This week’s addition of “If the Election Were Held Today.”  Things are settling more clearly into place following the two conventions and as a result we have hit a milestone  on our map that includes “toss-up states”:  for the first time Obama has passed the 270 electoral vote mark required to win the election, meaning that if the election were held yesterday there would be a clear winner even before we had the results of the states “too close to call.”

Here is the map with toss-ups:

As in weeks past, here is our rubric (based on most recent polling data):

• Candidate has 20 pt or greater lead in a state:  “Solid”
• Candidate has between 10 and 20 pt lead in a state:  “Likely”
• Candidate has between a 5 and 10 pt lead in a state:  “Leans”
• Candidates are polling within 5 points of one another in a state:  “toss up” or “too close to call.”

Taking into consideration trends and momentum, here is our prediction of the outcome of the election if it had been held yesterday after all the results had come in:

It is important to note that based on recent trends three states (Iowa, Colorado, and Florida) are what we might call “true toss-ups” where the trends are beginning to shift and the state could easily be flipped.  So here is one more map, a “Best-Case Scenario” for the Romney campaign:

This week’s data doesn’t yet include the impact of the “gaffe” videos of Romney that have recently been dominating the news cycle.  Next week we will start to get a more clear picture of what their impact has been on the race.