Presidential Election - Update 2

I have made one modification to my model. Instead of using the latest poll results for the 18 battleground states, I now use the average of polls from the last week or so as reported by RealClear Politics. Hopefully, this makes the analysis more robust.

One other caveat - I have excluded the CNN/USAT/Gallup poll from 10/21-24 for Florida as it appears to be an outlier. They show Bush+8, while the other polls show Bush+1.2, Bush+4, Kerry+3, Tie, Kerry+2, Tie.

Here is the latest update to my simulation-based predictions of the presidential election outcome using data as of 11:55 AM, October 27.

SCENARIO	Kerry electoral votes	Kerry win probability
Undecided voters split between Kerry and Bush	261	35.08
Undecided voters favor Kerry 3:2	278	66.16
Undecided voters favor Kerry 2:1	290	81.84

Scroll down for a graph showing the projected distribution of Kerry's electoral votes for the scenario where undecided voters favor Kerry 3:2. The blue bars denote the outcomes corresponding to a Kerry victory. As in my previous post, I am going with this scenario as my "bottom-line" prediction.

Details of the model and other assumptions can be found in my Oct 21 post titled "Presidential Elections" - accessible from the "Previous Posts" menu on the right.

I will update this table on Friday (10/29) and finally on Monday (11/01).

Until then, 10-4.