Debate Night! 2024

The second debate of the 2024 general election will be begin in under four hours.  It is the first debate to include Kamala Harris.  As I usually do, I will post some questions that I would like to hear the candidates be asked tonight.  But first, a quick word about the state of the race.

I believe that Harris will win the popular vote by something between three and six points. I believe she will sweep the Blue Wall states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. I also think she will win Nevada. I think Georgia, North Carolina and Arizona are true tossups that either candidate could win if the election were today. So my hunch is that she will win one or two of those, but not all three.

This is slightly more bullish than the average forecast, as you can see below.

I. The State of the Race.

The race is very close. Most recent national polls have been within two points. Harris has led in the majority of them, but that doesn't tell us much since she probably needs to win by a point and a half or two points to become president. The professionals and hobbyists who look at this stuff in some detail tend to put the likelihood of either candidate winning somewhere between 40 and 60 percent.

Which of course is making everyone on Politics Twitter mental.  The uncertainty is grating and not everyone is taking it in stride. But I don't think there's much difference between 60/40 and 40/60 when there are eight weeks to go. Here I have round up the predictions from various models and prognosticators. And I'll include myself because well, why not?

That's quite a spread, but of course the two most optimistic forecasts are amateurs with a rooting interest. The real divide seems to be between 538.com and it's prodigal son, Nate Silver. 538 gives Harris a nearly 56 percent chance of winning but Nate only a 38.4 percent chance of winning

II. Questions That Should Be Asked.

1. To Donald Trump, "Who won the 2020 election for president?" 

I'd like to get even more specific and ask Trump which states he is willing to admit that he lost last time. But last week Trump seemed to make some news in admitting on a podcast that he lost "by a whisker." He probably said that to avoid the podcast host from beating him up on election denialism. I think the moderators need to push further on this today because well, shit, democracy matters.

2. To Kamala Harris, "How would you have handed the withdrawal from Afghanistan differently than Joe Biden and Donald Trump did?"

I continue to believe that the withdrawal from Afghanistan was the most successful large-scale operation carried out by the American military this century. Many disagree with me on that, although, none of them can name one more successful.  But this is an issue and I want to hear both her talk about it and Trump respond to it.

3.  To Donald Trump. "You are awfully fond of Vladimir Putin,  the House of Saud, Xi Jinping and Kim Jung Un. Do you believe it is important for America to promote democracy abroad?"

I am recycling this from my post about the June debate, because I think it's a great question.

4. For Kamala Harris: "Why specifically did you change your views on fracking since 2019?"

5. For Donald Trump: "The first time you ran for president you promised to balance the budge and pay off the debt in four years. Your current campaign is predicated on a lot of tax cuts and a lot of new spending. The only new revenue source you have endorsed are tariffs on all imported goods. Have you crunched the numbers on all of these plans and how much do you think the national debt will be four years form now if you are elected."

6. For Kamala Harris " Do you think that any tariffs currently in place contributed to the inflation of the past few years and will you repeal or reduce any of them?

7. For Both Candidates:  Three out of four of your parents were immigrants. Mr. Trump's father was born about 2 year after his parents arrived in this country from Germany.  Why do you think so many voters s have hostile feelings about recently arrived Americans and what will you do to change that?

As always, I would also like to have them answer the questions on the test to become a naturalized citizen but I don't think we will get anything like that tonight.

III. If This Were a Baseball Game.

As the election proceeds, I will play around with probabilities from a different passion, baseball.  

To think of think of the election as a baseball game. We'll treat the remaining weeks as innings. And we'll make Harris the home team, since we are root, root, rooting for her and if she doesn't win it will be a shame. 

So with eight weeks to go, the game goes to the second inning today. 

A. 538 Baseball Forecast: The game is tied in the top of the 2nd. There is one out and no runners on base.

B. Nate Silver Baseball Forecast.  The visitors have a 2-0 lead in the top of the second. There are two outs and no runners on base.

Bottom Line: A lot of baseball left to be played.

 

The Election Reduced to One Chart.

Today is Labor Day, the traditional beginning of the general election season. I have no changes to make to my previous forecast of Harris winning 292 Electoral Votes to 246 for Trump.   (This means Harris winning Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Nevada and Georgia while Trump wins Arizona and North Carolina.)

I. Polls, Betting Markets, Forecasts and Wishes.

Harris holds a modest lead in most national polls. Five Thirty Eight, the Economist and Nate Silver have up by about three and a half points. Real Clear Politics has her up just under two points. 

