"Clinton is in a better place than Barack Obama was at this point in 2012."

[Miles Archer]

New Polls Show Hillary Clinton Leading In Most Key States
Plenty of people seem ready to freak out, but the race remains as it was.
11/02/2016 09:31 pm ET

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/state-polls-clinton-leading_us_581a8098e4b08f9841ad3a03

Political Twitter was a mess Wednesday afternoon, waiting for a single set of poll numbers. The highly respected Marquette University Law School Wisconsin poll (https://law.marquette.edu/poll/) could have framed the day’s narrative about the state of the presidential race.

Had the Marquette poll shown Republican nominee Donald Trump leading, tied, or even just close to Hillary Clinton, the Democratic panic narrative might have taken over the day, despite a plethora of polls in other states. In part, that’s because Marquette is the gold standard Wisconsin poll. In part it’s because Wisconsin is one of several states Trump probably needs to win, and gains there might indicate a watershed of support breaking loose for the GOP nominee.

*****

Okay, it’s not just about ratings. The polls do show that some states are close. But the level of panic that threatened to ensue if one poll showed Trump up in one state was baffling ― especially considering the other high-quality polls out on Wednesday. It shows just how uncertain politicos think this election is.

Yet Clinton is in a better place than Barack Obama was at this point in 2012. In the HuffPost Pollster chart, Obama widened his lead to just 1.5 percentage points over Mitt Romney nationally ― but that was good enough for Simon Jackman’s HuffPost model and Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight model to give Obama a 91 percent chance of winning. Obama’s odds in the states were good enough that he was predicted to get 332 electoral votes (which is what he got).

[writes3000]

1. Fascinating to see how Silver treated a smaller lead back then. Very telling.

[whatthehey]

6. The difference is in the undecideds, so yes it is very telling.

There is a huge differrence in uncertainty between leading, say, 51 to 48 and leading 46 to 42. The second lead is larger, but has far more scope to be reversed if the undecideds break one way.

[Coyotl]

2. dKos election forecast is 326-212:

forecast Hillary Clinton 323 Trump 215 Electoral Votes

http://elections.dailykos.com/app/elections/2016/office/president



Hopefully, turnout will turn OH blue too. Latinos may make the difference in Texas. They are already turning Fl, AZ and NV blue.

[Drunken Irishman]

3. For sure she is - except in Ohio and Iowa, which have stubbornly stuck with Trump.

But in national polls, and other swing state polls, she's exceeding Obama's numbers.

This is a weird election. Utah is up for grabs but Iowa, a state the Democrats have won in six of the last seven presidential elections, appears to be slipping. I don't get it. I don't get why Iowa, of all states, is so pro-Trump.

I think Hillary is going to win but I'm skeptical it'll be by as many electoral votes as Obama. I could see her winning by a wider popular vote margin but losing Florida, Ohio and Iowa - while flipping North Carolina and maybe Arizona. So, 305-233 electoral vote win - about 30 votes fewer than Obama in 2012. If she wins Florida, it boosts upward to around the same level.

Going by Nate Silver, she'll win the electoral college 278-259.

Very close.

[Tom Rivers]

4. as well she should be

i voted for president obama twice but neither of his opponents were complete psychos set out on an unhinged mission to destroy the planet and fundamentally change the country and our standing in the world in a radically negative way for years to come. i disagreed with them strongly on policy, but my disagreement with trump goes far beyond that. it goes down to the core of him as a human being and the hate he is bringing out in his supporters nationwide. the thought that he could even come close to winning is terrifying enough, i don't want to imagine anything worse than that coming to fruition. i really don't understand what is going on with at least 40% of the people in this country that they could want a man like this, far too many republicans are putting party over country.

[tanyev]

5. Agreed.

The really disheartening thing is that Trump has as much support as he does.