Hey, that's a teriffic guess! And you're almost right, except that I am a lifelong Democrat and have never voted for a Republican or an Independent in my life.
Hehe, 50% hit rate is still pretty decent, as far as clairvoyance is concerned. =)
my points:
1. Two-party system is not good enough. I believe 3-party system should be better.
2. Before 1949, the communist party in China who promised the politicians Democracy; businessmen the right to the private property; and the farmers a piece of land, well.... It is not difficult to make promises, especially in order to win, but it is difficult to fulfill the promises.
3. There should be changes. It does not necessarily have to be Obama. He has given too much of I WILL, but I do not think he knows HOW after checking what he did as a Senator.
The trouble's not the precise number, it's the practical lockout of "others". If there's one good thing to be said for winner-take-all electoral college apportionments, it's that they leave people in a non-contended red or blue state to send a message by voting for third-party candidates, but they still don't (by and large), and even if more did, at some point the spoiler effect does kick in for whichever side would have taken the state. A third party can't get any meaningful share of votes unless one of the big 2 falls of to less than 25% share, or fragments into 2 or 3 parties. If the situation were to be the same for "fourth-parties" in a 3-party system, it would be practically as bad.
I suspect the polls showing a close McCain/Obama race are inaccurate to put it mildly. So many other polls show a large margin of discontent with the status quo. Either that isn't rendering into actual voter rebellion, or the close polls are (ahem) rigged.
Given Diebold's history, though, I expect a close outcome could be easily engineered.
