Who Are You Going to Believe, a Bookie or a Disreputable Creep Like Dick Morris

In recent days Michael Barone, George Will and the incomparable Dick Morris have all predicted that Mitt Romney will be elected President, and by a significant margin.  Mr. Will even has him carrying Minnesota, a state that has not voted Republican since 1972, when Nixon beat George McGovern in 49 states. Karl Rove has also predicted a Romney win, albeit my more modest margins.  Mr. Rove after all has to raise a lot of money every two years, and it helps to not completely shoot your credibility when you ask people to trust you with their money.

If you know someone that also believes that Mitt Romney is going to win tomorrow, please encourage them to wager on it.  Google led me to a web site where one could bet $100 on Romney and collect  $295 if he should be elected tomorrow night.  To bet on the President being re-elected, you would have to risk $340, just to win $100 if he wins.

Bookmakers make a profit by minimizing their risk.  Political pundits get paid to please an audience.  The bookmaker's goal is to minimize risk by having equal amounts of money ride on either outcome.  So a 3 to 1 betting line reflects the real actions taken by actual bettors with their own money.  That should influence your thinking, whether the result is one that you wish for, or not.

Nate Silver's prediction model, which correctly predicted every state except for Indiana last time, and has correctly predicted all but one of the last 60-odd Senate elections, predicts that the President's re-election is 92.2% probable.  The Intrade Future Market has the President's re-election at 67.3% likely.

My official 2012 Presidential Prediction:

• Barack Obama 50.2%/303 Electoral Votes
• Mitt Romney 48.4%/235 Electoral Votes
• Gary Johnson 0.9%
• Jill Stein 0.4%
• Virgil Goode and assorted eccentrics: 0.1%

303 Electoral Votes represents the President winning every jurisdiction he carried except for IN, Nebraska's 2nd congressional district, NC and FL.

A few days ago I wrote a post about how to follow the electoral math on election night.  It considered nine states in play.  But today I find it very unlikely that Romney can win NV or WI.  I also think he can't win without taking NC, the only swing state where he is a significant favorite.  Reducing the variables to these six states, the math becomes even simpler.

The President has 253 likely Electoral Votes and his challenger has 206.  With 79 EV to be determined on Election Day, Barack Obama needs to win only 17 of them.  He can get there just by winning Ohio or Florida.  Or Virginia and one more state among NH, CO, or IA.   One last path to 270 would involve losing OH, Fl and VA, but sweeping NH, CO and IA.

So I'm confident.  Not because I want the President to be elected, but because the available evidence tells me that he is likely to.