Actually, he was 100 or so votes from being elected in a race to 270. So how does the GOP get to 270? They get Texas, till maybe 2020, when it goes Blue. That's a biggy in the class of say CA and NY. FL, godwilling, despite Jews not being keen on minorities being picked on since they're thus, not to mention get that one nation under God ain't talking about theirs, might with some trickery and the hand of God overcome the fact that even the former stauchly-GOP-locked Anti Castro Cubans are voting Dem with all the anti-brown folks rhetoric coming from the GOP to lock up them voters in Mississippi and other low EC vote backwaters. A long shot, on a good day, wrapped in serendipity might create a shocker upset ... oh; and it's vital. Gopniks lose without it. Meanwhile them Johnny lunchbuckets hugging guns in rural OH might create an upset ... and it's vital. Then the locked in Red state, and only 80 percent of the could go other way states, and by golly, it's 2K all over again. EC win by 1.
Bad nights can happen. Dewey should have never called Truman's train outreach "whistlestops" right when it was coming into Chicago, where folks didn't like being called a whistlestop. And others start thinking Dewey's a disconnected elite. Or maybe a candidate seeks divine counsel and gets caught smoking crack with Jimmy Swaggart and some young ladies of questionable employ. Ergo the October of Dreams in which Gopniks get skinned knees praying for an October Surprise as Fox scrambles to create one through repetition bordering on autistic. Without miracles in a couple big states and an even more miraculous skew on tossups, they do not get to 270 or anywhere near. Meanwhile if Dems get either of two they stand to win (OH, FL) they win. No need to stay up waiting for polls to close in HI, nor CA, AZ ...
Victory speech time.