O-Hi-O

Okay, the map I'm looking at has Bush up in Ohio with 2,706,778 votes. Kerry has 2,581,451. Let's assume that there are 300,000 provisional and absentee ballots still waiting to be counted. Let's further give a generous 70% of those votes to Kerry. What would that mean?

Bush gains 90,000 votes and ends up with something like 2,796,778 votes.

Kerry gains 210,000 votes and ends up with something like 2,791,451 votes.

If the numbers broke that strongly for Kerry, he could win (assuming Hawaii, Wisconsin, and Michigan all stay with Kerry--Wisconsin is close enough that I think it will be Kerry's, but it certainly wouldn't shock me to be wrong). But that is both a guess on the number of provisional and absentee ballots and a distinctly generous give to Kerry. If there are distinctly fewer ballots than that, even with the generous give, there isn't much of a chance for a Kerry victory.

The upshot is that Kerry could still win, but it would be pretty surprising at this point. Notably, if the margin ends up with the numbers that I have above, there will also be a mandatory recount since the initial numbers are well within the required margin.

I don't believe that there are any realistic potential "tie" scenarios, so it really comes down to two things: does Wisconsin stay Kerry and does Ohio stay Bush. If Wisconsin flips, Ohio doesn't matter. Assuming that Kerry keeps Wisconsin, though, then the fight over Ohio will probably be nasty.

I'm betting on the nasty fight.

But even with my generous give to Kerry on those ballots, he looks like a loser to me.