text: We begin with the three words everyone writing about the election must say: Nobody knows anything. Everyone’s guessing. I spent Sunday morning in Washington with journalists and political hands, one of whom said she feels it’s Obama, the rest of whom said they don’t know. I think it’s Romney. I think he’s stealing in “like a thief with good tools,” in Walker Percy’s old words. While everyone is looking at the polls and the storm, Romney’s slipping into the presidency. He’s quietly rising, and he’s been rising for a while. 
   
   Obama and the storm, it was like a wave that lifted him and then moved on, leaving him where he’d been. Parts of Jersey and New York are a cold Katrina. The exact dimensions of the disaster will become clearer when the election is over. One word: infrastructure. Officials knew the storm was coming and everyone knew it would be bad, but the people of the tristate area were not aware, until now, just how vulnerable to deep damage their physical system was. The people in charge of that system are the politicians. Mayor Bloomberg wanted to have the Marathon, to show New York’s spirit. In Staten Island last week they were bitterly calling it “the race through the ruins.” There is a disconnect. 
   
   But to the election. Who knows what to make of the weighting of the polls and the assumptions as to who will vote? Who knows the depth and breadth of each party’s turnout efforts? Among the wisest words spoken this cycle were by John Dickerson of CBS News and Slate, who said, in a conversation the night before the last presidential debate, that he thought maybe the American people were quietly cooking something up, something we don’t know about. 
   
   I think they are and I think it’s this: a Romney win. 
   
   Romney’s crowds are building—28,000 in Morrisville, Pa., last night; 30,000 in West Chester, Ohio, Friday It isn’t only a triumph of advance planning: People came, they got through security and waited for hours in the cold. His rallies look like rallies now, not enactments. In some new way he’s caught his stride. He looks happy and grateful. His closing speech has been positive, future-looking, sweetly patriotic. His closing ads are sharp—the one about what’s going on at the rallies is moving. 
   
   All the vibrations are right. A person who is helping him who is not a longtime Romneyite told me, yesterday: “I joined because I was anti Obama—I’m a patriot, I’ll join up But now I am pro-Romney.” Why? “I’ve spent time with him and I care about him and admire him. He’s a genuinely good man.” Looking at the crowds on TV, hearing them chant “Three more days” and “Two more days”—it feels like a lot of Republicans have gone from anti-Obama to pro-Romney. 
   
   Something old is roaring back. One of the Romney campaign’s surrogates, who appeared at a rally with him the other night, spoke of the intensity and joy of the crowd “I worked the rope line, people wouldn’t let go of my hand.” It startled him. A former political figure who’s been in Ohio told me this morning something is moving with evangelicals, other church-going Protestants and religious Catholics. He said what’s happening with them is quiet, unreported and spreading: They really want Romney now, they’ll go out and vote, the election has taken on a new importance to them. 
   
   There is no denying the Republicans have the passion now, the enthusiasm. The Democrats do not. Independents are breaking for Romney. And there’s the thing about the yard signs. In Florida a few weeks ago I saw Romney signs, not Obama ones. From Ohio I hear the same. From tony Northwest Washington, D.C., I hear the same. 
   
   Is it possible this whole thing is playing out before our eyes and we’re not really noticing because we’re too busy looking at data on paper instead of what’s in front of us? Maybe that’s the real distortion of the polls this year: They left us discounting the world around us. 
   
   And there is Obama, out there seeming tired and wan, showing up through sheer self discipline. A few weeks ago I saw the president and the governor at the Al Smith dinner, and both were beautiful specimens in their white ties and tails, and both worked the dais. But sitting there listening to the jokes and speeches, the archbishop of New York sitting between them, Obama looked like a young challenger—flinty, not so comfortable. He was distracted, and his smiles seemed forced. He looked like a man who’d just seen some bad internal polling. Romney? Expansive, hilarious, self-spoofing, with a few jokes of finely calibrated meanness that were just perfect for the crowd. He looked like a president. He looked like someone who’d just seen good internals. 
   
   Of all people, Obama would know… ||||| Well, not everyone can be right. Here’s POLITICO’s rundown of the top pundits who got it wrong and predicted a Mitt Romney win. Oops: 
   
   Newt Gingrich: 
   
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   reset Pundit predictions: They blew it Play Slideshow Top 2012 takeaways 
   
   “I believe the minimum result will be 53-47 Romney, over 300 electoral votes.” – Oct. 25, on Fox News. 
   
   Karl Rove: 
   
   Romney 285, Obama 253. “If crowds at his recent stops in these states [NV, WI and PA] are any indication of his supporters’ enthusiasm, Mr. Romney will likely be able to claim victory in these states as well.” — Nov. 5, on his website. 
   
   Fox News contributor Dick Morris: 
   
   Romney 325, Obama 213. “It will be the biggest surprise in recent American political history. It will rekindle the whole question as to why the media played this race as a nailbiter where in fact I think Romney’s going to win by quite a bit.” — Nov. 4, on Fox News. 
   
