If you average all of the polls, then you could come pretty close each time. I've never been as far off as 2012. In 2004 I had Bush winning New Jersey and in 2008 I had Obama winning Missouri and North Dakota. However, in 2012, I had Romney winning New Hampshire, Virginia, Florida, Ohio, Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Colorado.
Um what? Every polling average had Obama consistently ahead in every one of those states except maybe Florida and he had a national lead except for a few weeks after the first debate (but even then he never lost his EV lead).
I was all about Romney leading up to the election and have no idea what happened to the evangelical conservatives on election day. I think Rick Santorum would've been a helpful running mate with hindsight.
um what again? In 2004 when the last Republican won White Evangelicals made up 23% of the vote and Bush won them 78/21. In 2008 the number was up to 26% and McCain carried them 74/24. In 2012 the number stayed the same at 26% but Romney carried them by same margin as Bush (78/21). So Romney had more White Evangelical votes than either Bush or McCain which is impressive (especially as the white vote was decreasing overall).
Conservative vote share was up so Romney also had more of them then either McCain or Bush.
You seem to live in a counter-factual world.
The surprises for me on election day were that Romney did better in PA and OH than I had thought he would and Obama carried FL (i had guessed Romney would carry it narrowly). But
