9/17 ELECTION MODEL(TIA): OBAMA SURGING, 319EV! WHY THE MODEL DIFFERS FROM 538, ELECTORAL-VOTE & RCP

This
State
National
State
National
Monte  Carlo
Simulation

Update
Poll
5-Poll
2-party
2-party
Expected

9/17/2008
Aggregate
Average
Projection
Projection
Electoral Vote

Obama
McCain
 46.54 (50.69) 
 45.28 (49.31) 
 47.00 (51.20) 
 44.80 (48.80) 
51.45
48.55
51.92
48.08
 319 
 219 

 

The Obama Surge

The jarring economic news combined with a sharp increase in Sarah Palin negatives has caused Obama to rebound sharply in the state and national polls. The National model is at 51.92% thanks to Gallup, Hotline, Zogby and CBS. In the new CNN/Time state polls, he is leading in FL, OH, and VA and is nearly tied in NC. The State Monte Carlo model projects him to win 319 Electoral votes with 51.45% of the two-party vote.

But the key result, as always, is Obama’s Electoral Vote Win Probability. It’s a simple calculation — if you use Monte Carlo simulation. Obama won 4906 of 5000 Election trials, so it’s exactly 98.12%.  More confirmation: based on the national polls, there is a 98% probability that Obama will win the popular vote; based on the state polls, it’s 92%. Of course, all of these calculations assume that a fraud-free election is held today. It??s a snapshot which changes slightly every day. But today was a major turning point. See the State vs. National vote share projection Trend.

Why Election Model projections differ from the Media, Academia and the Bloggers

There are a variety of election forecasting models used in academia, the media and internet election sites. The corporate MSM (CNN, MSNBC, FOX, CBS, etc.) sponsors national polls to track the “horserace” and state polls to calculate the electoral vote.

As of Sept.16, three well-known sites each had McCain in front: electoral-vote.com had him leading by 257–247 (34 tied). realclearpolitics at 227–207 (104 toss-up). The fivethirtyeight.com at 288–250. But the 2008 Election Model (EM) had Obama leading 285–253. Why the difference?

• The EM uses Monte Carlo (MC) simulation method to calculate the probability of winning the electoral vote. Monte Carlo is widely used to analyze diverse risk-based models when an analytical solution is impractical or impossible. The EM is updated weekly based on the latest state and national polls. The model projects the popular and electoral vote, assuming both clean and fraudulent election scenarios. The EM allocates the electoral vote based on the state win probability in calculating a more realistic total Expected EV.

• Corporate MSM pollsters and media pundits use state and national polling data. Electoral vote projections are misleading, since they are calculated based on the latest state polls regardless of the spread; the state poll leader gets all of its electoral votes. This is statistically incorrect; they do not consider state win probabilities. And there is no adjustment for the allocation of undecided voters.

For example, assume that McCain leads by 51–49% in each of five states with a total of 100 electoral votes. Most models would simply assign the 100 EV to McCain. But that is an oversimplification: Obama could easily win one or more of the states, since his win probability is 31% :

• The state projected vote share V(i) is the state poll share PS(i) plus the undecided voter allocation UVA(i):
  
  
  V(i) = PS(i)+UVA(i),   for i=1,51 states
  
  
  For this example, a final Obama projected vote share V(i) = .49 for all states is assumed (with distinct state poll shares and respective undecided voter allocations implied). Five states total 100 EV.



• The probability P(i) of winning each state assuming a 4% polling MoE (95% confidence):
  
  
  P(i)  =  NORMDIST ( V(i),  0.5,  .04/1.96,  true )
  
  
  .31 = NORMDIST( .49,  0.5,  .04/1.96,  true)  for each of the 5 states       (the NORMDIST function is available in Excel)
  
  The 2008 Election Model would allocate 31% of 100 EV to Obama and 69% of 100 EV to McCain.

• Bloggers also track state and national polls and do not adjust for undecided voters. A few use Monte Carlo simulation, but the EV win probabilities and frequency distributions are NOT consistent with the polling data. Either the state win probabilities and/or the simulation algorithm is incorrect.

• Academic regression models predict the popular vote but are run months prior to the election. They are typically based on economic and political factors rather than state or national polling data. They do not project the electoral vote. In 2004, virtually all of them forecast Bush to win by 5-10%. But since the election was stolen, the models had to be wrong — they didn’t factor election fraud as an independent variable in the regression. In fact, they never even mentioned the F-word in describing their methodologies.

