What i mean by my title is that we do not yet know the final results, although I am prepared to argue that the Presidential race is pretty well baked.
Election day is 4 weeks from tomorrow, by which time perhaps 40% of the votes will be cast. Already states are voting, and how people feel about the race can often make a difference in how they vote.
So where, as of 3:30 EDT did the aggregators and models find themselves?
As you may expect, with recent national and state polls in showing widening margins for Clinton, including the WSJ/NBC poll taken AFTER the Access Hollywood tape story broke on Friday, basically everyone is showing movement in Clinton’s direction.
The Real Clear Politics national average in the head to head is up to 5.8%
Pollster.com showed a 48.1-41.8, or 6.3% margin
Our own Daily Kos is up to 94% probability for CLinton, with 324 EVs in her favor
PredictWise is now at 88% for Clinton.
Huffington Post is at 88%.
Princeton Election Consortium Baysesian model is up to 96%, meta margin 4.0, and 326 electoral votes.
Five Thirty Eight Polls Plus 79.8%
Polls only 83.6
Now Cast 8.7.7% with 358 EVS (2012 states + NC + AZ)
Upshot Blog has it 86%
their consensus break of states for Clinton is now at 263 electoral votes
addit states. WI (10) 85% 273
FL (29) 71 302
NV (6) 70 308
NC (15) 85 323
OH (18) 62 341
they still have IA leaning R.
So what does this all mean?
There had been scuttlebutt for several days that private polls in Senate races (and perhaps Governor’s races as well) were showing a collapse of support for Trump. That is clearly demonstrated in the results in particular in Rasmussen and WSJ/NBC.
About the latter — so far the only scientific poll taken completely after the tape story broke on Friday. A quick look inside had me noting several things. It has a 71% white non-hispanic makeup, which many people would say is too high by 1-2 points. On the other hand, when you look at how people said they voted in 2012, the margin between those reporting for Obama versus those reporting for Romney was substantially more than the real approximately 4 points in that cycle. That said, it is probably a reasonable approximation of the status prior to the debate.
Republican consultant Mike Murphy has told a number of people that as severe as the drops in Republican support, especially but not exclusively for Trump, after the tape broke as in shown in the WSJ/NBC poll, what he is seeing in a number of the private polls is worse. Keep that in mind.
How the debate will have an impact going forward: Trump’s core support is somewhat energized as a result of what they saw as a strong performance. That he lied through his teeth does not affect them, because they believe the things he said. But of the 35-38 (4-way vs 2-way) share he shows in the poll, I would estimate that perhaps 25% is hardcore — either totally pro-Trump or sufficiently anti-Clinton to stick with him to the end. Some of the others could still be discouraged, particularly if he is seen as cratering.
There will be more bad news coming out for him.
There will be more from Wikileaks/Russia against Clinton — several thousand pages today.
The former is probably more important. Trump is now on record saying he never did the things he talked about in the Access Hollywood tape. We already have several people, one (Miss Utah) on record by name, that he did. Should tapes come out, or should there be sufficient confirmation beyond tapes, that could potentially impact him more.
I am less concerned with how he is impacted. It seems clear that he no longer has a path to 270 electoral votes. That was true before the debate. His lurking on stage only served to reinforce in the minds of many women what bothered them about the tape — it was a clear attempt to intimidate.
It failed.
Far too many of the talking heads last night and this morning missed what was happening in that debate — despite what the polling from CNN and YouGov clearly showed.
But not that many voters listen to the talking heads, so in a sense they are becoming increasingly irrelevant. Social media is far more important. And Clinton won the engagement handily on Twitter.
Of greater importance is what happened with the House Republican Caucus, with Ryan basically saying he will no longer defend Trump, and Trumpistas going ballistic. I am already seeing tweets urging people not to vote for any Republicans other than Trump, and I expect the campaign may itself move to urge its supporters to refuse to vote for those who rescinded their endorsements or called for Trump to withdraw.
The Republican side of the political divide is now at the early stages of a civil war.
The Clinton campaign is clearly considering expanding their map — to at least Georgia, AZ and maybe a few other states.
Republican figures, without being on the record, are now openly worried about losing the House, and very concerned that they will lose the Senate.
Steve Schmidt, on MS-NBC last night, basically said that the only question remaining right now is whether Nancy Pelosi will regain the position of Speaker.
We are in a good place, for now.
It is the time to go full pedal to the metal, to press whatever advantages we have.
Where we can get people to vote early, we need to lock in those votes.
While we can still register more people, we should.
In 2006, it did not look originally like a wave election. What made it so is when the full dimension of the Mark Foley story broke.
This can still be a wave election.
Let’s do all we can to make it so.