538.com and Brett Marty "On the Road" in the battleground states

One new favorite site for following the political races is FiveThirtyEight: Electoral Projections Done Right. Blogger and statistician extraordinaire Nate Silver is doing the kind of data crunching here that he pioneered in Baseball Prospectus. He and co-blogger Sean Quinn writes about their Road Trip through the battleground states in these last eight weeks before the election.

Although the site's main purpose is quantitative analysis, what I've come to enjoy as well is, not surprisingly, the stories they are telling. Nate and Sean's road trip stories and Brett Marty's amazing photos focus on the organizing efforts waged by both campaigns, and give us detailed interviews and conversations that help us understand how each place is unique, and the importance of the local. Each town, each state is different. What's happening on the ground? How do events have an impact on people? What are they saying? Today's post is from Troy, Ohio, and tells a fascinating story of neighbors in a small town in dialogue with each other, and that dialogue is creating a shift from a Republican stronghold to a town that will likely end up with a majority for Obama. The big story that's emerging from this road trip? Obama's campaign organization has out-organized McCain's in every state.

The numbers-crunching part of the site follows both the presidential race and the Senate races, and tracks national and state polls. They also work out various scenarios and there are tons of charts. Every day there is also a post with some analysis about what factors they think are affecting the numbers. From the original small group of readers, the readership has grown to become a real national presence, and the bloggers have been invited to appear on TV shows, including the Colbert Report. Heated discussions take place in the comment section from time to time; not all the commenters agree.The site's FAQ explains their statistical and polling methodologies. I don't get the math; all I know is that my award-winning colleague who is an international Big Daddy of historical demography tells me that he now reads this site because that means he doesn't have to do all the computations himself. If he gives it his seal of approval, that's good enough for me.
Here's Nate explaining to Keith Olbermann on Countdown back in August exactly what it is 538 does:

A story we must all hear, a story too many already know

Sunday's must read: "Held Suspect" by TerranceDC at Pam's House Blend. He eloquently recounts his own experience, as well as that of family and friends, as a black man in the U.S. who must always be aware of the very real possibility of police violence if he is stopped for driving while black, walking while black, being black in America. I have several friends and acquaintances who have lived through some version of this experience as darker-skinned Latinos or Latin Americans living in the U.S. as well. One of the definitions of white privilege is that those of us who are white have the luxury of being ignorant of these realities, without risk. All black parents must confront that moment when they have to teach their children to survive in a racist society.