Davos Newbies

I’ve been crowing about an Obama victory for some time. But I’m not complacent. I went again today to my local Obama office to do phone bank calls. Last time I went, a few weeks ago, the office on Adeline Street in Berkeley was filled and busy. Today, when every poll and pundit is forecasting an easy Obama win? The main office was so packed that they opened an overflow office down the street. That in turn was so crowded they opened a second overflow office in the pizzeria down the street. Wow.

I made calls to Virginia to GOTV (get out the vote). Very heartening experience all round. Nice Virginian bit of trivia. One of my calls was to Robert Lee. Quite a name for a Virginian.

Just for my own record, I’m plumping for Obama to win 349 electoral votes to McCain’s 189. Obama will win the Kerry states plus Ohio, Virginia, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, Iowa, Florida and Missouri. I wavered for a while about Indiana, Montana and North Carolina (which would bring Obama to 378), but I wanted to be conservative in my picks.

As for the Senate, I think the Democrats will end up with 59 seats. I’m not terribly bothered, as someone I met the other day, that this will mean that the odious Joe Lieberman will have the crucial 60th vote. The Democrats are going to kick Lieberman into another state, if he doesn’t leap to the Republicans before they have a chance. There may well be Republicans the administration can pick off on various issues if they need to get to 60.

Incidentally, the always interesting Kevin Drum has a valuable observation:

The upshot is that both parties get moved to the right. Most of the Democratic pickups will be in centrist states and districts, which will move the Democratic caucus moderately toward the center. At the same time, it will remove these centrist states and districts from the Republican side, which will make the GOP caucus not just smaller, but even more conservative than it is now.

It also means, as a number of others have observed, is that the Republicans will be reduced to a regional party. Outside the South, Republicans will be few and far between. That’s not a great platform for returning to national power.