Experts Ponder Prospect of a Tie
Wednesday, October 27, 2004; Page A01
Could one of these electoral college nightmares be our destiny?
President Bush and Sen. John F. Kerry deadlock on Tuesday with 269 electoral votes apiece -- but a single Bush elector in West Virginia defects, swinging the election to Kerry.
Or Bush and Kerry are headed toward an electoral college tie, but the 2nd Congressional District of Maine breaks with the rest of the state, giving its one electoral vote -- and the presidency -- to Bush.
(snip)
None of these scenarios is likely to occur next week, but neither is any of them far-fetched. Tuesday's election will probably be decided in 11 states where polls currently show the race too tight to predict a winner. And, assuming the other states go as predicted, a computer analysis finds no fewer than 33 combinations in which those 11 states could divide to produce a 269 to 269 electoral tie.
(snip)
But many political strategists are preparing for a narrow -- and possibly split -- decision. Jim Jordan, former Kerry campaign manager now working on a Democratic vote-mobilization effort, puts the odds at 1 in 3 that Bush will share the fate Al Gore suffered in 2000: a popular-vote win but an electoral loss. "It's actually looking more and more plausible," he said, citing a number of polls showing a Bush lead nationally but a Kerry lead in many battleground states.
A repeat of 2000 -- Bush losing the popular vote but winning the electoral count -- is considered less likely because the president has been boosting his support in already Republican states and reducing his deficit in some safely Democratic states.
more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A439-2004Oct26.html
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