Fixing the polls: Party ID, Voted in 2000, RV vs. LV

There has been much discussion regarding the recent McCain “surge” in the national polls. Most national and state polls are sponsored by the corporate MSM. Gallup, Rasmussen and other national polls recently increased the Republican Party ID percentage weighting. This had the immediate effect of boosting McCain’s poll numbers. But there are 11 million more registered Democrats than registered Republicans. USA Today/Gallup changed the poll method from RV to LV right after the Republican convention. Party-ID weights were manipulated to favor McCain as well.

There is a consistent discrepancy between Registered Voter (RV) and Likely Voter (LV) Polls. The Democrats always do better in RV polls. No wonder: Since 1988, Democratic presidential candidates have won new voters by an average 14% margin.

The manipulation of polling weights is nothing new. Recall that the 2004 and 2006 Final National Exit Polls weightings were adjusted to match the recorded vote miscount. But all category cross-tabs had to be changed, not just Party ID. Of course, the Final Exit Poll (state and national) is always matched to the Recorded vote, even though it may be fraudulent — as it was in 2000, 2002, 2004 and 2006. This cannot be emphasized enough. Say it loud, again and again.


The final 2004 Election Model projection indicated that Kerry would win 337–201 EV with 51.8% of the 2-party vote.  In their Jan. 2005 report, exit pollsters Edison-Mitofsky provided the average exit poll discrepancy for each state based on 1250 total precincts. Kerry won the unadjusted aggregate state exit poll vote share by 52.0–47.0% (2-party 52.5%) with 337 electoral votes — exactly matching the Election Model!

In the 2006 midterms, the 7pm NEP had a 39–35 Democratic/Republican weighting mix. The Democrats won the NEP by 55–43%. But the weights were changed to 38–36 in the Final NEP in order to match the 52–46% recorded vote; the Dem 12% margin was cut in half. Once again, the 'Voted 2004' weights were transformed: from Bush/Kerry 47–45 at 7pm to 49–43 in the Final. The landslide was denied; 10-20 Dem seats were stolen.

The “dead heat” claimed by pollsters, bloggers and the media is a canard — unless they are factoring fraud into their models and not telling us. The media desperately wants a horserace, and so they fail to adjust the polls for undecided and newly registered voters. They avoid McCain’s gaffes, flip-flops and plagiarisms, while he supports the most unpopular president in history.

Polling data source:
Electoral-vote.com
RealClearPolitics.com

THE 2008 ELECTION MODEL

Last
Aggregate
5-poll
2-party
2-party
Monte  Carlo
Simulation

Update
State
National
State
National
Expected

9/17/2008
Average
Average
Projection
Projection
Electoral Vote

 
 
 
60% UVA
 
 

Obama
McCain
46.54
45.28
47.00
44.80
51.45
48.55
51.92
48.08
 319 
 219 

 

2004 Final
 
 
75% UVA
 
 

Kerry
Bush
47.88
46.89
47.80
46.60
51.80
48.20
51.77
48.23
 337 
 201 



Projected Recorded Vote   (assuming fraud)

Obama Vote Share      after adjustment for:

Popular Vote
Electoral Vote
48.9%
235
3% -
4% -
Uncounted Votes
Switched Votes

 

Sensitivity Analysis — Vote Share Impact on Electoral Vote

Undecided Voter Allocation Scenario
 
 
Base Case

Obama
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%

 

Projected 2-Party Vote Share

Obama
McCain
49.8
50.2
50.6
49.4
51.45
48.55
52.3
47.7
53.1
46.9

 

MoE
Obama popular vote win probability

2.0 %
2.5 %
3.0 %
35.7
42.7
45.1
89.2
73.2
66.0
99.8
92.2
82.8
100.0
98.7
93.1
100.0
99.9
97.8

 

Obama Expected Electoral Vote

Average
Median
279.0
280
299.9
301
319.1
320
338.3
338
358.2
357

Maximum
Minimum
362
177
372
215
399
230
416
264
427
278

 

Obama Electoral Vote Win Probability

Trial Wins
Probability
3240
64.8
4435
88.7
4900
98.00
4994
99.9
5000
100.0

 

95% Confidence Level
Upper
Lower
330
228
347
253
363
276
380
297
402
315

 

States Won
Obama
 
23
 
25
 
26
 
29
 
30
 

 

 

 

 
 
L A T E S T    P O L L S
 
 
OBAMA vs KERRY
MONTE CARLO  EV  SIMULATION

 

 
 
Pre-Undecided Voter Allocation
 
Projection
Projection
JK Exit Poll
Recorded
Diff
 
Diff
Obama
Obama
Sprd*wt
Battlegrnd
EV Flip(*)
 
