Today's electoral vote.com tally of state by state polls has Bush leading Kerry 273-255 (with ten electoral votes in a tie state). The site claims this is the first time that all 50 states plus DC have recent poll data.
electoral-vote.com
What's really interesting, though, is that Bush is ahead by this count even though the polls used by the site give Pennsylvania, Michigan, AND Florida to Kerry.
The only noncoastal state West of the Mississippi in Kerry's column (and barely, at that) is Minnesota. Kerry has 7 of the biggest 9 states (CA, NY, FL, PA, IL, MI, and NJ) while Bush has only 2 (TX and OH). Those 7 states give Kerry 187 EV's. His problem is that there are 43 other states, and Kerry has the lead in only 11 of them.
I am still a little skeptical that the polls are accurately capturing voter sentiment, but they probably aren't radically far off either. As I see it, Kerry's problem is that he pretty much has to hold onto the three weakest of his 7 big states to have much of a chance. Those three are PA (47-46 Kerry), NJ (47-43 Kerry), and FL (46-45 Kerry). If even one of those slips away, he'll have to convert a whole bunch of other Bush states back to his column to have a chance. It can be done, but at the moment I wouldn't be inclined to bet on it. |
