#lichtman

Political historian Allan Lichtman developed a method which has allowed to correctly predict every presidential election since 1984, and working backwards this same method retroactively accounts for every single election since 1860.  The only hiccup was in 2000, when he predicted Gore would win, which he technically did.

Every election comes down to 13 keys, 13 yes or no questions on the state of the union during the previous presidential term.  Lichtman claims that voters are smarter than we give them credit for, and won’t just blindly follow one party or the other, but will consciously reward whichever party maintains some semblance of order during their time in office.  He claims that campaigning and advertisements are irrelevant, because people have usually already made up their minds, and the only thing that matters is election day itself.

Each election, Lichtman asks 13 questions directed towards the incumbent party, to determine how they’ve done over the past few years.  If 8 or more of the questions are true, then the incumbent party is predicted to win.  If 6 or more are false, the challenging party is predicted to win.

Party Mandate:  After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than after the previous midterm elections.  FALSE (Democrats won more in 2018 than Republicans won in 2014)

Contest:  There is no serious contest for the incumbent party nomination.  TRUE (Donald Trump faces no real challengers)

Incumbency: The incumbent party candidate is the sitting president.  TRUE (barring the coronavirus, or a heart attack brought on by all the fast food he eats, Donald Trump will be the nominee this November)

Third party:  There is no significant third party or independent campaign.  True, as of right now (Justin Amash is running as a Libertarian, but it’s unclear if he’ll reach Gary Johnson/Jill Stein levels, certainly not Ross Perot levels.  Frankly, he’s only running for president to save face because he doesn’t stand a chance of winning his House seat back; he left the Republican party, so all of his constituents hate him, and he’s too conservative for the Democrats.  We’ll see how this goes)

Short-term economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.  FALSE (The Great Shutdown, the second once-in-a-lifetime economic collapse in less than 15 years. We’re only four months into it right now; things are going to get so much worse before they get better.)

Long-term economy:  Real per capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.  Unclear (Obama’s first time saw only 3.9% growth due to the end of the Great Recession, but his second term saw dramatic improvement with 8.8%.  This averages to 6.35% growth per term.  As of 2019, Donald Trump’s first term has seen 7.6% growth, but taking into account the recession, it is almost certain that our 2020 GDP will drop because of this.  It only needs to drop 1.25% to be below Obama’s average, so maybe)

Policy change:  The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.  Maybe (this is incredibly subjective, now more than ever.  What constitutes “major” change?  The McConnell controlled Senate has been blocking all major legislature since 2015, and Trump still hasn’t managed to meet any of his campaign promises; he didn’t build the wall, he didn’t lock her up, he didn’t get rid of Obamacare.  Then again, he has greatly expanded the executive branch, giving the president total power to just ignore Congress is he so desires, so it could go either way)

Social unrest:  There is no sustained social unrest during the term.  Probably false?  (again, this is subjective; what constitutes “unrest?”  There are regular protests, but they’re all organized and civil.  Some nut jobs stormed the Michigan state capitol with guns to “take back the state,” and nobody was arrested, which seems like unrest to me, except they were on the president’s side.  I don’t think it will get to civil war levels, or martial law declarations, but rest assured the country is not happy with him)

Scandal:  The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.  Almost certainly false. (indictments galore; so many of his associates are in jail, almost all of his original cabinet secretaries quit or were fired, and he admitted to trying to blackmail Ukraine to dig up dirt on Joe Biden, was impeached for it, and got away with it.  This man is a walking scandal.  The question is, what does “untainted” mean?  Yes, there have been endless scandals, one after another, but have any of them really stuck around?)

Foreign/military failure:  The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.  Maybe true? (on the one hand, Iran didn’t retaliate when we killed their general, but on the other hand we retreated out of Syria, let thousands of ISIS fighters go, and aided the Turks in a Kurdish genocide.  The tit-for-tat sanctions against China threatened to crash the global economy, but then the coronavirus came in and did that all by itself, so it’s unclear whether we’ve “failed” or simply “not succeeded”)

Foreign/military success:  The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.  Maybe false?  (for the same reason as above, it is hard to judge what is or isn’t a success.  USMCA is unpopular and small potatoes.  The North Korean talks are all show with no substance; Kim will never get rid of his nukes.  We’re still caught up in W’s endless wars, and I don’t see an end in sight, so I’d say this is definitely not a success).

Incumbent charisma:  The incumbent party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.  FALSE (Trump is a hero among Republicans, but reviled among everyone else.  He has never had majority approval, and will not go down as one of the universally beloved presidents like Washington, Lincoln, or the Roosevelts)

Challenger charisma:  The challenging party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.  TRUE (Joe Biden is the Walter Mondale of Al Gores.  Republicans hate him, and only half of Democrats really like him.  He’s old and senile, he keeps making gaffe after gaffe after gaffe, and doesn’t seem to know how the game is played anymore.  Someone needs to find Grampa a nice home so he can retire and talk to his nurse about how he used to get into fist fights with ne’er-do-wells, “buncha malarkey, I tell ya”)

Lets review the scores, from Best to Worst

FALSE

FALSE

FALSE

Almost certainly false

Probably false

Maybe false

Unclear

Maybe

Maybe true

True as of right now

TRUE

TRUE

TRUE

Incumbent Trumps needs 8 true to win.  Challenger Biden needs 6 false to win.

