What is considered a 'Safe' popular vote win?

[GOPhound]

I was thinking about some of these state polls and how the one to really keep an eye on are the national head-to-head polls.  In almost every election, the popular vote winner has also won the electoral college vote.  I would think that these national polls are a more important indicatior of who will win the election.

We saw in 2000 how Gore won the popular vote by .5% but lost the electoral college by the slimmest of margins.  Going by that, would it be safe to assume that any popular vote victory over .5% would guarantee an electoral victory?  Basically that means that if one candidate won by .5% or more, a majority of the electoral votes from the close states like NM,IA,FL,OH would end up voting for the winner.

I'm not a statistician, but I think the odds of a candidate winning the popular vote by let say 1.5%, yet losing the electoral college would be pretty slim.  Therefore I think I'm going to focus on the national polls, especially those by reputable organizations like Zogby.

[GOPhound]

I might argue the point on Zogby...

There are several much better polling firms...

Regarding a "safe" margin...

In 2000, if Gore had 1% more popular vote in every state (and Bush 1% less) the electoral college would have been. 296/242 for Gore.

A shift of 1.0% for Bush would have made it 327/211 for Bush

A shift of 3% for Gore would have made it also 327/211 - except this time for Gore

A shift of 3% towards Bush would have made it 366/172 for Bush


a gap of 3% or more it is almost inconcievable that the EV and popular vote would  not agree

Didn't Zogby come closet in the past 2 presidential elections?  I visited his site during the Dem primaries and he basically seemed to nail those too, with a few exceptions.  Which firms would you consider better?

So going by what you say, a Gore PV win of 1.5% would have given him a 296-242 win in the EV?  It would seem to me, just based on intuition, that it would be extremely unlikely for someone to win the PV by over 2% yet lose the EV.  From 1-2%, I think with the right combination of states, it is possible but not probable.  Under 1% it's quite probable.

I have a feeling that in both the EV and PV this election isn't going to be as close as 2000.  The problem is I'm just not sure who's going to be ahead.