Breslin's last column for Newsday going naked on why Kerry will win

Why Kerry will beat Bush

One day last May, I assigned the election to John Kerry. I said it early, and often. As I looked more, I saw that it shouldn't even be close. I said that in this space more than once. Now I am so sure that I am not even going to bother to watch the results tonight. I am going to bed early, for I must rise in the darkness and pursue immediately an exciting, overdue project.

Besides, if I was up, so many people, upon seeing every word I said of this election coming true on television in front of them, would be kissing my hands and embarrassing me with outlandish praise. So I go to bed with total confidence. I will get up and stroll to other meadows. I invented this column form. I now leave, but will return here for cameo appearances. And I leave today as the only one in America who from the start was sure John Kerry would win by a wide margin. Let me tell you why.

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/newyork/columnists/nyc-breslin1101,0,7396742.column?coll=ny-ny-columnists

Wow, I had no idea there were so many cell phones.

that what I've been saying all along. Kerry landslide by 10 pts...which is an amazing number since Reagan won in a landslide but won popular vote by 5 pts,so 10 pts is an astounding number. I too sleepy to sit here and list my reasoning.

NO ONE who voted for Gore would today vote for Bush, not gonna happen. The youth vote is gonna rock. Pass the champagne, I've seen the Promised Land, and I believe.

I will sleep with dreams of suicidal neocons dancing in my head.

..."Then I saw on television yesterday, and I hate to single him out, but he singled himself out, this fellow Bill Schneider on CNN and he is their election expert and he said that cell phones didn't mean anything. He's right. They didn't mean anything in 1950."

Yea, right. Bill Schnieder and their are caught in a time capsule...

i need a cigarette after reading that

The cell phone -- young people -- the draft

=

Kerry -- Landslide!

still, it was a satisfying moment

Breslin's talk about overlooking the landline-less cell-phone-owning youth reminded me of the famous Chicago Trib blunder: "Dewey Beats Truman!"

The reason for that mistake was that the "polls" showed Dewey winning in a walk. Polls were done by phone then, too. It was 1948. Gallup was the only pollster. He began in 1936. But until 1948, the races weren't even close, so his polling hadn't been put to the test.

Now, in 1948, he's really facing the music because it's close. And he gets it terribly wrong. How? The post-requiem analysis showed that he had overlooked the fact that 40% of the public had no telephone service. And these were the people who typically voted Democrat.

Isn't that a sort of mirror image of what's happening today?

If 40 million under-30-year-olders have cells, and 20 million of these have no land lines, and the spread among such types is 55%K - 40%B or +15%K, and at least half of them vote, that's half of 15% of 20 million, or 1.5 million additional votes for Kerry.

I didn't know that bit of history. I do think we are see history repeat itself again.

... note the following excerpt:

"I invented this column form. I now leave, but will return here for cameo appearances. And I leave today as the only one in America who from the start was sure John Kerry would win by a wide margin. Let me tell you why."

It would be typical of this down to earth and self-deprecating soul to leave his column in just such a manner with but only one sentence. Since this is his "farewell," doesn anyone have any background on why or if he's previously addressed it ?

:kick: