Biggest surprise in the 2008 presidential election?

[diarrhea]

?

[Formerly Californian Tony]

Nevada, not for who won it but because the margin was far bigger than expected.

[Senator Snowstalker]

The Nebraska 2nd--I don't remember any talk about it. IN and NC were tossups, so not surprising.

[Assistant to the Regional Manager Cathcon]

I didn't know enough about what were Republican and what were Democratic states back then (I had an idea, but nothing too nuanced), but in retrospect without any real thought, I guess I'd say Indiana.

[MilesC56]

Like Cathcon, I didn't really follow state-level polling in detail then, but I was amazed that Obama got 365 electoral votes. All of my predictions had him getting about 320.

[Assistant to the Regional Manager Cathcon]

I didn't even know there was a place you could go to look up electoral vote counts and stuff like that. My election night story is my history teacher giving each of us a blank US map and telling us to go home that night and fill it in as states were called. The only states I have any memory of are Ohio ("this is important!" I had no idea why), Missouri (Me: Shouldn't it go Republican? They still haven't called it. Uh-oh) and Florida (That's not going Republican either! They still haven't called it! No!). I remember filling in the vast majority of the map but for a few, FL, MO, and a couple others. I wish I could find that map and see how far I'd gotten.

[Assistant to the Regional Manager Cathcon]

I actually found it in a stack of folders stashed in a part of my room. I guess I should actually throw that stuff away, but this is what I had down before I was sent to bed (in real life colors of course, as that was what I colored it in):


I guess at the tiem for me it was Florida given that I was really hoping it'd go for McCain. The next couple days or so I looked up the final results online and much to my dismay, it went for Obama.

[politicus]

Indiana.

[nclib]

The Nebraska 2nd--I don't remember any talk about it. IN and NC were tossups, so not surprising.

Would agree, but voted Indiana because it's easier to swing 1 CD than a state equal to 9 (or 13 CD's). Was impressed but not as surprised with NC since there are a lot of Northerners moving here and we have a higher black population to begin with.

[Rockefeller]

I'd say Florida. Just because it was not as close as it should have been.  Florida has never been a good state for Obama demographically.

[Chaddyr23]

Indiana simply for the fact at how sharply it swung and the President ended up winning it

[Formerly Californian Tony]

Difference between 538.com's forecasted margin and actual results :

- Grey : within 1%
- Between 1% and 2,5%
- Between 2,5% and 5%
- Between 5% and 7,5%
- Between 7,5% and 10%
- More than 10%

[rbt48]

Indiana totally surprised me.  I throught that McCain would, at worst, carry it by 1 or 2 %.

Since I live in Omaha and knew how close the Democrat came to unseating Lee Terry in 2006, this was not a big surprise.  But the margin was slim for Obama.  He trailed until the provisional ballots were tallied.

[ThomasSmith106]

Indiana and Virginia suprised me. I thought McCain would win Indiana and Virginia.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

I remember plenty of analysts saying that Obama had a chance in NE-02, so I wasn't at all surprised when he won there.  I actually wasn't surprised by any of the results.  North Carolina, Virginia, and Indiana were all considered states where Obama had a chance.  Obama led in Virginia for much of the campaign, so that was probably one of the least surprising.  I would probably have to say Missouri, since it was really the only swing state that McCain carried, and that was only by the barest of margins, and even that wasn't a big surprise since it was close in the polls.