Photo by perke on Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons.

Even though this election feels like it started more or less around the time we lost our baby teeth, if 2000 taught us anything, it’s this: It ain’t over ’til it’s over. The politics section, after months of ignoring all news headlines that didn’t include the words “McCain,” “Palin,” “Obama,” or “bailout,”, has come up with some predictions for how the longest election in recent history will end. Feel free to add your own in the comments.

Ben Armstrong: I predict that Barack Obama will become the president-elect with 349 electoral votes and 52.1 percent of the popular vote to McCain’s 46.0 percent. Of the questionable states, Obama will win Pennsylvania, Virginia, Florida, Ohio, Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico and Missouri. He will lose Indiana, Montana, Georgia, North Carolina and North Dakota. His late campaign push in Florida – coupled with disproportionate housing woes – will give him a small edge: one or two points. Missouri will be close, too, but it will not break its streak of picking winners. The Democrats will pick up six Senate seats and 17 House seats. Gordon Smith (R-OR) and Norm Coleman (R-MN) will hold on to their seats, while Ted Stevens (R-AK), John Sununu (R-NH) and Elizabeth Dole (R-NC) will lose their Senate offices. The Dems will pick up open seats in Virginia, Colorado and New Mexico. Bottom line: capitalizing off of economic discontent, Democrats will sweep.

Anna Stark: I predict that in a sudden upset on the morning of election day, the Supreme Court will un-deny Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr’s lawsuit to remove McCain and Obama from the ballot in states where both failed to meet the filing deadline for certifying their presidential candidates as they would appear on the ballot. In a come-from-behind victory, Barr will take Texas, whose Aug. 26th filing deadline was violated, and all other red states will follow its lead, because Texas is big and scary. The remaining swing states, thoroughly confused, will go to McCain fearing hostile takeover and/or the dreaded backwards-cheek-B’s, giving Barr a slim lead in the electoral college, and securing the first Libertarian president elect in the United States. Immanuel Kant smiles lovingly down from heaven.

Well, okay, I may be willing to admit that this is not the most likely of all possible outcomes. I’m going to terrify my parents by saying that, even with Texas going to McCain, Obama will take the electoral college, as indicated by his strong lead in the polls. Unless Biden says something ridiculous in the next 24 hours, and then God only knows will happen. I do not, however, think that the Democrats will end up with a Senate supermajority, no matter how much Nancy Pelosi wants them to.

Matt Zeitlin: I think Obama will win all of Kerry’s states along with Colorado, Iowa, New Mexico, Ohio, Virginia and Florida. So McCain gets the rest of the swing states: North Dakota, Montana, North Carolina, Indiana and Missouri. Basically, I don’t think the Democrats can turn out votes in deep-red states like Indiana or North Carolina, or if they can, the Republicans can still it do it better. The deep-red states that I do think will turn, namely Virginia, are going through long-term demographic and political realignments that are making them much more purple, and in the case of Colorado and New Mexico, blue. Under my optimistic, Florida-goes-Obama scenario, Obama wins 338 electoral votes to McCain’s 200. The popular vote will be 52-47. As far as the Senate goes, I think the Democrats will win seats in New Mexico, Colorado, New Hampshire, Alaska, Virgina, Oregon and Minnesota. That’s seven new seats, which, with Joe Lieberman and Bernie Sanders, would give the Democrats 58 Senate seats. As for the House, the Democrats will pick up a net of 34 seats, giving them a 240-165 advantage in the House. Also, just for fun, one million people will gather in downtown Chicago to celebrate Obama’s win, and Sarah Palin will ritually slaughter 13 moose to make herself feel better. Also, bonus prediction: Expect an uptick in the birth rate in liberal parts of the country. No better way to lower inhibitions than winning back the White House. The baby name that will have the biggest jump in popularity in 2009? Barack.

Jason Plautz: The polls stay open way later than any television station wants them to because of record high turnout. Even so, they’re able to call the race for Obama early, thanks to North Carolina, Virginia, Florida and Ohio going Democratic. Early exit polls even have him taking Arizona, but that turns out to be a pipe dream. In the end, it’s a washout for Obama, who clears 320 electoral votes. However, it’s not such a big win for the Democrats in Congress - they only turn five seats, leaving them short of the Magic 60, but still giving them a sizable majority. And John King’s magic map will malfunction around 8:30, throwing the Best Political Team on Television into utter chaos for ten minutes.

Caleb Melby: Following a 2000 political awakening, I am a Pavlov blue dog Democrat, classically trained to accept Democrats’ inability to win some of the most seemingly winnable elections in history. So conditioned, I have spent the last couple of months forging doomsday scenarios where Democratic Senator Barack Obama loses out to Republican Senator John McCain. But take a look at the numbers, and it becomes hard to imagine any situation in which McCain can win. Let’s say the Bradley Effect is legitimate, and it can be expected that some of the projected support for Obama goes to McCain. If this is true, closely contested swing states like Indiana and North Carolina will go red on Tuesday. Counting all states save Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida (using the latest in reliable polling data), that puts Obama at 270 electoral votes (the number necessary to win) to McCain’s 200 (with 68 toss-up votes). To win, McCain is going to have to pick up these three swing states, including the significantly blue Pennsylvania, plus yet another more modestly-sized electoral morsel (perhaps Nevada) to win. His chances are looking grim. Predicting that Florida and Ohio go to McCain (states arguably within the realm of “too close to call,” and perhaps also within danger of being bumped by the Bradley Effect), and concluding that Pennsylvania stays blue (as polls overwhelmingly suggest), I predict the winner to be Barack Obama with 291 to 247 votes.