(ETA: The odds that 19 or 20 out of 20 win their race, given that all of them have 95% odds, is about 38%. Not terribly unlikely. The odds that 95% or greater win their races, given that each have 95% odds, is a bit more of a pain to calculate, involving 22 "n choose k" calculations, but it can be done. If I do it, I will update here.)

The odds are higher than I expected.

Suppose that in every congressional district, one candidate has the (unreasonable) probability of 0.95 to win the race. In that case, the probability of every favored candidate winning is 0.32, not bad at all. The probabilty of at least 95% of the favored candidates winning is about 0.34.

Drop the probability of the favored candidates from 0.95 to 0.75, and the odds of all of them winning goes down to about 0.0018, and the odds of at least 95% of them winning is roughly 0.0027.
 
That's just because of illegal aliens voting ten times each! Never fear, Sherrif Joe will track them down.
Personally, I'm going to send in my mail in ballot and then cast a provisional ballot at every polling station that I can manage to get to. I'm a US citizen though.
 
It's what has happened in Ohio that is the big reversal. Clinton has a 60% chance of winning...when Donald had been given the edge a week ago. I think the did not pay taxes story has hurt him badly with the key Blue Collar voters in Ohio.

Ohio's been given a lot of attention, but it's everywhere. (And whether the polls adjust themselves or not, the worst prognostication is often Ohio. They just don't seem to find a way to poll the inner cities and rely on roving reporters saying, "Gosh, Ed. It just doesn't seem to be a lot of support for the Democrats.")

538 has Iowa turning blue. Once RCP puts the blue states in the gray boxes, Trump has about zero routes to victory. RCP has the most conservative projections at present. A candidate has to be leading by 6 or more for them to change the color. If they move WI, MN, NH, ME to light blue, Hillary's at 272.

And that's without FL or OH or NC, all of which Clinton will probably win.

The real key that the GOP hasn't commented on is that conservative-friendly RCP has had Trump on a solid 165 all along. Big wins for him in polling news consist of "hey, it's closer in New Hampshire than we thought". Usually based on one poll. And poof(!) a week later Hillary's up by four on the average and cruisin'. Meanwhile Donald keeps spending his money in those places and when he leaves town the polls shift to Hillary. PA, MI, NH, CO, NV. Donald's the best campaign tool the Dems have. He cuts a swath through the local Fox interviews, trashes whomever is on his list that day, and four thousand people of all stripes (unions in NV, teachers in NH, never-trumpers in MI) shudder collectively and say, "I gotta call me the Clinton HQ and help stop this schmuck!".

The Trump Challenge: Find a way to break 200 Electoral Votes. Yeah, it's that grim for him. He's got his ironclad 165. He can go to 192 with AZ and GA, which I think he'll take. He might get six in IA. I don't think he gets any others.... not OH, not FL, not NC.
 
The odds are higher than I expected.

Suppose that in every congressional district, one candidate has the (unreasonable) probability of 0.95 to win the race. In that case, the probability of every favored candidate winning is 0.32, not bad at all. The probabilty of at least 95% of the favored candidates winning is about 0.34.

Drop the probability of the favored candidates from 0.95 to 0.75, and the odds of all of them winning goes down to about 0.0018, and the odds of at least 95% of them winning is roughly 0.0027.

Agh. A horrible miscalculation, sorry.

There a 435 house members. Given that the probability of each favored candidate is 0.95, the probability that 95% (or more) actually win their elections is actually 57%. If the probability for favored candidates is only 0.75, odds drop to 10^-29.

Even if the probability is 0.9, then the likelihood that 95% or more win is 0.0001!

Given my abject failure in calculating the probability correctly before, take these numbers with a grain of salt. I calculated them thus:

Sum_{i=0}^{22} (435 choose i) * P^(435 - i) * (1-P)^i,

where P is the probability that the favored candidate wins. (Again, I'm using a constant probability, which is unrealistic, but a heck of a lot easier to calculate.)
 
The Trump Challenge: Find a way to break 200 Electoral Votes. Yeah, it's that grim for him. He's got his ironclad 165. He can go to 192 with AZ and GA, which I think he'll take. He might get six in IA. I don't think he gets any others.... not OH, not FL, not NC.

I'm in Michigan and I'll be voting for Trump.

That should help.
 
I'm in Michigan and I'll be voting for Trump.

That should help.

Naaaah. Trump will still be over in Grand Rapids with his Breitbart bush-beaters, wearing a pith helmet searching for The Lost Tribe of Angry White Voters while Detroit puts Hillary over the top by about 9% in Michigan. But if you could mail that sentiment in to Kellyanne, it'd help. Get them to spend some more time in Michigan, particularly chasing the elusive rust-belt vote - the people who most hate his tax shenanigans.
 
