Out on a limb...

Sure, I have nothing to lose by going out on a limb. If I call the election wrong, who am I? Just some insignificant novice blogger without good sense. And if I'm correct I will be in a very small minority, since the overwhelming majority, even the smart guys, all agree that it's a horserace, too close to call...
Besides, thanks to the president we are all out there on a limb already, in Iraq, and at the rate he's going, all over the world.
Here is a snip from American Digest. Look at the date.
This was published in July, not last week. It was republished October 19.

There are millions and millions of citizens who are registered as Democrats and who talk the Democrat talk but do not always walk the Democrat walk when push comes to shove. You might be in a union-- Trade, Government, Teachers, etc. -- that could harm you if you announced for Bush. You might be in a family with deep Democratic roots. You might be a member of a minority in which you would be ostracised if you confessed you would vote for Bush. You might be of a sexual persuasion where you're chances of dates would be severely curtailed if you said you were voting for Bush. You might be working in an office or in a career where you chances for advancement might be crippled if you voted for Bush. You might be at a school where even your grades would be impacted if you said you were voting for Bush.
In short there are hundreds of situations in which millions of people find themselves where a declared preference for Bush would not be a wise thing to announce. Much better to simply nod vaguely and stay out of the way of any negative consequences. The idea that everybody is going to vote the way they say they will is very oversold, particularly by the media or the pollsters who have a vested interest in declaring the race "tight."

Quite so.
Another piece of trivia I picked up just after I started blogging was about the Flora MacDonald Syndrome, which I had never heard of. As you read the description you can easily see how it applies in this election.

A couple of comments on this stealth Democrat theory. First, something very similar happened in Canada about twenty years ago, at a convention to select a new leader for the Tories. One candidate, a well-known woman MP named Flora MacDonald was doing very well in the polls before the convention. Much was made of the possibility that MacDonald might become the first female leader of a major Canadian political party, and quite possibly Prime Minister. But on voting day, MacDonald got only a small fraction of the vote count she was expected to get. Lots of people who said they were going to vote for her - who told
MacDonald, told the press, and told pollsters they were going to - got into the privacy of the voting booth and voted for someone else. It was a major story in Canada at the time, and is now referred to as the Flora MacDonald syndrome.

Go to the site for further comments which are equally compelling.

My prediction is a Bush landslide, for the reasons above and others I explained two months ago. The old fashioned meaning of "landslide" was a massive majority. The loser is lost in the dust and the winner walks away with what statesmen like to call a "mandate," a nice way of saying they can now get away with murder.
This time the word landslide only means that the results will be clear enough that only the cheesiest of lawyers will try to challenge the winner. And when they have their day in court they will lose their case.

At the risk of repeating myself, at the last moment, in the secrecy of the voting booth, enough Americans, with every head bowed and every eye closed, will vote for the president, because they cannot bear the responsibility of changing leadership at what looks like a critical time in our nation's history.

If you waded through my post from Saturday morning, you know I am not among them. I have a cynical streak agreeing with H.L. Mencken that "no one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public."
I am aware of violating the spirit of my theme line, but this time the issues are too serious to use rose-colored glasses.
The country is so polarized tonight that no matter who wins, he will have half the country exhibiting a very bad attitude. If by some fluke Bush is not re-elected, I seriously expect a backlash from his political base that has not been seen for decades. He aims to win, or else.
However it goes, the country has seldom been closer to the need for fervent prayer.