Election Blog #6

Ok, so I'm kinda just sitting around at home doing nothing so I figured I should get this election blog knocked out of the way :D

As for going with this estimate I believe the electoral voter turn out will be roughly 360-375 Obama to McCain 150-175. My main reasons as for going with that estimate is only based off of googling some sources. Obama also has control of large states with large amounts of electoral votes, such as California, Pennsylvania, and New York. However there are states like Florida or Ohio who are only slightly leaning Democratic that could change republican when the time comes. As for demographics, it's expected for McCain to do well in the mid-west and places like Texas, but big surprises such as the loss of Virginia for the republican side of things. But to assume the leaning states go the ways they lean, that's how I think the election will turn out.

For the popular vote I feel that it'll become around 50-55% for Obama and around 40-45% for McCain. Over the last week or so, McCain as lost the gap between the two of them in the popular vote, letting Obama even reach 10% or 11% at one point, if it continues, I believe it'll remain 5%-10% gap between the popular vote.
...Unless Nader, feels like screwing with the votes and drawing votes from either side, like he did in the 2000 election...darn you Nader! haha

As for the Senate race, I believe Mark Warner will win over Jim Gilmore mainly because that Mark Warner has been ahead in the polls by at least 20-30% in each of them, I don't think there will be a significant input of 20-30 more percent of republican voters for Gilmore coming out of no where!

As for the House races for the 10th and 11th District:

• For the 10th I think it'll become a close race between Judy Feder and Frank Wolf. I think both have a equal chance to win, I've seen much support for both sides and I think it could go down for either with a few percentage difference.
• For the 11th district I think it'll probably be Connolly for the win, I've not heard much or found much info on the race, but I believe he will win because he won the democratic primary vote with a 15% difference and his opponent, Keith Fimian, I've never really heard of to be quite honest haha.

So those are my predictions, wish I could give better ones about the congressional districts though. And I hope the presidential election doesn't get skewed too much by Nader...darn 3rd parties! :-P
Also yay last election blog post! :) :)

Current Event #6

This weeks article that I read was called "Counting On Colorado" in the Sunday Washington Post of October 26th. Talking about another battle ground state area between the two parties in the upcoming Presidential election.

As for problems that persist for McCain that is benefiting Obama this whole time is the money Obama has. Obama has had a 3-1 ratio of more money then McCain has this whole election which allows Obama’s campaigning to dominant over his opponent. Many republicans in Colorado acknowledge Obama’s efforts in campaigning for their consistency and persistency in Colorado, but they believe they’ll pull away with the state because of previous Republican roots and experience. In the Denver Post they did a research that concluded Obama will outspend on campaign ads on TV 7-1 in Denver. Overall, Obama has spent $8.5 million on ads in Colorado during the general election, compared with $7.9 million for McCain. In the past week, Obama spent $838,000 to McCain's $531,000. Once again Obama will campaign mainly for the minorities such as the growing Latino population in Colorado, African American communities, and the younger aged voters. In lower houses of government in Colorado, Ritter, a former Denver district attorney, captured the governorship from Republicans two years ago, and Democrats control both houses of the state legislature. Also in the senate, they hope to pick up the other seat, which is Senator Wayne Allard right now.

As the election closes up, we’ll see how the turn out goes in these states, I hope to see Obama take Colorado for his side, but who knows what will happen. The Colorado voters might not respond to change, and may remain on the republican side of things again for another presidential election, just like the last four decades.

Obama Campaigning Photos!

Ok so my blog won't let me upload the photos in a slideshow application so i gotta do it through sharing on a blog!

Community Service Blog #2

Hey, so this week on Monday (20th) we went to volunteer for Obama again...It also happened to be my birthday also...fun stuff...haha

So this time we had to take polls through the phone, exciting ain't it?
We ended up doing this for 3 hours from around 3pm to 6pm. They gave us some like prepaid verizon phones and we began to call all those people on the list. It was kinda hectic to repeat the prompt they have for you when you leave a voicemail on their answering machine for them...Carrie tried to say it like a robot once...but failed epically haha and ended up just laughing into the answering machine and she was like "WHAT DO I DO?!?!" and I just told her to hang up. Anyways...majority of the people we called were pretty much not at home, so it was kinda easy, mainly because people were still at work. The people who picked up however we either REALLY mean or REALLY nice, which was weird, not really a neutral person. Like one person was giving me a attitude about the poll, and he was like "how are you convincing me to vote for this person?! your not doing a very good job!" and I'm just like, I'm only taking a poll...I'm not doing any convincing to get you to change your vote! Tyler's phone also broke but I don't know why.

Pretty much sums up those 3 hours right there, fun stuff...haha

Election Blog Week 5

Soooo, for this week we got to compare to two different states that are considered swing states in this 2008 Election! Yay fun stuff... :D

Two states who are currently are strongly contested between the parties are Virginia and North Carolina. They were very pivotal because Virginia carries 13 Electoral Votes and North Carolina carries 15 Electoral votes which is a good decent amount. At the moment in VA Barrak Obama is ahead 51% to 44% and in NC Barrak Obama is ahead barely by 48% to 47%.

