In the latest Curmudgeon’s Corner Sam and Ivan talk about:
Recorded on 12 Nov 2012 Length this week – 1:22:17 |
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Just before 18:00 UTC today, Florida was finally “called” for Obama. Absent any faithless electors, this makes the final electoral college results Obama 332, Romney 206. As those of you following my electoral college tracking this year know, not only was that the final state of my “Current” line on election day, but it is also by far the most common location of the race in the daily updates covering the whole year. As I’d said quite a few times, 332-206 just seemed to be where this race “wanted” to be. Sometimes events would move the polls slightly further in Obama’s direction, sometimes slightly further in Romney’s direction, but 332-206 seemed to attract the race like a magnet, and things would revert back to this state. When things “reverted to the mean” this is where they went. Also of course, looking at the daily updates going back to January, Romney was NEVER ahead in this electoral college analysis… or any other electoral college analysis. Aside from a few days in October where Romney was threatening to take the lead (but never did) the question was never if Obama would win, but rather by how much. But yet reports are that the Romney campaign, and Romney himself, were shocked by the fact that they lost. They really truly did not believe the overwhelming consensus from the pollsters. I guess to some degree to run a national campaign like this you HAVE to make yourself think you are winning, but still… One final point. There are quite a few more complicated models out there doing electoral college analysis. They provide potentially more detail and more kinds of insight than mine, but part of my point in doing this exercise is that even a very simple “last five poll” average can get you very good results. The marginal value from added complexity doesn’t really seem to get you that much more. This isn’t to say that there isn’t value in that complexity. There is. And if I had more time, I’d certainly be tempted to make a more complex method of analysis myself. But the simple average still got 56 out of 56 right. (That would be the 50 states plus DC, plus the congressional districts in Maine and Nebraska.) That ain’t bad. Note added Nov 11 00:25 UTC: I have some final clean up to do on it yet, but the archival wiki page with all the information from this general election season is here. The earlier wiki archiving the primary season is here. Edit Nov 11 00:34 to change some awkward wording.
I needed to pause to take my wife to the airport, so I couldn’t make this update earlier, but shortly after 06:00 UTC, Alaska was called for Romney. This means so far the five poll average has called 54/54 contests. Only Florida is left. Even if it ends up missing on Florida, that is pretty good… It is better than it did four years ago. If I do this again in four years, I may end up doing some things differently based on things I’ve learned this time around, but for the most part I’d say this exercise has been a success. And lots of fun, if somewhat exhausting in the last month. I have no idea if Florida will end up being called in the next few hours, or if it will end up going almost 15 days like Missouri did in 2008. Given that, I think it is time to call it a night. I’ll do another update sometime after Florida is called, although it may not be immediate given I’ll now start spending time on non-election things as well. :-) Thanks again for following my coverage this year. It has been a blast!
The two remaining Nebraska congressional districts were called for Romney shortly before 06:00 UTC. As of then, that left Alaska and Florida outstanding, but only Florida was ever really in question. And this wraps up the live coverage of Election 2012 from Abulsme.com. I have to take my wife to the airport now. Alaska was actually called for Romney already, and I’ll include that in a 6:15 update when I get back. And then we wait for Florida to tell us if we do indeed end up at the magical 332-206, or if we end up at 303 to 235 instead. I’ll make a final update once the results in Florida are known. And then a really final update once the electoral college votes in December, just in case there are any faithless electors. But for now, thanks for joining Abulsme.com for the election coverage all year long. Sam out.
The five poll average’s streak continues.
Colorado and Maine’s 2nd also go to Obama. Still haven’t missed one.
At 04:49 UTC CNN called Nevada for Obama. The five poll average still hasn’t missed, but there are still a few states left.
Between 04:15 and 04:30 UTC, three more states were called. Missouri for Romney, and Oregon and Ohio for Obama. All three of these were fully expected, but Ohio put Obama over 270. CNN waited until they called Ohio at 04:18 UTC to call the election, even though based on the polls by the time we got to election day, Ohio wasn’t even close. Once Iowa was called 9 minutes earlier, Romney had no more ways to win. At this point, the only question is the margin of Obama’s victory. As of this update, the five poll average hasn’t missed a state yet. Four states and two congressional districts to go. (Of the close ones… there is also Alaska and Nebraska’s 3rd, but those will certainly go to Romney.) Edit 2012 Nov 7 05:13 to add that last parenthetical note.
A bunch of states were called between 04:00 UTC and 04:15 UTC:
Only one of these mattered. Iowa. Iowa was a close state. Romney needed every close state he had left in order to win. Without Iowa, even if Romney swept every other close state (and Maine’s 2nd) he would only get to 264. When CNN called Iowa at 04:09 UTC, I called the race on twitter in these two tweets. Nine minutes later when some more states came in, CNN called the election for Obama. They were slow. More on those next states in the next update. Anyway, Obama wins reelection!
With this update, there are no surprises, and no close states called, so Romney hangs on to his one glimmer of hope… But the 04:15 update is coming soon, and the news is not good for Romney… |
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