First, we can look at Nate Silver, a new prognosticator to the political scene. The baseball statistician turned Electoral College map savant really was the belle of the election ball, living up to his website's tag line: Electoral projections done right.
While Silver never did any of his own polling, he analyzed all the pollsters' findings and spit out every voting model possible. Ultimately, he said Obama would win by 52 percent to 46 percent. In the end, Obama won 52 percent to 46 percent in the popular vote.
Silver's Electoral College map wasn't far off either. This graphic below, shows a comparison of what he projected vs. what actually happened. Unless I'm looking at this map wrong, the only thing they projected incorrectly was Indiana. (A note: Many news outlets have not called Missouri yet because it's so close. The latest numbers have McCain ahead by about 6,000 votes. If that's the ultimate outcome, Silver got that right too.)