Total

AL
AK
AZ
AR
CA
       
CO
CT
DC
DE
FL
 
GA
HI
ID
IL
IN
 
IA
KS
KY
LA
ME
 
MD
MA
MI
MN
MS
 
MO
MT
NE
NV
NH
 
NJ
NM
NY
NC
ND
 
OH
OK
OR
PA
RI
 
SC
SD
TN
TX
UT
 
VT
VA
WA
WV
WI
WY
       
Poll
 Date 
       
9/10
9/10
8/16
7/14
9/15

9/14
7/31
2004
9/12
9/15

9/10
2/28
9/10
8/12
9/15

9/10
8/20
8/11
8/17
9/10

9/5
8/5
9/10
9/12
9/10

9/10
9/9
7/28
9/11
9/10

9/12
9/9
9/15
9/15
9/9

9/15
9/7
8/7
9/14
8/20

7/23
9/9
8/20
8/21
9/13

2/28
9/15
9/10
9/10
8/5
9/10
       
 
EV
 538 
       
9
3
10
6
55
       
9
7
3
3
27
       
15
4
4
21
11
       
7
6
8
9
4
       
10
12
17
10
6
       
11
3
5
5
4
       
15
5
31
15
3
       
20
7
7
21
4
       
8
3
11
34
5
       
3
13
11
5
10
3
       
Obama
 46.54 % 
       
35
35
37
33
52

47
55
90
55
48

38
61
37
58
45

52
35
38
38
52

53
51
48
47
39

45
42
32
46
51

48
47
53
47
41

49
24
49
47
51

40
43
36
38
26

63
48
49
39
50
39
 
McCain
 45.28 % 
       
55
54
49
49
37

47
37
9
43
44

56
31
54
36
51

40
58
54
54
38

41
39
45
46
52

50
53
50
48
45

43
45
40
48
55

47
56
42
46
30

53
47
55
49
63

28
46
46
44
47
58
      
 
Diff
 1.26 
     
(20)
(19)
(12)
(16)
15

0
19
81
12
4

(18)
30
(17)
22
(6)

12
(23)
(16)
(16)
14

12
13
3
1
(13)

(5)
(11)
(18)
(2)
6

5
2
13
(1)
(14)

2
(32)
7
1
21

(13)
(4)
(19)
(11)
(37)

35
2
3
(5)
3
(19)
 
 
Obama
 51.45 % 
       
41.0
41.6
45.5
43.6
58.8

50.6
60.1
90.6
56.2
52.8

41.6
65.8
42.4
61.5
47.4

56.8
39.2
42.7
42.6
58.0

56.6
57.3
52.2
51.2
44.4

48.2
45.0
42.8
49.6
53.4

53.4
51.9
57.2
50.0
43.4

51.4
36.0
54.5
51.2
62.4

44.2
49.0
41.5
45.9
32.6

68.4
51.6
52.0
49.2
51.8
40.8 
Final  Kerry
 51.80 % 
       
42.0
39.8
48.8
51.0
55.8

50.8
56.5
86.3
57.8
52.3

46.5
52.5
38.3
57.0
41.3

54.5
39.3
42.8
49.0
58.3

56.3
70.8
54.3
55.0
47.3

49.3
41.3
37.3
50.5
51.5

56.0
50.5
60.0
49.0
42.5

52.3
36.3
54.5
53.8
62.0

44.3
46.5
49.2
40.0
29.3

58.3
48.5
55.0
50.0
54.8
33.5
       
IMS  WPE
 52.49 

42.3
40.6
45.0
45.7
60.7

50.6
62.9
91.5
61.9
51.5

42.4
58.7
32.6
57.1
40.8

51.2
37.5
40.3
44.0
56.1

60.2
66.4
55.0
56.3
49.5

49.5
37.6
37.4
53.4
57.8

58.1
53.6
65.1
50.0
35.0

54.6
34.2
51.9
55.7
62.7

46.2
36.3
43.6
42.4
28.4

67.2
50.3
57.4
40.7
52.6
32.9
    
       
Kerry
 48.76 

37.2
35.9
44.8
45.0
54.9

47.5
54.9
90.1
53.9
47.6

41.8
54.6
30.6
55.4
39.7

49.7
37.0
40.1
42.6
54.1

56.5
62.6
51.7
51.6
40.2

46.6
39.0
33.0
48.4
50.7

53.5
49.5
59.0
44.0
35.9

49.2
34.8
51.9
51.4
60.0

41.3
38.8
43.0
38.6
26.3

59.5
45.9
53.4
43.6
50.2
29.4
    
Projection
 (0.35) 

(1.0)
1.9
(3.2)
(7.4)
3.0

(0.1)
3.6
4.3
(1.6)
0.6

(4.9)
13.3
4.2
4.5
6.2

2.3
(0.0)
(0.0)
(6.4)
(0.3)

