What's the smallest popular vote margin that will ensure Obama an electoral vote win?

[Frank Booth]

McCain will have to run the table in the following states, unless something weird happens: Colorado, Nevada, Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida.

FiveThirtyEight.com shows McCain having only a 1.7% chance of losing the popular vote but winning the election. This seems a bit low to me.

With a three percent popular vote margin Obama would be almost certain to win at least one of the 6 states listed above. Anything less than that starts to get a big scary, though. Close elections are fun, but I wouldn't mind seeing this one called early for Obama.

Anyone have any opinions on this or know where's there some analysis on it? I'm curious to see if there's some sort of consensus.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

1. Literally, something like 40-50%. Practically, about 2%

[MercutioATC]

2. .

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[Frustratedlady]

3. Allow some for purging voter lists and machine manipulation.

You'll need armed guards at the controls, just like a 3rd world country. Just sayin'.

It ain't going to be easy. Too many goodies in the WH they'll want locked up for 50 years and I doubt Obama/Biden will be too eager to oblige.