Saturday, June 22, 2019

HARD HATS AND MORTARBOARDS: Forecasting the 2020 Presidential Election

The only function of forecasting is to make astrology look respectable. ~ John Kenneth Galbraith  


First Prediction: 500 days before the election.
Here it is just four days before the enigmatically -implemented first Dem candidates’ debate in Miami. I’ll bet you can hardly wait to hear all 23 of them struggling for airtime. Oops, it’s just 20 of our favs over 2 nights.[1] Finally, something (hopefully) real-ish will be happening election-wise. It’s round #1 of 81? After all, the election is practically right upon us. In this spirit, I’ve scurried way out on a thin bended limb of the electoral tree (a relative of the college) to offer my inaugural 2020 presidential election prediction. I’ll be updating my predictions periodically over the next 500 days.
My prediction today is that dystopia will continue after Nov. 3, 2020 when #45 was re-elected for another term. This ghastly result again demonstrates the alarming power of incumbency. How could this happen?
Trump was enthusiastically supported by the same solid slice of core voters – principally less-educated, less urban, more white, more religious, more conservative “working middle-class” men and women – with all too few defections from their MAGA voting in 2016. This unyielding core, who voted to KAG (Keep America Great), was preserved despite the Dems’ considerable efforts to peal some away from #45 and actually vote for their own economic self-interests with a Dem in the White House. It didn’t happen.
The Dems’ 2020 progressive ticket ultimately was determined behind a closed door session at their July 13-16 convention in Milwaukee. The initial voting rounds were deadlocked, and described as a nasty cat-and-dog fight between competing species of Dem progressives unwilling to negotiate. The expected complete transparency was suddenly clouded, to the dismay of many. Rumors were that the winning presidential nominee, Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI), promised to faithfully become a modern-day FDR by adhering to an updated, democratic socialist agenda he would have favored. “Franklin Delano Roosevelt is my spirit totem,” Ms. Gabbard proclaimed in victory. She benefited from being both the first Samoan-American and the first Hindu member of the US Congress.
Unfortunately, as in the previous national election, neither Ms. Gabbard nor Andrew Yang (her VP candidate) could stitch together strongly enough their broad, multi-faceted quilt of adherents to actually vote sufficiently in all 50 states and produce an Electoral College victory. The Repubs’ brazen voter-suppression efforts certainly didn’t help. The Trump/Pence machine’s unsubstantiated characterization of the Dems’ policies as costly “extreme socialism” convinced enough anti-Trump voters in key precincts to cast their ballots for the Green Party ticket of Pete Buttigieg/Marianne Williamson.
After election-day there were no rainbows in Honolulu or any other blue locale; instead bleakness reigns. I need my support alligator, where could she have gone? The Dems also did not end up winning control the Senate and their plurality in the House was reduced to 29 from 37. The Repubs’ hard hats carried the day over the Dems’ mortarboards. L



[1] These 20 Dem debate participants also do not include the other 141 minor Dem candidates running for president. Yup, that proverbial galaxy of folks has each duly filed their candidacy with the Federal Election Commission.


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