0.4
(13.5)
(2.1)
(3.8)
(2.9)

(1.1)
3.8
5.6
(0.9)
1.9

(2.6)
1.4
(2.8)
1.1
0.9

(0.9)
(0.3)
(0.0)
(2.6)
0.4

(0.0)
2.5
(7.7)
5.9
3.4

10.2
3.1
(3.0)
(0.8)
(3.0)
7.3
    
 
UnadjEP
 (1.04) 
 
(1.3)
1.0
0.5
(2.0)
(1.9)

0.0
(2.8)
(0.9)
(5.7)
1.3

(0.8)
7.1
9.8
4.3
6.6

5.6
1.7
2.4
(1.3)
1.9

(3.6)
(9.1)
(2.8)
(5.1)
(5.1)

(1.3)
7.4
5.4
(3.8)
(4.4)

(4.7)
(1.7)
(7.9)
(0.0)
8.4

(3.2)
1.8
1.7
(4.5)
(0.3)

(2.0)
12.7
(2.1)
3.5
4.2

1.2
1.3
(5.4)
8.5
(0.8)
7.9
Exp EV
 319.3 

0.0
0.0
0.1
0.0
55.0

5.5
7.0
3.0
3.0
24.7

0.0
4.0
0.0
21.0
1.1

7.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
4.0

10.0
12.0
14.6
7.2
0.0

2.0
0.0
0.0
2.1
3.8

14.3
4.1
31.0
7.5
0.0

15.1
0.0
6.9
15.2
4.0

0.0
0.9
0.0
0.8
0.0

3.0
10.2
9.2
1.7
8.1
0.0
    
Win Prob
 98.00 

0.0
0.0
1.4
0.1
100.0

61.6
100.0
100.0
99.9
91.5

0.0
100.0
0.0
100.0
10.1

100.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
100.0

99.9
100.0
85.9
72.2
0.3

18.6
0.7
0.0
42.2
95.2

95.2
82.7
100.0
50.0
0.1

75.4
0.0
98.6
72.2
100.0

0.2
31.2
0.0
2.3
0.0

100.0
78.3
83.6
34.8
81.1
0.0
    
Rank
 100% 







6.2



10.3





2.5









7.8
6.1


3.6


2.7
0.9

4.6
2.6

9.1


10.7

1.1
12.8



1.1





6.9
5.0
1.5
4.6

    
Evote
 219 







9



27





11









17
10


11


5
4

15
5

15


20

7
21



3





13
11
5
10

    
to Obama
 6 

AL
AK
AZ
AR
CA

CO*
CT
DC
DE
FL*

GA
HI
ID
IL
IN

IA*
KS
KY
LA
ME

MD
MA
MI
MN
MS

MO
MT
NE
NV
NH

NJ
NM*
NY
NC
ND

OH*
OK
OR
PA
RI

SC
SD
TN
TX
UT

VT
VA*
WA
WV
WI
WY
    

These graphs display the effects of uncounted and switched votes on Obama's projected EV and 2-party vote share.
?click">Effect of uncounted and switched votes on the projected vote share
?click">Effect of uncounted and switched votes on the electoral vote


The 2004 Election Calculator was developed as a response to the Final 2004 National Exit Poll.
The Final was forced to match the recorded vote using impossible weightings.
Read more about the 1988-2004 Election Calculator here.

The 2008 Election Calculator projects Obama will win the True Vote by 71 – 59m.
Read more about the 2008 Election Calculator here.


The Great Election Fraud Lockdown: Uncounted, Stuffed and Switched Votes

Professional statistical organizations, media pundits and election forecasters who projected a Bush victory never discuss Election Fraud. On the contrary, a complicit media has been in a permanent election fraud lockdown, as it relentlessly promotes the fictional propaganda that Bush won BOTH elections. They want you to believe that Democrats always do better in the exit polls, because Republican voters are reluctant responders. But they never consider other, more plausible explanations — such as uncounted votes and stuffed ballots. Read more here.

Apparently, the MSM and election fraud naysayers are unaware that millions of ballots are either uncounted or stuffed. And that these anomalies have always favored a Bush: in 1988, 1992, 2000 and 2004. That is one reason why the Democratic True vote (and exit poll share) is always greater than the Recorded vote.

The MSM does not want you to know the facts and assumes that you won’t try to reconcile the preliminary exit polls, census and recorded vote totals. If you try, expect to be labeled as a conspiracy nut.

