The Next President Of The United States

A t-shirt company is selling a prophetic t-shirt with the image of Barack Obama within the presidential seal with the logo, "The Next President Of The United States", and they are of course on track. Mr. Obama is highly likely to win the electoral college by a 353 to 185 margin over John McCain on Tuesday. The only real surprises would be if Mr. Obama would also manage narrow wins in both Indiana and Missouri by a few hundred or thousand votes, in which case the electoral vote total would be 375 to 163 in Mr. Obama's favor.

Some have become distracted with looking at the daily expected popular vote polls. However, it is the electoral college that elects a president, and enough tracking polls in all states put a clear leader ahead in most cases to pretty well project exactly where this race is headed.

On Tuesday, at 7pm Eastern time when the polls close in Georgia, Virginia and Indiana, and Mr. Obama wins in Virginia, is nearly even in Indiana and only trails slightly in Georgia, it should be pretty clear to any realist in the McCain Campaign that this election is over. All three states indicate a level of GOP voter erosion over the previous healthy margins that George Bush won twice in 2000 and 2004, and that John McCain has lost this election, but he will likely wait some time for other states to vote before conceding, such as his home state of Arizona, which McCain is likely to only narrowly hang on to like Barry Goldwater was just barely able to hang on to in 1964 by a bare 4,780 vote margin over Lyndon Johnson.

By 7:30pm Eastern time, when both "Red" states Ohio and North Carolina fall to Mr. Obama, it should be absolutely clear to any "Doubting Thomas" within the McCain Campaign organization that this election is absolutely over and no miracle McCain strategy of counting on a Pennsylvania surprise is going to rescue McCain from defeat. This thing is over, Done. Put a fork in it.

Baring any electoral miracle greater than raising the dead by Tuesday, the state by state breakdown should be as follows.

Very Close McCain(but Obama could win by by a slender margin): Indiana and Missouri, 11 electoral votes each.

Narrowly for McCain: Arizona 10, Montana 3, Georgia 15 and North Dakota 3

Modest McCain leads: Arkansas 6, Mississippi 6, South Dakota 3, West Virginia 5

Strong McCain Leads: Kansas 6, Kentucky 8, Louisiana 9, South Carolina 8, Tennessee 11, Texas 34

Big McCain leads: Alabama 9. Alaska 3, Idaho 4, Nebraska 5, Oklahoma 7, Utah 5, Wyoming 3

Narrow Obama leads: Florida 27, Nevada 5, North Carolina 15

Modest Obama Leads: Colorado 9, New Hampshire 4, New Mexico 5, Ohio 20, Virginia 13

Strong Obama Leads: Iowa 9, Minnesota 10, Oregon 7, Pennsylvania 21, Wisconsin 10

Big Obama Leads: California 55, Connecticut 7, D.C. 3, Delaware 3, Hawaii 4, Illinois 21, Maine 4, Maryland 10, Massachusetts 12, Michigan 17, New Jersey 17, New York 31, Rhode Island 4, Vermont 3, Washington 11

So about the biggest drama might be whether John McCain can barely hang on to Missouri and Indiana, or whether states both will get swept up in the Obama electoral sweep. You can also expect Mr. Obama to garner about 53% of the vote compared to John McCain's 45%, with Ralph Nader or others likely splitting the rest of the vote.

Democrats will also pick up seats in the senate, however are likely to fall below the magic 60 margin they would like, but holding a big 57-58 seat majority. In the house, Democrats may pick up 22 seats, and hold a strong 258-177 majority.

I also expect Mr. Obama to attempt to rule the country from the center politically and attempt to pull the country together and be an inspirational president that will challenge this nation to believe in goals and be similar to John Kennedy in many ways. In fact, much of the opposition to Mr. Obama in Congress and elsewhere in the public may come from the political left rather than the political right who will be critical that his policies will be modest, however they will be goals where it is more likely to achieve results by delegating responsibility to the right persons to get some results.

There is also the real reality that the economy may tend to worsen for a short period after Mr. Obama becomes president because some economic trends will take a few months to turn around. However, there should likely be a positive uptick in consumer confidence with the election of a new president, creating a climate of hope that may well help to create an early boost and economic turnaround. If anything, President Obama will inspire hope. And that will go a long way towards healing this nation and making America great again.