So, I did predictions back in 2008 and 2012, but I do wanna go back over the polling and do them again. I will post my original predictions (which did not include percentages), and then I will post my updated prediction, and get a handle on how these elections went. Much like 2004, I won't do a chart, this is just a quick prediction.
2008 at the time: 350-188 Obama
I remember this on the basis that I got everything right but NC. ironically I thought NC went blue in the polls and I went red based on previous trends, but no, the polling indicated it was red too. Also it's possible I would've gotten NE2 wrong but i didnt even know what NE2 was back then. I just assumed it was an at large state.
Idk how I got Indiana right but I remember I did get it right. I know I looked at it this time again and it was red so idk wtf I was thinking there. Again, all I remember was i got everything right but NC.
As for revisiting the 2008 polls at the time, this is the map i reconstructed polling wise:
This one was wild. North Dakota leaned slightly blue. NC was STILL red so I STILL would've gotten it wrong. Indiana I wouldve gotten wrong, I literally mustve gotten it right by chance. In some ways my instincts at the time did improve my chances of getting stuff right, but yeah, instead of getting 49 states right, I would've only gotten 47 states right. I excluded NE2 from this analysis based on a lack of polls. because we know how hard it is to find NE2 data (ugh).
Vulnerable states for McCain were North Carolina and Missouri, with NC going blue and MO red in the final result. Another states worth looking at were Montana, Indiana, and Georgia. Indiana went blue but the other two went red.
This is why I knew Clinton stood no chance in Georgia in 2016 and wondered why she even tried. I mean, heres the thing about pre 2016 electoral maps. They SUCKED for dems in the south. The south is the one place the GOP reliably has a stronghold. This whole democratic "southern strategy" involving the sunbelt has always been relatively ill advised IMO. Meanwhile look at how well Obama dominated the rust belt. Most states werent even swing states, they were solid blue. PA was BARELY one, Ohio was reasonably in place, and Indiana was too. But Iowa? Wisconsin? Michigan? Minnesota? All blue. All reliably blue. We had it all. We really didnt know what we had in 2008. I really feel like the dems threw it away. I look at these old maps and shudder at what the map has become. Because of clinton's hubris and trump's politiking. We screwed up so hard.
Anyway, for Obama, the only really vulnerable states in his camp polling wise were Florida and Ohio, which were both the great election deciders of 2000 and 2004, and that in 2024 are now both basically solid red. North Dakota was too, and that went for McCain, but really the polling was weird here.
And McCain was screwed. I mean even if he took North Dakota, Ohio, and Florida, while keeping his entire column, Obama still would've won 291-246. 291-247 if we gave him NE2.
So we would've needed to go into the next block of states and find 21 votes for McCain to win. The path to least resistance would've been Virginia, which was at 4.4% polling, and Colorado, which was at 5.5%.
I recall I did do the percentage thing back then but i think I tried a 3 point MOE back then so I came up with something crazy as close to 95%. Yeah, Colorado at 5.5% with a 3% MOE would put McCain at a 3.4% chance of winning and Obama with a 96.6% chance. There's a reason I was so doomer about this as a conservative at the time. The blue wave was a massive tidal wave we didn't even have a shot against and I honestly believed we had zero chance here. I guess if I applied the 4 point MOE I normally do, i'd come up with 8.4% chance for McCain and 91.6% chance for Obama. Still very bad for McCain.
But yeah, that's basically 2008. Now 2012.
2012 at the time: 319-219 Obama
Once again, I recall getting everything right except for Virginia. I had some idea it was going red based on previous historical precedent. I was wrong, it throw off my prediction again, I had 49/50 right. Yeah.
Now to rebuild the map based on the actually polling data at the time, and to come up with a new map.
Revamped prediction: 303-235 Obama
Once again idk how I was so accurate with my old methodology. I literally would look not just at polling but historical predictions on things and made some judgment calls that went against polls. here I said VA would go red and it didn't so I stopped doing that in 2016. But I got florida wrong as a result, although everything else seems like it would've been accurate. So I guess I would've been right 49/50 times either way.
Here, we see the general thinning of the rust belt from 2008. A lot of that solid electoral advantage Obama had eroded, although he still held it comfortably and still had a decent shot at winning. Romney's most vulnerable states were North Carolina and Florida, and Florida did go to Obama. Obama's weakest state was Virginia, the state i got wrong and thought it would go Romney. I guess my prediction wasn't unreasonable at the time but yeah.
