Talk Elections

How did you expect things to go on November 4th? Discuss with maps.


My final map was this:
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Obama - 311 EV
McCain -227 EV

I had Indiana going for McCain all the way through the campaign and nearly every polls had it at about McCain +4. I'd had North Carolina flipping all the way through the campaign, but I thought it would go narrowly to McCain in the end as I thought he had the momentum there in the last week. The same story with Florida.

You can still see many people's final predictions in the relevant section of the site. Or even in the little icons on the left.
:)

Here's mine - the confidence map, of which I've more reason to be proud than the percentages/winners one.

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Indiana was a surprise.

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Not bad, but not great. My percentages map did a lot worse. (I predicted both Ohio and North Carolina to go Republican.)

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Obama: 364
McCain: 174

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Missed all three of the closest (MO, IN, NC)

Percentages were great tho, I only missed KY (which I thought would be McCain >60%) and Oklahoma (thought would be McCain >70%)

Was off on Missouri and NE-2

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I'm pretty sure I had this...

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Obama - 291
McCain - 247


Missed OH, FL, NC, IN and NE 2

I'll easily admit, I thought McCain was going to win, even on Election Day.

McCain-277
Obama-261
I missed Colorado, NE2, Pennyslvania, Ohio, Indiana, North Carolina, and Florida.

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What I got wrong: NE2, Montana (that was my prediction for a big upset of the night, too bad I didn't go with IN), Indiana and Missouri.

My EV total was off by 4. On the bright side of things I only got 6 percentages wrong including the 4 mistakes mentioned earlier. The two in addition I got wrong: Alabama and Idaho.

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Like many others, I whiffed Indiana, Missouri and NE-02 on the predictions.

I got Indiana and NE-02 wrong. I got a small dose of Jsojourner's pessimism at the last moment.

Obama wins VA but not PA?

Obama was doing really well in VA and McCain was campaigning in PA practically everyday.

Exactly what I was going to say. It was a longshot, I know.

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Obama: 338
McCain: 200

Confidence
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Obama: 264
McCain: 174
Toss: 100

I had Missouri going for Obama, and Indiana going for McCain.

My final map was this(not the one in my prediction):
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I thought that Montana would go for Obama, and switched Missouri and North Carolina. I got NE-02 and Indiana right, and thought that Florida, Georgia, and Ohio would be closer than they were.

I knew that Obama had the election won once McCain made his quixotic effort to win over Pennsylvania after seeing similar efforts prove counterproductive in Michigan (which is much like Pennsylvania in its politics), Minnesota, and Wisconsin.

In any event McCain was close to winning until the real estate and financial bubbles imploded on his campaign. 

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Confidence: (green = tossup)

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Prediction Map:

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Confidence Map:

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Confidence Map:
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Hey, I was desperate

I thought it was going to be a blowout:

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Dem: 405
Rep: 133

I kind of expected all of the GOP's negative campaigning to backfire on them. I was kind of right but sort of wrong at the same time.

Obama was up more than 10 in the polls in MN and PA on election day... did you actually think McCain was going to win those two, or were you just holding out hope?  (btw, i know the feeling... i had Kerry taking Florida in 2004 b/c I just knew Ohio was going to dissapoint)

My predictions generally skew Republican, and 2008 was no exception.

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Obama 338-200

Agreed on the percentages.

Off on Missouri and Indiana


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Thought all the close ones were going to Obama, did pretty good overall. Missed North Dakota which had Obama ahead In the polls and I was hoping Obama would win Indiana and Missouri.

My Toss up map. I had North Dakota gray since February.

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364-174
Missed: IN, MO, NE-2
IN, MO were complete guesses. NE-2 was quite surprising.

Confidence Map:
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311-142-85
Not happy about ND, GA, NE-2 - but overall, fairly satisfied with the prediction.

Got Missouri, Georgia and NE-02 wrong. Georgia was just stupid over confidence, Missouri was a toss-up either way, NE-02 is annoying because I had predicted he'd win a Nebraska CD in June or July but I lost hope in the last couple of weeks. I was on the Indiana bandwagon pretty early, though, and rode it until the end, even when most people were saying it was crazy.

Also kind of happy about my >40% prediction in MT.

I had the same map as Jas, and have the same feelings about the ones I got wrong.

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I made this map on election night, just before the 7:00 poll closing. Of course, this was months before I joined the forum.

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And a LOLcomment from my first version:

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Off on Indiana, NC, NH, and Missouri.

I was off on NC and IN and FL.  I thought it was going to only be 316 electoral vote victory for Barack.

I just went all in and guessed a big Obama win

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The only thing I was looking at was Colorado and Virginia, most polls had Obama retaining all the Kerry states(252), plus Iowa and New Mexico(12). All he had to do was win Virginia, Colorado, Ohio, or Florida to win the election. I never thought that he would win North Carolina, Indiana, or NE-02, but all the other states I saw him winning.

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Like many others, I got Indiana and Missouri backwards.  Between Montana and North Dakota, I picked Montana for the big upset and missed that one.  It never dawned on me that Obama could win Omaha too.

Before The Economic Crisis....

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Obama - 273
McCain - 265


After the Economic Crisis...

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Obama - 364
McCain - 174

Before The Economic Crisis:

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Final Map:

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I wasn't a member of this Forum yet, but here's my map that I was predicting right before the election:

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Obama-353
McCain-185

The only states I got wrong was GA, IN, and NC. I thought Obama would narrowly squeak through in Georgia and pull off an upset due to the increased black turnout and due to the fact that Obama spent a lot of time and resources there. I thought McCain would narrowly win IN and NC.

I thought McCain would win North Carolina, Indiana, Florida, and Ohio. That's what I missed. I didn't believe the polls from the Obama media.

I wasn't on the forum at the time, but this was about what I was thinking at the time:

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• I thought McCain would over perform (I was hoping he'd pull off an upset, though knew it was unlikely), so MO, IN, FL, MT, ND, and FL were all McCain wins.
• I did believe Obama would still win Iowa, though I thought it would be surprisingly close.
  
• NE-02 was a complete surprise.
• OH was close enough that the over performance of McCain I expected would put it in his column
• I thought the small government tendencies of NV would allow McCain to pull off a victory there.
• I thought McCain's history in NH would give him an edge.

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How come you thought Ohio was going to vote McCain?

I thought the election would be alot closer than it was

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Obama 341-197

Sorry for bumping. But I like These 'Final Prediction' topics. And I wanted to see if our newer members had anything to add.

I goofed up with Montana, Missouri and Indiana (quite possibly North Carolina too, I can't remember though)

I certainly didn't predict Indiana for Obama.

At that time I was a Republican hack (and not on the forum), so my map went a little something like this:

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McCain--343
Obama--195

In all honesty, I don't know how I could believe something as ridiculous as that map.  I think I was thinking that the Bradley Effect and disenfranchised Clinton voters would both help McCain.

Had this been the results MSNBC's Election night coverage would have been very interesting viewing. ;)

Many monocles would drop.

This was mine; I thought Obama would be in the low 300's.


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Obama- 319
McCain- 219

I got Indiana, Missouri, and NE-2 wrong. 

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I based it on 538.com's forecasts. It was a pretty good bet, apparently.

Here's what I had:

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Maybe a little optimistic in a couple spots, but I only got 3 states off (plus NE-2) so I think it works. I did use this as my prediction in the office pool and came in second. I would of won if Obama had gotten Missouri.