOT today, and there is still plenty of time for things to change. So far though… the situation is remaining pretty static. So if Romney wants to change this picture, he really should get started at some point.

Conventional wisdom of course is that most voters don’t start paying attention until the conventions… which start at the end of August. So we may have another two months of doldrums to live through before things start getting lively and the polls start moving more.