The Prediction Markets are very close. Predictit favors Harris slightly (54 cents to 49 cents) and Polymarket favors Trump slightly. (50% to 47%)

Most of the forecasts favor Harris by narrow margins. Five Thirty Eight has her winning 57 percent of the time. The Economist 52 percent of the time. Nate Silver has Trump winning something like 52 percent of the time but he has all but admitted that his model is suppressing Harris' vote too much because it's within two weeks of the DNC. (Put differently, she didn't get as large of a post-convention bounce than his model expected.)

So, you know.....close.

I for one am slightly more optimistic than these models. I think Harris has about a 65 percent chance of winning. I am of course biased in her favor. I want her to win. But the reasons for my optimism is that her personal approval ratings are about 10 points better than Trump's. That will make it difficult for him to change minds in his favor. 

Right now the median undecided voter is a normie who is sick of Trump's shtick. I believe they will be willing to turn things over to the next generation. Trump's job, as cynical as this sounds is, is to make that person afraid to turn things over to Kamala Harris. I think his attacks will get uglier over time but I don't think it will work on enough people for him to win.

He does not have the personal charisma, political skill, fund raising or even the personal energy to make that happen. He is old and declining. It shows more and more when he speaks and it is reflected in the less robust campaign schedule that he has been keeping compared to four and eight years ago. 

But campaigns are there to be won and stranger things have happened. A bit of bad news can always hurt the incumbent party and Harr is not yet running away with this thing. 

II. The Electoral Math.

We pretty much know what the result will be in 43 states and the District of Columbia. If we also assume that Harris will win Nebraska's 2nd congressional district and Trump will win Maine's 2nd congressional district, we can assume that the election starts with 226 electoral votes in the Democratic column and 219 in the Republican column.

That leaves seven swing states to decide the contest. There is an easy way to divide them-Northern and Southern. The three Northern swing states were all won by Biden last time and they generally poll to the left of the four Southern swing states.

If Harris wins all three Northern swing states, she will hit the magic number of 270 electoral votes. If she loses any of these states she will have to make up for it by winning a matching number of electoral votes in the southern part of the map.

Here's a way to think of it.  

1. Harris is expected to win 226 votes in reliably blue states.

2. She needs 44 more Electoral Votes to get to 270.

3. The quickest way to do that is to win the three Northern Swing States-Michigan (15), Wisconsin (10) and Pennsylvania (19). That puts her on exactly 270.

4. For every electoral vote she loses in the Northern Swing States, she must make up for them by winning that same number in a Southern Swing State: Georgia (16), North Carolina (16), Arizona (11) and Nevada (6).

Here a chart for what combinations of Southern Swing States would make up for losing one or more of the Northern Swing States.

That is the scorecard you need for election night. As the weeks progress, I'm sure I'll update my expectations. But the math on getting to 270 is pretty simple here. Harris needs to rebuild the Blue Wall of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania or patch any cracks in it with an equal number of Electoral Votes from Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada.

PS: I want to plug a new election forecaster for this cycle. He goes by Theo and I came across him on Twitter. (His Twitter handle is @ctolga_ )  

He has built a neat and visually appealing website for his forecast. His fore cast is considerably more optimistic than the older established forecasts. But I have a hunch that those forecasts are going to trend in his directions as the weeks go by.  Here is the link to his website:

https://theo-forecast.github.io/

Four More Years But For Whoah....Wait a Second. (2024 General Election Forecast, Take Four)

Folks, the tide has turned. Kamala Harris has had an amazing month of good fortune and better politics. For the first few months of this year I assumed that voters would eventually reconcile themselves to the fact that they had to choose between two old declining men and enough of them would choose the one who wasn't evil. 

But Father Time came for Joe Biden a little faster than I expected. Remarkably, he recognized that this was true, or at least the fact that the public believed it was true, so he stepped aside in favor of his vice-president. Then the institutional party rallied behind this decision. Since becoming the presumptive nominee, she has made a very popular choice for running mate, posted incredible fundraising numbers and staged a string of flawless campaign rallies. 

Now America has a choice between an old man, malevolent in being, choleric in temperament and declining in his faculties or a woman in the prime of life, upbeat in bearing and riding a wave of good sentiment that should carry through her convention. When the dust settles around Labor Day, this could be looking like the best presidential election cycle for Democrats since 2008.

