So, here it is, folks. This is my official prediction of how I think things are going to look Wednesday morning, barring endless recounts or some unforeseen disaster occurring in the next four days. It'll be 286 Obama - 252 Romney.
I'm not as comfortable with this map as I should be, but not in a way that you probably expect. There are four states that even I'm uncomfortable with my calls on: New Hampshire, Virginia, Florida and Colorado. Three of those I gave to Romney because most of the state polls that I've read have them leaning that way. I awarded Obama Colorado based on nothing more than a gut instinct, which could very well be wrong. And he could lose Colorado and still win, such is his cushion. With the exception of Colorado, where I've had a doubt, I've given the benefit of it to Romney.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if there were upsets in any or all of states. Because I was so unsure of the first three of the four, I went with (very) loose polling averages in them. But it's entirely within the realm of possibility that one, two or all three could go blue. I also have a feeling that Arizona might be closer than anyone suspects, but I have no serious current evidence there to change my call on it.
If you're the "early to bed, early to rise" sort, look at what happens in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Virginia. If Romney wins one or both of the first two (and if he wins one, he'll probably win both,) I'm wronger than I've been in my life and this is a Republican blowout. In that event, Romney will easily take Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa, Colorado, very probably Minnesota and maybe even Nevada. I don't realistically see that happening (although my good friend the Tiger on Politics does,) but it could.
The same applies if Obama wins Virginia. If he wins that, Florida might very well go with it, bringing his Electoral College total to an ass-kicking 338.
New Hampshire, being New Hampshire could flip from my prediction without indicating a trend.
For three years, I've been saying that Mitt Romney was the only Republican that would keep this election even reasonably close. But even I didn't think that he'd make it as close as it is and he deserves a great deal of credit for that. Make no mistake about it, if Romney loses, the Tea Partiers will go ape on him, rather undeservedly. None of their favorites would have been anywhere close to impressive electorally as Mitt has been. If Santorum or Gingrich were the nominee, I'd be devoting this post to deciding whether Obama breaks 400 Electoral College votes.
By my estimation, the House of Representatives is going to look pretty much like it does now. The GOP will probably lose two, but no more than seven seats. Even if Romney wins, he won't have much in the way of coattails. Isn't gerrymandering great?
The Senate, on the other hand, is going to be a Republican disaster. For the second consecutive cycle, they're going to blow a sure thing. Were it not for Tea Party challenges leading to the nomination of full-bore psychopaths, they could have possibly taken control of the upper body. But they didn't and they're going to fail to pick up Missouri and actually lose Indiana as a consequence. By pissing off Olympia Snowe to the degree that they did, they've lost Maine. It also increasingly looks like Scott Brown is going to lose in Massachusetts, which is too bad. I like him.
The Democrats went into this year defending an impossible number of seats in a hostile environment following 2010. But through sheer GOP incompetence, they'll almost certainly hold their losses down to two, possibly three seats.
And that should tell you everything you need to know about the Tea Party. Yes, they're an almost impossible pain in the ass, but they demonstrably can't carry state-wide elections outside of very narrow circumstances. And if they can't do that, they won't win a presidential election anytime in the near future. At some point, then, you need to ask what purpose these people serve.
Anyhow, it should be a much more interesting night than I thought it was going to be 40 days ago.
Map lovingly stolen from RealClearPolitics (which lets you make your own, because it's fun!) And my deepest gratitude goes to The Tiger on Politics for helping me copy mine here. That man is a godsend. If you think I'm wrong about everything, you should definitely read him on a regular basis.
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