Biden definitely has 3, with 3 teetering towards him, which is a good sign.  He could even flip the unclear key in his favor if the economy continues to tank.

As it stands, both parties seem to have 6 keys each, which predicts that the challenging party will win the election.  The scandal key is tentatively in Biden’s favor, as are the social unrest and military success keys.  This could change in the coming months if Trump does something erratic like assassinating the Ayatollah and declaring that a victory (which would lead to an endless oil war with Iran; it’d be 2003 all over again).  Trumps needs to flip more keys than Biden does, so he’s going into it with as disadvantage, perhaps the only time in his life he has ever not had an advantage.

But then again, there’s always the possibility that it could be a 2000/2016 repeat, where Biden wins the popular vote but Trump ekes by with the electoral college victory yet again.  This model doesn’t take that into account because the popular vote winner almost always wins the EC too.

Trump is not more popular today than he was 4 years ago.  He’s never had majority approval.  While his base loves him more now than ever, they represent a minority of voters, and pretty much everyone else hates him.  Anyone who was on the fence in 2016 is definitively over the fence in 2020.  If he “wins,” it’s not going to be a 1972/1984 blowout, that’s just not gonna happen, too many states hate him too much.  It will be very close; I will not rule out the possibility of a 269-269 tie in the electoral college, triggering a contingent election where the House of Representatives has to pick the president.  Democrats have a majority in the House right now, but in contingent elections they don’t vote as 435 individuals, they vote as 50 state blocs; even though there are more Democrats than Republicans, they’re packed together into as few states as possible, giving Republicans over 26 stateside majorities, enough to ensure they would pick Trump in a contingent election.

Emma Coronel. Jeffrey Lichtman, abogado que encabeza la defensa de Emma Coronel Aispuro, negó que su clienta estuviera cooperando con el gobierno de Estados Unidos para ofrecer información acerca del Cártel de Sinaloa o sobre las operaciones del narcotraficante Joaquín Guzmán Loera, el Chapo, esposo de la reclusa. El defensor neoyorkino se registró como representante de Coronel Aispuro el pasado 4 de marzo, junto con su colega, Mariel Colon Miro. Y aunque desde la primera semana en que ella fue arrestada, Lichtman reaccionó fúrico por la filtración de un presunto pacto con las autoridades, también dejó en claro que eso no se llevaría a cabo, independientemente si fuera verdad o él tuviera conocimiento de la versión. Sin embargo, los abogados de la esposa del Chapo no habían querido afirmar, con todas sus letras, que la cooperación con el gobierno de EEUU era algo completamente descartado en la estrategia legal de la acusada. Una de las razones que argumenta el defensor es que Emma Coronel en definitiva no está recibiendo el trato de un testigo colaborador, pues vive malos tratos en el Centro de Detención de Alexandria, en Virginia. Algo que Mariel Colon también ha comentado para Infobae México, quien ha indicado que su representada está en estricto aislamiento y solo puede salir dos horas, de una a tres de la madrugada. Lichtman concedió una entrevista el pasado 25 de marzo a W Radio, cadena colombiana propiedad de Caracol Radio. Cuestionado en el programa “La W”, el litigante dijo que la versión filtrada a medios, sobre un presunto pacto, solo ha sido publicada en diarios sensacionalistas; además, al no tener identificada la fuente, no se puede tomar con veracidad cualquier declaración. “Si estuviera cooperando el trato que recibiría fuera mejor, pero no está cooperando y no nos podemos basar en esa información que publican los medios amarillistas en EEUU”, aseveró. Por otra parte, Lichtman reveló que Emma Coronel viajó a Virginia como lo había hecho en otras ocasiones, debido a que tiene negocios en la zona hace un tiempo. Es decir, era común que acudiera a la ciudad. Cuando el gobierno de EEUU se enteró sobre el vuelo, entonces decidieron realizar los trámites para arrestarla. En cambio, descartó que el hecho de pasar por una condición precaria en prisión se deba a que la esposa del Chapo esté siendo presionada para cooperar con las autoridades. Agregó que la situación en el encierro no es necesariamente la más cómoda. El abogado reiteró que Guzmán Loera se mantiene al tanto de lo que pasa con su esposa. Mariel Colon Miro comentó a Infobae México que si bien, están en negociaciones con la fiscalía para una posible declaración de culpabilidad, eso no significa que sea lo que vaya a pasar. Solo se evalúa la opción, pues podría ahorrar el juicio y ver cuánto tiempo pasaría en prisión, en lugar de que Emma Coronel sea condenada por una década o hasta el resto de sus días.