But let's not get over our skis just yet. Harris hasn't done an interview, press conference or debate yet. A lot can go wrong and it's inevitable that a she will have a bad press cycle or two between now and November 5th. But for now, she is the favorite. And her opponent seems incapable of adjusting to this reality. 

The electoral college favors the Republican party. A few bad bounces could lead to another 2016 where Trump rides a lucky streak to the White House. He can win Pennsylvania and I'm not lighting any cigars until  that state is called on Election Night (Or the day after. Maybe Thursday. Seriously, folks, margins matter in PA. Let's get this done in a timely manner.)

I. The Roads to 270.

The colored chart at the top of this post is a list of every electoral contest from deepest blue DC to brightest red Wyoming. I don't do toss-ups, because that's boring. But any state or district in a pale color could reasonably won by either party. The darker shades are "safe." But I use that term a little more loosely than more serious outlets. They are safe for now. They are safe in a close election. I'll move the bricks around as polling and prediction markets shift. 

A. The Safe Blue 226.

Just a month ago, team Trump was eyeing Minnesota and Virginia. Trump himself was making noise about New Jersey. (That last one was never going to happen.) But for now, I thin those states are off the board. Unless something horrible happens in the next 87 days, Harris-Walz will win at least 20 contests worth 226 electoral votes.

B. The Swinging 93.

i. Michigan. This state is trending blue and I'd be shocked if Harris doesn't win it. Polymarket gives Harris as 62% chance of winning it. Until that gets over 70%, I'll leave it where it is. (Five Thirty Eight has not yet turned their forecast back on which is embarrassing).

ii. Wisconsin. Also trending blue, but not quite as fast as MI. Polymaket has it 56/44.

iii. Pennsylvania: WI and MI get Harris to 251. From there the clearest path is Pennsylvania, which gets her to exactly 270. The most recent polls have looked good there and I think Harris will probably win it. But let's face it 270 to 268 is a terrifying proposition. Especially for the 270 members of the electoral college in the states that vote for Biden. (And their alternates-thank God the electors have alternates.)

iv. Nevada.  If there is one state to flip because of the switch from Biden to Harris, it is this one. Biden was polling terribly there and Trump was polling weirdly well there all year long. I guess they like casino owners, even lousy ones. But Harris stepping in has led to a swift endorsement by the big culinary union there and it looks like the Reid machine will carry this one over the line for now. If I owned a polling company, I would spend a lot of money on this state the next two months. If Harris doesn't win PA, she probably has to win Nevada.

v. Georgia. After Pennsylvania, this state is most likely to put Harris over the top. If she wins the 251 states, plus NV and GA, she'll be at 273. A slightly less terrifying scenario than 270 to 268.

vi. North Carolina.  If I had to predict the closest margin in this election, I would pick NC. The Dems have only carried it once in the last 11 cycles but the state is nudging its way leftward and the Republicans, God love them, have nominated an absolute nutter to be their candidate for governor. It was the only state that Trump won by a narrow margin in 2020 and I hope this year it will fall the other way.

vii. Arizona.  This is another state that was very close last time and in which the Party of Lincoln has chosen a full-blown lunatic for the senate race. She will lose. But for some reason, this state feels like a reach for Harris. Polymarket still favors Trump there and I'm not ready to bet against that. Picking Kelly for Veep would have helped, of course. But I don't think AZ will be the tipping point state, so it's probably not worth worrying about. And Harris certainly has a chance to win, especially if Trump keeps making his cognitive decline so obvious.

C. The Safe Red 219.

I have written somewhat cautiously so far. I am very encouraged by the current state of the race. But I know there are limits to the popularity of the Democratic party and I'm not about to discount the possibility of attacks on Kamala Harris sticking with a certain kind of "independent voter" who think the President of the United States should be man, just the way more sensible folks believe that James Bond should always be a man. (Or God, if that's your thing.)

Part of my caution stems from the fact that I don't see Harris flipping any big states that Trump won in 2020. Florida could wind up being close. But it makes little senses for Harris to commit the kind of resources it would probably take for her to win there. Texas was fairly close last time, but I don't seeing it moving nearly five points to the left in a second consecutive cycle.  Ohio might be closer than last time and that's good news for Sherrod Brown's senate campaign. But it's not flipping Blue

One persistent prediction I have made is that Florida will again vote to the left of Texas this time. And I think they will both be Red in the end, whether by one point or five.  (The last time TX voted to the left of FL was 1988-when Dukakis-Bentsen lost FL by 22 points but Texas by 12 and 1/2 points. Good job, Lloyd!)

