Professor predicts presidential electability in the blink of an eye

The key to the outcome of this year's presidential election may ultimately have little to do with what the polls say, or with sound bites about health care or economic policy, or the war in Iraq. Instead, it may just hinge on something that no one is even talking about: blinking.

That's right, blinking. According to Boston College psychology professor Joseph Tecce, analyzing how rapidly (or slowly) candidates blink has proven to be a fairly accurate tool in predicting who is most likely to capture the White House.

"In U.S. presidential elections over the past 25 years, the candidates who blinked fastest in the debates lost the election, except for 2000, when George W. Bush, the fastest blinker, lost the popular vote but won the electoral vote," said Tecce, who studies the connection between body language and stress.

His fascination with the subject began about 35 years ago - on Aug. 8, 1974, to be precise. He was watching President Nixon give his resignation speech, he said, "and low and behold he seemed calm, cool and collected, but he was blinking very rapidly." So Tecce counted the blinks, and found that Nixon was "blinking faster than schizophrenics."