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The horserace polls dominating today's political news are worse than misleading -- they're bad for democracy. They're as corrosive for America's self-image as the news industry's obsession with murder and disaster, a black hole wildly unwarranted by actual crime and catastrophe. They're as toxic to our spirit as the advertising industry's brilliant cultivation of loneliness and desire, a yearning it persuades us to slake by spending money. Worse, once the nominees are chosen, the point of poll coverage will be that, unless you live in a handful of zip codes, your vote for president is irrelevant. How's that for civic uplift?
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On top of this, in November, Electoral College arithmetic means that the highest-value voters will be swing voters in swing states. Most states are reliably red or blue. The ones that aren't, the key swing states, number -- depending on whose analysis you like -- 11 [5], seven [6], five [7] or just three [8]. Many of those states will tip one way or another by a very small margin, which means that the presidential election could be decided [9] by a crowd that wouldn't fill the Rose Bowl. Though there will be some effort to pump up the turnout of the base, most advertising buying, ground game spending and candidate scheduling will be driven by the pursuit of those undecided voters.

Next fall, if you want to know what winning the White House is about, ignore the liberal or conservative tribes. The data most worth knowing will describe people who will have spent the past two years ignoring pretty much everything that Democrats and Republicans say they stand for and will do. These Americans will be unlike you, but the difference will not be ideological. It will be the difference between being passionate about a leader who shares your beliefs, and being uninformed, disengaged, alienated, indifferent.

Just like you, they'll have only one vote to cast. But theirs will actually make a difference.