As far as states beyond that, Romney had a lot to choose from. Nevada, Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New Hampshire were all in play. And he only needed 35 electoral votes to flip the outcome. Say he got Virginia. Okay, so, 13 down, 22 to go. Colorado, that's 9. 13 to go. New Hampshire is 4, 9 to go. Iowa is 6, that's 3 to go. And that makes the deciding state Nevada at 2.8%. That gives Romney a 24.2% chance, and Obama a 75.8% chance.
This is reminiscent of 2024 for Biden, where I have him at a 28% chance and Trump at a 72% chance. Of course, 2024 has a much more rigid electoral map for bIden, and Biden has a straight shot with only 3 states, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. MI and WI are within a point, PA is at 2.3%. And yeah beyond that, Biden just faces an electoral cliff.
Here, Romney either needed to take those 5 states. However, he could've taken a shortcut after VA and pulled off Ohio, which was at 2.9% and offered 18 electoral votes. Wisconsin, Michigan and PA were all in the 3-4 point range. Not impossible to take, just not very easy.
So if I had to guess whether Romney in 2012 or Biden in 2024 has it harder, I don't know. Probably Romney. He would've needed to overperform a bit more and win more states, but at the same time, he had more avenues to attack. Biden has one viable strategy as of now, bet everything on the rust belt and NE2 and win exactly 270. And that would still be similar to pulling off a Mitt Romney style overperformance in 2012.
So Biden is...kinda screwed. Just like Romney was screwed. Still, at least it isn't the equivalent of the 2008 map. As a republican, that was electoral oblivion for the GOP. In 2012, it looked like a repeat of 2008 and I did anticipate that Obama would win quite comfortably, but yeah the margins were lower.
All in all, going from this to 2016, I think that what happened seems obvious. Electoral fatigue. Every election you win, your base gets less enthusiastic, the opponents get more fired up, and independents shift toward the other party.
I mean, just thinking about Hillary in 2016, i get incensed. She blew it big time. She could've won, but she would've needed to actually appeal to the rust belt, and she didn't. The rust belt showed some weakness in 2012 but still held for Obama, but in 2016, she lost it. Why? because she was too busy trying to do her centrist thing and trying to run up the margins in win down south. She legit thought Arizona, Georgia, Texas, and North Carolina were options. In addition to normal old school bellweathers like Ohio and Florida. She gambled hard and she screwed up. Holy crap, did Clinton screw up hard.
I mean, I know people complain about my green vote in PA, but again, symptom of a larger problem. Clinton just wasnt what the country wanted, her strategy sucked, and now we're STILL paying for it. Since trump has been realigning the election. Yes, the southern strategy clinton went for did bring some states vague into striking range like Georgia, North Carolina, and Arizona. Still, they're BARELY in range, and if Obama couldnt pull it off, idk why clinton and biden had to campaign so hard there. It's why I really wanted to go the Bernie strategy. I mean doubling down on what we had seemed more reliable than going all in with this sun belt strategy. But, clinton was a centrist, and had this attitude like F the working class in the rust belt so...those guys shifted Trump. And we mightve lost them for a generation, similar to the southern strategy in the 1960s breaking the new deal coalition.
It really pisses me off. I'm just looking at this, and now I'm looking at where we are, with Ohio being solid red, Florida being borderline solid red. All these southern states being virtually out of reach, and not really wanting them either way since their liberalism is just...not my liberalism. Too moderate, yikes. And the GOP is insane now. And even WI/MI/PA and even fricking Minnesota are at risk of shifting to Trump. This isn't good. We're not in a good place. At all.
Again Im not saying Biden CAN'T pull off 2024. he CAN. It's not game set match yet. 2016 looked like it was gonna follow 2012, which is why clinton thought she could get away being so arrogant, and look what happened. So things CAN shift back toward Biden. But yeah.
I can't help but looking back at old electoral maps like this and being like, wtf did we throw away here?
Again, Bernie would've maintained the Obama electoral map for better or for worse. We wouldnt be making ANY gains in the south, but are we making gains anyway? Are we? I mean I know we barely won GA and AZ in 2020. But as long as we maintained the blue wall, MN/WI/MI/PA, and maybe OH and IA, it didn't matter. Beyond that, all we needed was VA, we needed to remain somewhat competitive in FL, and yeah, we had the electoral map locked down.
But yeah. Anyway, that's my analysis of 2008 and 2012. I guess this is like 2012 but Biden is Romney. Closest historical precedent in 20 years, and yeah. Not a great place to be. Could be worse, but yeah. Obama beat Romney comfortably and Trump could also beat Biden comfortably. And yeah.
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