But national polls do not reveal the way the race is going in the only place it matters i.e. the contest for the 538 electoral college votes which will determine the outcome. Professor Rod Tiffen of the University of Sydney did a good article on how all this works, and the outcomes in presidential elections, on Australian Policy Online recently.

A key point is that a small win on the national popular vote often translates into a large margin in electoral college votes.

Unless the polls are wildly wrong, and/or there is a dramatic swing to McCain in the last days of the campaign, the Democrats should have these states ‘in the bag’. They are California (55), New York (31), Washington (11), Oregon (7), Michigan (17), Pennsylvania (21), Minnesota (10), Iowa (7), Illinois (21), Vermont (3), Maine (4), Rhode Island (4), Connecticut (7), New Jersey (15), Maryland (10), District of Columbia (3), Delaware (3), Massachusetts (12), Wisconsin (10), and Hawaii (4). Total = 255

That is, Obama has a lead of 10% or more in states that add up to just 15 electoral college votes short of winning the presidency.

As a point of context, at this stage in 2004 John Kerry was only ahead by more than 10% in states that added up to 88 electoral college votes: Illinois, New York, Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, Delaware, Maryland and D.C.

That is why the McCain camp is campaigning so feverishly in Pennsylvania at the moment and hoping for a miracle, currently Obama leads by about 11% in Pennsylvania. Unless, McCain can pull a big state off Obama’s ‘in the bag’ list he is doomed.

Obama has many pathways open for getting those extra 15 votes.

Obama is leading by less than 10% in Nevada (5), Colorado (9), New Mexico (5), North Dakota (3), Missouri (11), Ohio (20), New Hampshire (4), Virginia (13), North Carolina (15), and Florida (27). Total = 112

In addition, McCain is only slightly ahead (less than 5%) in Montana (3), Indiana (11), and Georgia (15). Total = 29.

Another problem for McCain is that many votes are already in, so that the impact of any late swing back will be muted. For instance,

a SurveyUSA poll of Ohio: 22% of the likely electorate has already voted, favoring Obama by a 56%-39% margin, and the two candidates are tied among the remaining 78%.

The state by state breakdowns are even stronger in pointing to an Obama victory in 13 days time.

Realclearpolitics (RCP)suggests that Obama has a solid lead in states with a total of 259 electoral college votes, just 11 short of the number needed to win office. The equivalent figure for McCain is 137. It has three other states leaning towards the Democrat candidate: Colorado (9 electoral votes), New Mexico (5) and Virginia (13). In addition, it identifies 7 ‘toss-up’ states: Nevada (5), North Dakota (3), Missouri (11), Indiana (11), Ohio (20), North Carolina (15) and Florida (27).

Pollster.com offers a slightly different but essentially the same picture. It shows Obama getting 258 EV from states that are strong for the Democrats (McCain’s ‘strong’ category adds up to 142). The main differences in the composition of this total with RCP is that Pollster has Minnesota (10) and New Hampshire (4) as weak for the Democrats but Virginia (13) as solid. Like RCP, Pollster also has Colorado (9) and New Mexico (5) in the leaning category. The toss-up states are the same except that Pollster also has North Dakota (3) in this category whereas RCP still has this state in the leaning Republican column.

A third website, Electoral Vote Predictor (EVP), largely confirms this picture. EVP has the Democrats strong states adding up to 260 EVs (McCain, 134). EVP has New Hampshire (4) leaning to the Democrats but unlike the other two it has New Mexico (5) as strong for the Democrats. It does not use a toss-up category; instead it gives 26 EVs as ‘weak democrat’, another 78 as ‘barely democrat’ and 3 (North Dakota) as tied.

EVP also shows Obama as 107 electoral college votes ahead of where Kerry was on the same day in 2004 and has the Democrats winning 9 states that Bush held in 2004 while holding all those that Kerry won.

On top of all this, Obama is challenging McCain in a number of states that are categorised as weak, leaning or barely Republican: Georgia (15), West Virginia (5), Montana (3), South Dakota (3) and Indiana (11).

This all adds up to an electoral map that is tilted heavily in Obama’s favour. Something like an electoral earthquake would be needed to change it in the next few days to an extent that would deliver victory to McCain. The Obama campaign has the significant advantage of being able to attack across a broad front while holding a solid base which is just one or two states away from absolute victory, with up to 15 states in play.

This grim scenario is the reason why the McCain campaign is still pinning some hope on grabbing Pennsylvania (21) out of the Democrat ‘solid’ category. That would make Obama’s task much more difficult and give some hope that the Republicans might yet squeak it in, but a look at poll trends in Pennsylvania suggests that a republican ‘steal’ is unlikely.

Charlie Cook says in a National Journal article where he presents six reasons why this election is over:

Finally there are the states. Obama is now leading in every state that Al Gore and John Kerry both won, including Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota and Wisconsin, and he is ahead in Iowa, New Hampshire and New Mexico, the three states that went once but not twice for Democrats in 2000 and 2004. He is also ahead in Florida, Colorado and Virginia. If that weren’t enough (and it is), he’s running basically even in Indiana, Missouri, Nevada, North Carolina and Ohio, and even threatening in Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia.

As things are going now, this election would appear to be on a track to match Bill Clinton’s 1992 5.6 percent margin over President George H.W. Bush, the question is whether it gets to Bush’s 1988 7.7 percent win over Michael Dukakis or Clinton’s 8.5 percent win over Robert Dole in 1996.

Maybe some cataclysmic event occurs in the next two weeks that changes the trajectory of this election, but to override these factors, it would have to be very, very big.