   Conservative radio host Laura Ingraham: 
   
   “I think he’s going to win New Hampshire, Wisconsin, and a few other surprises. I think this thing is going to be close.” — Oct. 31, on the Laura Ingraham Show. 
   
   The Weekly Standard’s Bill Kristol: 
   
   “I’m cautiously optimistic that Romney’s going to win.” — Oct. 31, on the Laura Ingraham Show. 
   
   Conservative columnist George Will: 
   
   Romney 321, Obama 217. “The wild card in what I’ve projected is I’m projecting Minnesota to go for Romney.” — Nov. 4, on ABC’s “This Week.” 
   
   UnskewedPolls’ Dean Chambers: 
   
   Romney 311, Obama 227. “Despite the pattern of skewed polls, most of them commissioned by the mainstream media, the overall electoral landscape is looking more and more favorable for Romney.” — Nov. 1, on examiner.com. 
   
   The Washington Examiner’s Michael Barone: 
   
   “Bottom line: Romney 315, Obama 223. That sounds high for Romney. But he could drop Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and still win the election. Fundamentals.” — Nov. 2, writing in The Washington Examiner. 
   
   House Speaker John Boehner: 
   
   “I think Ohioans vote with their wallets. That’s why I think Romney’s going to win on Tuesday.” — Nov. 4, on CNN. 
   
   Sarah Palin: 
   
   “I do believe that enough Americans have awakened and understand it’s time for a shift.” — Nov. 2, on Fox News. 
   
   Fox News’s Sean Hannity: 
   
   “I got this, Romney three points.” — Nov. 2, on Fox News. 
   
   CNBC’s Larry Kudlow: 
   
   ”I am now predicting a 330 vote electoral vote landslide. Yes, that’s right — 330 electoral votes.” — Oct. 25, on CNBC. 
   
   Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer: 
   
   “Romney, very close. But he’ll win the popular by I think about half a point, electoral college probably a very narrow margin.” — Nov. 2, on Fox News. 
   
   Rush Limbaugh: 
   
   “All of my thinking says Romney big. All of my feeling is where my concern is. But my thoughts, my intellectual analysis of this — factoring everything I see plus the polling data — it’s not even close. Three hundred-plus electoral votes for Romney.” — Nov. 5, on his radio show. 
   
   The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan: 
   
   “I think it’s Romney. … While everyone is looking at the polls and the storm, Romney’s slipping into the presidency. ”— Nov. 5, on her Wall Street Journal blog. 
   
   Former Bush White House press secretary Ari Fleischer: 
   
   “My prediction: Romn 50.1%-49.5%. Romn w minimum 271 EVs (FL, VA, CO, WI, NH). 309 EVs if he takes OH&PA. Pres-elect Romney.” — Nov. 4, via Twitter. ||||| With President Obama's re-election, New York Times blogger Nate Silver has reason to smile. 
   
   Silver became a near-god for nervous Democrats, and, as the campaign entered its final stretch, a sudden subject of scorn and derision for some pundits who doubted his polling forecasts, which consistently showed Obama in the lead. His bet with Joe Scarborough (who had dubbed him a "joke") only stoked the controversy further. 
   
   As it turned out, Silver came through with flying colors, as Obama performed nearly exactly the way he said he would. The public recognition was immediate. 
   
   "You know who won the election tonight? Nate Silver," Rachel Maddow said on MSNBC. Even Fox News tipped its cap to Silver. 
   
   Others said that the results could force a bit of a sea change in political journalism. 
   
   "What does this victory mean?" Mashable's Chris Taylor wrote. "That mathematical models can no longer be derided by "gut-feeling" pundits. That Silver's contention -- TV pundits are generally no more accurate than a coin toss -- must now be given wider credence." 
   
   For his part, Silver cheekily plugged his new book: 
   
   Silver's wasn't the only forecast that had a good night:
target: – The official results from Florida aren't in yet but it looks like Nate Silver—whose blog accounted for a fifth of the New York Times' web traffic Monday—correctly called 50 out of 50 states after getting 49 right in 2008. "You know who won the election tonight? Nate Silver," said Rachel Maddow on MSNBC, a sentiment echoed even by Bret Baier at Fox News, the Huffington Post reports. But while Silver triumphed, there were plenty who got it wrong, notes Politico, which lists more than a dozen pundits who predicted a Romney win with varying degrees of confidence. Among them are assorted Fox pundits, Sarah Palin, and Peggy Noonan at the Wall Street Journal, who wrote "I think it’s Romney ... While everyone is looking at the polls and the storm, Romney’s slipping into the presidency." Rush Limbaugh was also way off. "All of my thinking says Romney big," he said Monday. "My thoughts, my intellectual analysis of this—factoring everything I see plus the polling data—it’s not even close. Three hundred-plus electoral votes for Romney."