Of the 80 races viewed as most competitive by The New York Times, based on polls and interviews with independent analysts, 32 are leaning Republican, 23 are leaning Democratic and 25 are tossups.
Mr. Obama now has a solid lead in states that account for 189 electoral votes, and he is well positioned in states representing 71 more electoral votes, for a total of 260, according to a tally by The New York Times, based on polls and interviews with officials from both campaigns and outside analysts.
Or in the words of one top campaign adviser: "Did we peak too soon?" Mr. Obama now has a solid lead in states that account for 185 electoral votes, and he is well positioned in states representing 58 more, for a total of 243, according to a ranking of states by The New York Times, based on polls and interviews with strategists in both campaigns.
Happiness level is based on polls of citizens, with a 10 indicating perfect bliss.
The reason he did so was because he believed that the Democrats win not by making their decisions based on polls, but by trusting themselves with their more complete and mature understanding of world affairs and supporting a position that would end up being best for the country.
The initiative's backers add that even if they fail today — which looks likely based on polling data — they'll be back next year with a different version.
Sometimes the site will say (in the smallest print ever) that the numbers are based on some poll done with some group with some margin of error.
Mr. Murray's decision, several campaign aides said, was based on recent polls showing Mr. Landrieu with a huge lead, buttressed by considerable support among black voters, many of whom remember the racial barriers torn down by Mr. Landrieu's father.
Even though election forecasting guru Nate Silver predicted Angle would win with 83% confidence, his own post-election analysis suggested that his prediction could have been based on biased polls in Nevada, with bad Latino samples in particular.
