Nate Silver on PA

Nov. 3: Romney’s Reason to Play for Pennsylvania

".....That brings us to Pennsylvania — where the forecast model puts Mr. Obama’s chances at better than 95 percent.

One poll of Pennsylvania on Saturday, from Susquehanna Polling and Research, showed a different result, with the two candidates tied at 47 percent. But in context, this is not such a great poll for Mr. Romney.

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Still, Mr. Romney’s campaign is making a late play for Pennsylvania with advertising dollars and a visit there on Sunday.

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But Florida, Virginia and Colorado are traditionally slightly Republican-leaning. If Mr. Romney overperforms his state polls across the board — something he will need to do anyway to win the election — they may come along for the ride.

Is Mr. Romney likely to flip enough votes in Pennsylvania to win? Probably not. Pennsylvania has historically had quite accurate polling, with the final polling average missing the eventual margin there by just one percentage point on average between 1996 and 2008. It is also a relatively “inelastic” state, meaning that there are relatively few swing voters who make up their minds at the last minute — perhaps part of the reason that the polling has normally been accurate.

Given the number of unappealing options for Mr. Romney, however, it may be worth a try. Pennsylvania still ranks seventh on the FiveThirtyEight list of tipping-point states — and that is without considering the mechanics of early voting. Pennsylvania has little early voting, meaning that a larger share of the vote there is still in play.

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http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/nov-3-romneys-reason-to-play-for-pennsylvania/#more-37144


Bottom line: GOTV


eta: the complacency on these boards scares me;