Virginia in this case has been very different this year. Virginia has always tended to lean Republican in the last few presidential elections, by at least a Margin of 5%, mainly because of southern Virginia always tended to vote Republican. But, this year Obama had put much effort into his campaigning there and the votes are way different then as expected. At the end of March this year McCain had a significant lead in the winning Virginia race, but it then became afterwards contested constantly in a close race up until it's split now.

North Carolina, another state which is very different this election. Alike Virginia, it has always tended to go towards Republican in the last few Elections. This year Obama has also strongly focused on North Carolina and has now pulled a 1% lead as of today. But, this is a close race in North Carolina so we'll see what happens.

I predict that Virginia will go towards Barrak Obama because there's a large margin difference between to the two, although not much, it's enough to last through the election if it sticks. For North Carolina I want to say Obama because his efforts of these last few weeks will help him out. But, since it is only by a 1% winning difference as of right now, it could lean for John McCain, so we'll see what happens! :D

Majority of the information was found on... http://www.electoral-vote.com/ for the updated map of the election on Oct. 20th.

Current Event #5

This week I read a article from the Washington Post called "Arduous Transition Awaits Next President". The article was in the Sunday Washington Post talking about whoever becomes president they will be facing alot of major problems such as the economy, and have to assume the responsibility of being president well.

As it looks, Obama will have to deal with the Bush Economic Crisis and McCain will have to deal with the over spending with a Democratic Congress called back into special session with the goal of passing a new economic stimulus package. McCain also will however deal with the economic crisis, and both will need to bring balance back to the economy and government through new policies. The new president would also have to deal with their own promises, antiwar groups would press Obama to start the process of ending the war in Iraq, and conservatives would demand tax cuts from McCain. Top advisers said McCain would move quickly to implement the economic agenda he has promised, including tax cuts, business incentives, lower trade subsidies and controls on government spending that he says are bankrupting the country. Obama will have to keep his promise of Change and Hope, but has to deal with the policies that were created in the Bush administration. Obama lastly has his promises such as immigration reform, tuition assitance for college students, and a new ethnics code. People will wonder if he will whether really go with all these ideas if he assumes as the role of the new president. For McCain, he won't be able to slowly react to respond issues, he would have to act immediately on all.

Overall I see that whoever assumes as the new president they will have a very hard time dealing with all issues, and they will be under pressure for every issue that comes up or every issue that is under the minds currently of the citizens of the U.S.

Community Service Blog #1

So for the first 2 hours I had to do community service hours was for the Barrak Obama campaign office in Reston. We went to the office right after school on wednesday after the senior panorama I wasn't too excited to do this but at least I had Tyler, Maggie, and Carrie who also had to finish their hours :)
Our main job was to hand out these flyers to spread the word about the former First Lady of VA that was going to speak at Herndon Elementary. Seemed easy enough right? Yeah it was pretty easy, we drove around handed a bunch on a few cars in parking lots. It was pretty hard to get it posted especially at places that we didnt find out that was a government building until after asking...Like this one really mad and angry woman at the Herndon Community center...she even called a complaint to the office which was bad, but it was ok since the people were at the office and was like it happens. We ended up getting some flyers up at like Bloom and Starbucks, so it was too bad of a first time going to volunteer! :)

Election Blog Post #4

For this blog post It asks to analyze 2 Polls on the Presidential and Senate race soooo...

Presidential Polls:
-Gallup Polls, October 14th, 2008 Obama leads the poll 51% to 42%, by 9 points difference

-Rasmussen Report Polls, October 14th, 2008 Obama leads 50% to 45%

-Recently the big news is that Obama has had a lead by double digits (by 10) and it's causing McCain to change his campaigning tactics.

VA Senate Race Polls:
-Rasmussen Report Senate Polls, September 25th, 2008
Warner leads 60% to 34% Gilmore

-Survey USA Senate Polls, October 6th, 2008
Warner leads 61% to 31% Gilmore

-Since the beginning of the race Warner has also been leading the whole time in polls, Gilmore has not won a poll yet and has always been behind by at least at 20% deficit. As it shows, the polls are consistent and has changed much.


Polls are useful to get the opinion of the public and of who registered voters are going to vote for. Sometimes though it creates changes in votes such as changing people's votes just so one candidate would win. It can also base on determining the winner, but can be incorrect such as the 2000 Election between Al Gore and G.W. Bush when they based Gore as the winner by polls rather not waiting all to the end. But, it is very useful to base on determining how votes change and how the candidates are doing in their campaigning. Overall I think they analyze trends such as Warner's correlation that seems like he will be the winner of the house seat, but I don't think we should rely on polls because they can change very easily in a good amount of time. Like we shouldn't rely on say Obama will win because he has a 10% lead, because that can very well change in 3 weeks

Guess that's all I gotta say!

