Prognostications #6 and #7: The caucuses in Colorado and Minnesota - UPDATED WITH NEW DATA

February is slim pickings for primaries and caucuses that actually count.  Today, there are contests in Colorado and Minnesota, both caucus style, but no delegates go directly to the nomination.  Instead, a candidate who does well gets delegate to the state convention and the state convention makes decisions in the old-fashioned smoke-filled rooms. This differs from a place like Missouri, where the primary is strictly a beauty contest, not unlike the Iowa Straw Poll held in the fall, the one Michele Bachmann won.

My predictions are using three days of polling in both Colorado and Minnesota conducted by PPP. I give the more recent polling more weight than the older polling.  I remove the "None of the Above" votes from the sample and distribute the votes so that the sum of all the candidates is 100%.  In Nevada, I assumed the None Of The Above would be 0.5% and it was actually 0.3% of caucus goers opted not to vote. Since I don't know the in and outs of the caucus rules in these states, I'm going to assume it's difficult to vote for anyone but the four remaining guys.

Here are my numbers.  Nate Silver hasn't posted a prediction about either. Most of his tweets since the Super Bowl have been sports related.  No matter.  If he puts up predictions today, I'll update this post. If not, this was me keeping in practice.

Colorado caucuses

Romney 36% (was 41.5%)

Santorum 28% (was 27%)

Gingrich 22.5% (was 19%)

Paul 13.5% (was 12.5%)
(New data says Romney is being dragged closer to the pack, but still leads comfortably.)

===========

Minnesota caucuses

Santorum 34% (was 30%)

Romney 23.5% (was 28%)

Gingrich 22%(was 22.5%)

Paul 20.5%(was 19.5%)

(Santorum steals from Romney and Paul steals from Gingrich, more or less.)

If the polling data is even close, this should be a big news cycle win for Santorum.  The race for second place in Minnesota could produce yet another narrative.

When the final results are posted, I'll come back with a recap of how I did.