These are the facts:

a) In most states, total votes cast exceeded votes recorded (uncounted ballots exceeded stuffed). In Florida, Ohio and about 10 other states, total votes recorded exceeded votes cast (ballot stuffing exceeded uncounted ballots).

b) The majority (70-80%) of uncounted ballots are in Democratic minority precincts. In 2000, according to the 2004 Census, a net 5.4 million of 110.8m total votes cast (4.9%) were uncounted, of which approximately 4.0m were Gore votes.

c) In 2004, Bush won the recorded vote by 62–59m with 286 EV. But 3.4m of 125.7 million total votes cast were uncounted (2.7%) and 2.5m were for Kerry. Adding back the uncounted votes, the recorded Bush 3.0m margin is cut in half, 62.9 - 61.5m.

Repeat a lie often enough, and it becomes conventional wisdom. Although the media commissioned exit polls which indicated that Kerry won by 5%, they never explained why mathematically impossible weights were used in the Final Exit Poll to 'force' a match to the recorded vote count.

In the Three-Card Monte con, the mark is tricked into betting that he can find the money card among three face-down cards. A rigged election is the Vote Scam equivalent of the Three-card Monte. What you see in the exit polls is not what you get in the recorded count; the recorded vote is never equal to the True vote. In this con game, the voter is the mark. Any model which correctly calculates the True vote is doomed to fail in a rigged election.

Allocating Undecided Voters: Sensitivity Analysis

In the 2008 Election Model, Obama is considered to be the challenger, since McCain is running for Bush’s third term. Typically, challengers win 60–90% of the undecided vote (UVA), if the incumbent is unpopular.

The State Model includes a sensitivity (risk) analysis of five Obama undecided voter (UVA) scenario assumptions ranging from 40–80%, with 60% as the base case. This enables one to view the effects of various projection assumptions on the expected electoral vote and win probability. Electoral vote forecasting models which do not provide a risk factor sensitivity analysis are incomplete.

The National Model calculates a 5-poll moving average projection assuming the 60% UVA scenario.

In 2004, final state and national Pre-Election Polls had the race nearly tied at 47%. Bush had a 48% approval rating. That’s one reason why the Gallup poll projected that Kerry would win 88% of the late undecided vote.

The 2004 Election Model allocated 75% of the undecided vote to Kerry as the base case of a five UVA sensitivity analysis. The base case scenario projected that Kerry would have an expected 337 electoral votes with 51.8% of the two-party vote. His electoral vote win probability was over 99%.

Calculating the Expected Electoral Vote: A Simple Summation

It’s hard to understand why election forecasting blogs and academics and the media, who employ the latest state polls as input to their models, don’t use basic probability, statistics and simulation concepts in forecasting the electoral vote and corresponding win probability.

A meta-analysis or simulation is not required to calculate the expected electoral vote. Of course, the individual state vote projections depend on the particular forecasting method used.

This is the procedure in the 2008 Election Model for calculating the expected electoral vote:

• The state projected vote share V(i) is the state poll PS(i) plus the undecided voter allocation UVA(i):
  
  
  V(i)  =  PS(i)+UVA(i),   for i=1,51 states



• The probability P(i) of winning each state assuming a 4% polling MoE (95% confidence):
  
  
  P(i)  =  NORMDIST ( V(i),  0.5,  .04/1.96,  true )



• The expected electoral vote EVS(i) for each state (win probability times electoral vote):
  
  
  EVS(i)  =  P(i)* EV(i)



• The total expected electoral vote EV as the sum of the state electoral votes:
  
  
  EV  =  Σ EVS(i),   for i = 1,51 states

Calculating the Probability of Winning the Electoral Vote: Monte Carlo Simulation

The Excel-based Election Model is very straightforward as shown above. After updating the database for the latest state polling data, the vote shares are projected. The normal distribution function calculates the corresponding state win probability. The expected state EV is the product of the win probability and electoral vote. The sum of the 51 state expected EVs is the total expected EV.

The final step is to calculate the EV Win Probability. The Election Model uses a Monte Carlo (MC) simulation. MC is widely used for analyzing complex systems, when an analytical solution is prohibitive due to the virtually infinite number of possible combinations of risk-based variables (i.e. state win probabilities). A random number generator (RND) is used in the simulated election trials. The EV win probability is just a simple division: the number of winning election trials divided by 5000 (total trials).

The Monte Carlo mean and median EV of the election trials match are always within one of the EV summation formula. This proves that 5000 election trials are sufficient to derive a theoretically accurate win probability. The simulation illustrates the Law of Large Numbers (LLN).

With all due respect to Professor Sam Wang, his Meta-Analysis program is an unnecessarily complex combinatorial algorithm when compared to Excel and Monte Carlo simulation for calculating the expected Electoral Vote and Win Probability.