Current Event Blog Week 4

The article I read this week was the one from Monday October 13^th, in the Washington Post called “Obama Up by 10 Points as McCain Favorability Ratings Fall”. This article talks about Obama’s sudden increase in his votes by 10% of all likely voters from recent events. McCain is slipping behind in his votes and now his campaign strategy has changed because of him falling behind.

The recently overall average poll now places Obama at 53% to 43% over McCain from all likely voters for this election. McCain so far now as shown a bit of change in his campaign strategy. McCain now begins to attack Obama rather then expressing his own political views to the public now and using references such as Obama is too “Liberal” or “Risky”. As the article says most republican supporters now feel less supportive or enthusiastic about McCain’s new tactics which has not been shown since before the GOP Convention. With the election in about three weeks, we can’t help to think if this trend that leans to favor Obama will continue or will it balance out again. Also what may be a strong influence in this change of voters is the economic crisis. As a poll came from after the 2^nd presidential debate, 53% voters believe the economy is the most important issue and that Obama wins in that issue by 62% to 33%. McCain however still wins on the polls on Foreign Policy. McCain as well did not really gain much influence with describing Obama as a “Risky” candidate, voters say that 55% say Obama is a very safe candidate choice and 45% say he is not. After the 2^nd presidential debate voters, by contrast of a poll taken after the 2^nd debate, by a quarter many think worse of McCain as a result of debates.

As an Obama supporter, I'm happy to hear this and that it surprises me a lot that it's changed from such a close race to a 10% difference in polls now. I do agree with the rest of these voters on economics is the most important thing right now, and I believe Obama will do a better job with it, I mean if we got a bad economy how can we even answer all the other issues we have! Although I'm happy to see that he is ahead now in the polls, I don't think Obama supporters should rely on a safe win though, 3 weeks is a long time before the actual election day and a lot can change between now and then!

Election Project Week 3

So the 3rd Election Blog is to talk about the local elections, I'm choosing to talk about the election for the new Virginia State Senate Seat.

The Democratic running for the seat is Mark Warner (former Governor of Virginia) and Jim Gilmore of the Republican Party (formerly also Governor of Virginia).

Mark Warner political background:

• Became Governor of Virginia in 2001 and remained in office as Governor until 2006
• Majored in Poli Sci at George Washington University with a J.D. from Harvard Law.
• Spoke at the DNC in 2008 as the Keynote Speaker
• Allowed the single largest investment into K-12 education when governor
• In '04, Warner worked with Democratic and liberal Republican legislators and the business community to reform the tax code, lowering food and some income taxes, and increasing the sales and cigarette taxes.

Jim Gilmore political background:

• Attorney General in 1994 to 1998 and Governor of Virginia from 1998 to 2002 (which Mark Warner succeeded him as Governor in 2002)
• Gilmore campaigned on the twin promises of hiring 4,000 new teachers in public schools and phasing out Virginia's car tax.
• When Gilmore was elected, He won winning 56% of the vote to Beyer's 43%.
• Gave a try for running for president this year in '08 but dropped out on July, 14 2007 believing he could not raise enough money

For main issues at stake for this Senate election are; the Radical Centralist Coalition, and that Mark Warner believes that the coalition will increase the cooperation in congress. Mark Warner also believes alternative energy is a big emphasis while Jim Gilmore supports offshore drilling alike John McCain and President Bush. Another strong issue is the tax increase in 2004 for Virginia.

So far in *all* polling Warner has been ahead in *ALL* by a substantial amount to a 50-60% comparison to a 30% that Gilmore gets from the polls. The most recent one by Rasmussen Reports on September 25th, 2008, Warner has 60% to a 34% Gilmore.

Seems like Warner's going to win the election easily if the polls correspond to the results of the actual votes this year!

Current Event Week 3 Post

For this weeks current event, I read an article in the Washington Post called "Big Gains In Voter Registration Could Benefit Obama". I found this article to be interesting since I am an Obama supporter.

As the statistics say in the article, this year the most substantial amount of new voter increase was Florida, who had 600,351 new voters this year. Out of all of those voters, 53% are registered as Democrats, 21% as Republicans and 26% independents. As of new voters for other states such as North Carolina, Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico, all new voters have registered as 50% or above as democrats. But, besides a substantial amount of new democratic registered voters, the newly registered republicans amount has dropped. In North Carolina, 208,000 voters have registered democrat, and only 34,000 new voters are registered as republicans. 208,000 sure feels a lot bigger then 34,000. The main new set of voters in North Carolina is mainly minorities, at first at the beginning of the year, North Carolina white voters out numbered African-Americans 4 to 1 and Hispanics 10 to 1. Now this year there are new 146,000 registered voters in North Carolina of African-Americans and Hispanics, which is ¾’s of the amount of the total of new white voters. In Virginia, Obama volunteers rise up higher and there are 310,000 new registered voters since the beginning of this year. Even though we cannot determine what party affiliation all these new voters are (because Virginia does not require you to state it), there has been a 10% increase in democratic voters in many democratic counties in Virginia.

Hopefully things will turn into Obama's favor, and I'm definitely looking forward to vote in November since I'm turning 18 before the voting day and I just registered to vote this weekend! :)