From: king@cogsci.ucsd.EDU (Jonathan King)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.elections
Subject: A guess at the electoral votes (was Re: Some state polls)
Summary: it could be very, very close
Keywords: electoral college, electoral votes, poll, polls, states
Date: 9 Sep 92 10:55:32 GMT
Organization: University of California, San Diego

jmk@cbnews.cb.att.com (joseph.m.knapp) writes:
>ncovey@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (neil covey) writes:
>>Some state polls I've seen over the weekend:
>>
>>Indiana  Bush 50%  Clinton 41%
>>Ohio     Clinton 48%  Bush 38%
>>Texas    Clinton 44%  Bush 42%
>>Connecticut  Clinton leads Bush by 4 points according to one poll; I
>>think it was 42% 38%
>
>One more I heard about: in Tennessee, Clinton/Gore only lead by 4 points.
>Kind of surprising in Gore country. Could be a fluke.

Well, with national polls showing Clinton leads ranging from 6% to
around 15%, I wouldn't know what to think without knowing a lot more
about the poll.  Another point is that Bush/Quayle really can't do
much to take advantage of Clinton/Gore weakness in Tennessee when they
have to scramble around trying to stabilize things in Texas, of all
places.  (Over the weekend I heard that there might be some
distressing news for Bush in Louisiana (!), as well; anybody else know
about this?)

>>I see all these polls as good news for Clinton.  Closer than expected in
>>Indiana, with perhaps a small chance of actually winning.  Bigger than
>>expected lead in Ohio--a state which the pundits say Bush must win.
>
>There had been some rumblings lately that the Bush Campaign expected 
>that Ohio would return to the fold eventually, and the do-or-die 
>battleground would be Michigan and Illinois. I suspect the recent Ohio 
>poll indicates that that is wishful thinking and Bush will be fighting 
>for his life there too. 

Well, sure: if Bush loses Ohio, he's pretty close to totally screwed;
there are only so many 20+ EV (Electoral Vote) states, and you can't
afford to lose them all or even be losing them all in September.
(BTW--Michigan is an honorary member of the 20+ EV club. :-))

As far as Indiana goes, Bush/Quayle should take that without any real
trouble.  Quayle can spend as much time there as it takes.

>The situation is the reverse of the so-called "electoral lock" that
>until now the Republicans have enjoyed: Bush must make no mistakes by 
>losing in even one of the battleground states; if Clinton comes through 
>in a couple of Rust Belt states or certainly in Texas or Florida, George 
>and Bar will  have a lot of time for cookouts, bass fishing and the 
>grandkids next year.

And the reason for this is that Bush now appears to be absolutely done
for in California, which is 20% of that vaunted electoral lock.  How
bad is it for Bush here?  As of last week, San Diego county was still
going for Clinton, and that was before the latest unemployment figures
were announced (i.e. 9.8% in the state).

But, hey: let's try to be systematic.  As of 9/9/92, this is how I
conservatively see the race ending up in November.  (States listed in
approximate order of strength for both candidates.)

CLINTON LOCKS		CLINTON ADVANTAGE

State	EVs		State	EVs

AR	 6		CA	54	; the biggie
DC	 3		IA	 7
WV	 5		WA	11
HI	 4		OR	 7
MN	10		TN	11
WI	11		VT	 3
RI	 4
MA	12
MD	10
NY	33

Total	98		Total	93

GRAND CLINTON TOTAL	191		; note that this is just Dukakis
					; in 1988 plus CA, VT, AR, and TN


BUSH LOCKS		BUSH ADVANTAGE

State	EVs		State	EVs

UT	 5		ME	 4		
ID	 4		NH	 4
AK	 3		VA	13
SC	 8		NE	 5
MS	 7		KS	 8
MT	 3		AZ	 8	; a loss here could be death
WY	 3		TX	32	; a loss here is almost instant death
IN	12		FL	25
ND	 3		NJ	15
SD	 3		NM	 5	; I've heard of problems in NM (!)
AL	 7		LA	 9	; same here in LA
NV	 4		NC	14	; NC is worth more EVs than before
			DE	 3

Total	62		Total	145

GRAND BUSH TOTAL	207


SWING STATES

LEAN CLINTON		LEAN BUSH	

State	EVs		State	EVs

MO	11		OK	 8	; MO may be stronger for Clinton
CT	 8		CO	 8	; CO is overlooked as a swing state
PA	23		GA	13	; both PA and GA are very important
IL	22		OH	21	; IL may be stronger for Clinton
MI	18		KY	 8	; KY reports early...stomaches flutter?
					
Total	82		Total	58


CLINTON LOCK PLUS ADVANTAGE PLUS LEAN	273

BUSH LOCK PLUS ADVANTAGE PLUS LEAN	265

As you see, the're called "swing states" for a reason; if any of the
ones I have for Clinton go to Bush, he wins the election unless
Clinton can "steal" two of Bushes.  Similarly, if Clinton takes *any*
state on the Bush swing list, then Bush has to "steal" Michigan or better
from Clinton unless Bush loses Ohio, in which case he has to steal any
two Clinton swing states.

In general, it would seem that Bush is somewhat more vulnerable to
unpleasant surprises in the voting as the poster suggested, but when the
race looks this close, every surprise is potentially fatal to somebody.

Tie possibility:  If Clinton takes all his Locks, Advantages and CT, OK
CO, KY, MO, GA, and IL (identically), then there could be a 269-269 tie
in the Electoral College.  The distressing thing about this is that this
is hardly the least plausible scenario.  Also note that Bush could just
end up winning the EV while losing the popular vote since he projects to
take many more of the Big Square States (tm).

Comments?

>Re: debates
>>...Could it be they're actually afraid of Bush going one on one with 
>>Clinton?
>
>Maybe they are staking everything on creating a bogeyman image of 
>Clinton that won't hold up if people actually see him sparring with 
>their hapless candidate? 

If Bush's advisors *aren't* afraid of having Bush debate Clinton
one-on-one, then they're absolutely crazy.  Whatever you may think of
his policies or ideas, Clinton is certainly a more polished speaker,
and is much, much better at the coherence thing and the syntax thing.
Only somebody like Dukakis could make George Bush look effective in a
debate, I would think.

Politically, however, it may be impossible to avoid debating entirely.
I'm not sure that anybody pays attention to Vice Presidential debates,
though, unless somebody claims to be like JFK.

>I suppose they could attempt to win on the issues, but the
>public seem to be not responding to their rallying cries. Survey said:
>the #1 issue is the economy (stupid). 

Stupid that this is the #1 issue?  I'm not so sure; here in California,
the unemployment rate is 9.8%...  You can argue about where to put the
blame for the country's economic problems, but people have always tended
to vote their pocketbooks.

>Joe Knapp     jmk@cbvox.att.com

jking
Newsgroups: alt.politics.elections