The Washington Post appears to suspect that Hillary is going to lose and is attempting to prepare Hillary’s supporters for post-election shock and awe:
If the polls closed right at this moment (which they won’t) and if the results in each state perfectly mirrored the current RealClearPolitics average of polls in each state (which they won’t), Hillary Clinton would be elected president by an electoral college margin of 8 votes.
From her high in the polls a week or two ago, Clinton’s leads in a number of critical battleground states have collapsed or evaporated entirely. The election could come down to one state with four electoral college votes that flips from Clinton to Donald Trump and, boom: A 269-269 electoral college tie, and a vote by the House of Representatives to decide on the next president — who, given the composition of the House, would almost certainly be Donald Trump.
On Thursday, that Clinton state with four electoral college votes raised its hand. Hi, New Hampshire! Two new polls, from Boston Globe-Suffolk University and WBUR-MassInc put the Granite State at a virtual tie, with the continuing trend in the state away from Clinton. That’s Trump’s 269th electoral college vote. Or, really, his 270th: Polling in Maine’s second congressional district (which allocates one electoral college vote separately) has Trump in the lead. He wins the states he holds now and that one in Maine? President Donald Trump.
The trend is stark for Team Clinton.
Now, here is what has provoked this sudden outbreak of pessimism amongst the biased media. If you look at the Post‘s map of Hillary’s theoretical path to Electoral College victory, the pitfalls are readily apparent.
Trump is not only leading in New Hampsire now, but is also threatening to take Pennsylvania, Michigan, Viriginia, Colorado, and even New Mexico. Consider the recent Drudge headlines:
COLORADO: TIED
MICHIGAN: TIED
NEW HAMPSHIRE: TIED
NEVADA: TIED
PENNSYLVANIA: TIED
What do you think “TIED” means in a world where the pollsters give 96 percent of their political donations to Hillary Clinton? Despite weighting their demographics in her favor, massaging their data in her favor, and attempting to create a narrative of Clintonian inevitability, they still can’t present a credible picture of her winning those states.
In fact, they know, as does the Washington Post, that she’s probably going to lose all those states. This “trend to Trump” is merely pre-election CYA meant to retain their credibility for the next national election. And, if you recall, it is exactly what I have been waiting to see in the case of a Trumpslide, they’ve merely left it a little later than expected.
Remember, Colorado, Virginia, Michigan, and even New Mexico were supposed to be in the bag for Hillary. She wasn’t even campaigning or advertising in Colorado because her advisers were foolish enough to buy their own narrative. But look at what RCP, which operates on two weeks delay due to its poll-averaging model, now has as “toss-up” states.
AZ (11) CO (9)
FL (29) GA (16)
IA (6) ME (2)
MI (16) NV (6)
NH (4) NM (5)
NC (15) OH (18)
PA (20) MECD2 (1)
That’s 158 Electoral College votes. If Trump takes them all – and he now appears likely to take most of them – that’s a 322-216 victory.
Events will take their course. But it certainly appears that the path has been laid for the glorious ascension of the God-Emperor Trump and the crushing of both the Clinton machine and the global establishment.
Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton now leads Trump by an average of just 1.7 percentage points nationally, according to the RealClearPolitics average of polls. Less than three weeks ago, Clinton led by 7 points on the same model. FiveThirtyEight’s forecast model gives Trump a 34 percent chance of winning. On Oct. 17, the same model gave Trump a 12 percent chance.