Update Noon 05 October

NY Times - 81%
538 - 75%
Daily Kos - 82%
Huffington Post - 82%
PredictWise - 80%
Princeton Election Consortium - 91%

Fivethirtyeight is often accused of having a left bias, but they're the most conservative (in the "playing it safe" sense of the word).

Update Noon 07 October

NY Times - 82%
538 - 79%
Daily Kos - 86%
Huffington Post - 84%
PredictWise - 81%
PEC - 93%

Whomever predicted the polls would come back towards Trump in time to make the second debate tenser is incorrect. The backlash from his poor performance in the last debate and his even poorer news coverage has created a situation where he doesn't just have to clear the low bar on Sunday, but needs a complete meltdown by Hillary or a solid knockout blow. Since their hoped-for Wikileaks bombshell was a wet firecracker, they've got to do it on their own.

Dems need to not get too smug. (Note to self: Heed your own advice.) There are thirty days to go and a month before the 2012 elections Romney was leading in a number of polls and on the RCP average.... also after the first debate.
 
To be fair though, a month before the 2012 election 538 was still predicting an Obama victory.
 
Update Noon 07 October

NY Times - 82%
538 - 79%
Daily Kos - 86%
Huffington Post - 84%
PredictWise - 81%
PEC - 93%

Whomever predicted the polls would come back towards Trump in time to make the second debate tenser is incorrect. The backlash from his poor performance in the last debate and his even poorer news coverage has created a situation where he doesn't just have to clear the low bar on Sunday, but needs a complete meltdown by Hillary or a solid knockout blow. Since their hoped-for Wikileaks bombshell was a wet firecracker, they've got to do it on their own.

Dems need to not get too smug. (Note to self: Heed your own advice.) There are thirty days to go and a month before the 2012 elections Romney was leading in a number of polls and on the RCP average.... also after the first debate.

Someone wrote that n the Second Debate, all Hilary has to do is not totatlly blow it,whereas Donald needs to hit a home run. Just doing better or OK will not be enough for him.
 
Whomever predicted the polls would come back towards Trump in time to make the second debate tenser is incorrect.
It is good to be mistaken pessimist!

Current stat: 79.6%. Let's see how Sunday town hall debate - entire universe (including Trump) vs Trump - will change that!
 
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It is good to be mistaken pessimist!

Current stat: 79.6%. Let's see how Sunday town hall debate - entire universe (including Trump) vs Trump - will change that!

The aggregators don't have any overnight action, but PredictWise, which follows the odds giving by the bookies jumped 4% since the Grab Her Pussy tape came out.

ETA: Ooops.... 538 just went up a point to point-and-a-half. I think that's reaction to the late polls on Friday, though.
 
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Well, I dare say! If I had known Nate was light in his loafers, I would never have turned my browser loose on his site. Now I'll have to scrub it in some bleach. :rolleyes: <--There ain't enough of these.

More seriously, since the tape of Trump talking about women on the bus has hit the airwaves, the odds will see a major shift toward HRC before the townhall on Sunday. He has boldly stated that he has not prepared for this one either. By mid-next-week, every poll will be over 90%
 
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Well, I dare say! If I had known Nate was light in his loafers, I would never have turned my browser loose on his site. Now I'll have to scrub it in some bleach. :rolleyes: <--There ain't enough of these.

More seriously, since the tape of Trump talking about women on the bus has hit the airwaves, the odds will see a major shift toward HRC before the townhall on Sunday. He has boldly stated that he has not prepared for this one either. By mid-next-week, every poll will be over 90%

By mid-next week? Maybe by mid-day Sunday. The betting poll (PredictWise has moved five points, NYT and 538 about three and Princeton a mere 1, but they were already 90. The Daily Kos and Huffpo haven't really moved. Knowing Daily Kos and HuffPo readers, they're still laughing too hard.
 
Update Noon 07 October

NY Times - 82%
538 - 79%
Daily Kos - 86%
Huffington Post - 84%
PredictWise - 81%
PEC - 93%
<snip>

I'd only been updating this every 48 hours but the last 24 have been rather eventful.

NY Times - 83%
538 - 82%
Daily Kos - 90%
Huffington Post - 84%
PredictWise - 86%
PEC - 93%

Two of the big jumps are from significant organizations - 538 and PredictWise, +3 and +5, respectively.
 
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Clinton is back to roughly 79% win in the 538 polls plus model. She's at similar numbers to the post-convention high.
 

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