Other than NC, it's hard to see where Harris picks off a state that voted for Trump twice. She might win both of Maine's congressional districts, but that's hardly a trivial effect on the election. If we're talking about a blow out, then Iowa and Alaska could become kind of, sort of close. But if we're worried about that in November, then this will be a good cycle indeed.

II. The Bottom Line.

This election will be decided in seven states worth a total of 93 electoral votes. Kamala Harris needs to win 44 of those 91 votes. Trump needs to win 51 to win outright or 50 to get a 269-269 tie and force it to the House of Representatives*. 

The contours of this are shaped by how the three Blue Wall states vote. 

A. Harris has 3 Paths to winning at least 44 of these votes:

a. The Blue Wall: WI+MI+PA (exactly 44)

b. The Hybrid: Any two Blue Wall States plus NV+ GA or NC (47)

c. The Southern Belles:  NV+AZ+ GA + NC (49)

I do not see the Southern Strategy working. If Harris gets swept in the Rust Belt states, she probably does not win all four southern states. But stranger things have happened.

B. Trump's Needs A Rust Belt Swing State to get to 270:

The good news is that Trump has to win at least one of the Blue Wall states. The bad news is that winning one or more of them gives him several paths to 270.

If Trump wins one of the three Blue swing states, he has the following paths:

If Pennsylvania,  he is up to 238 and he needs either: 

a. North Carolina and Georgia 

b. North Carolina or Georgia plus NV and Arizona.

If Michigan, he is up to 235 and he needs: 

a. North Carolina and Georgia and NV or Arizona.

If Wisconsin, he's up to 229 and needs: 

a. North Carolina and Georgia and Arizona.

If Trump wins any two of the Blue Wall states, he's up to at least 244 and needs to get 26 more. 

a. Georgia plus North Carolina  

b. Georgia OR North Carolina plus Nevada AND Arizona.

If Trump wins any two of the Blue Wall states and one of them is Pennsylvania then he's up to at least 248 and needs to get 22 more. 

a. Georgia and North Carolina

b. Georgia or North Carolina plus Arizona or Nevada.

If Trump wins Pennsylvania and Michigan but not Wisconsin, then he's up to at least 253 and needs to get 17 more. 

a. Georgia or North Carolina plus Arizona or Nevada.

b. Arizona and Nevada.

If Trump wins All  Three of the Rust Belt states, he's up to at least 263 and needs to get 7 more. 

a. Any of the four southern swing states would probably work. House of Representatives. Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia or Arizona would give him a clean win. Nevada would make it a 269 to 269 tie, which means that Trump probably gets elected president by the House of Representatives*. 

We're Doing this, America. We're Doing This Again.

 

The first debate of the 2024 general election is tonight. This is very early for a general election debate but this debate is important because we are likely to only get one more after tonight. 

It's also important because I think tonight will be the night that the average American finally accepts the fact that this election will be between the same two guys as last time. So I want to get a few thoughts out there.

1. Expectations.

The first debate is always bad for the incumbent. Trump got his ass kicked. Obama got his ass kicked. W got his ass kicked. GHW Bush came in third. Reagan did so poorly that concerns about his age came back out in the public. Only Bill Clinton held his own. Nixon didn't do any debates.

My explanation for this is that sitting presidents are not used to being on a stage with someone who must be treated as an equal. They are to used to having people defer to them and it disorients them when an opponent pushes back on everything they say.

But tonight might be different. For one thing, these are both men who have been president. And for another, Donald Trump lives in a bubble of ass-kissing sycophants way bigger than the West Wing of the White House.  Biden also has the advantage of not being crazy.

The Republicans have spent four years telling their voters that Joe Biden is a drooling moron. About a week ago they realized this was a mistake and have since been speculating that Biden will be hyped on something or other. (Some say Gatorade, other say prescription drugs. I wish I was making this up but we really do live in a very dumb time.

Biden does have to avoid looking old. He will probably have at least one moment where he looks confused or uses the wrong name, gets a fact wrong or maybe embellishes the truth a little. That's not great. But the guy at the other podium will be ranting and swearing and lying.

II. Questions That Should Be Asked.

1. To Donald Trump, "Who won the 2020 election for president?" Joe Biden's response better begin with something like, "He's not man enough to admit he lost."

2. To Joe Biden, "Should voters have any cause for concern related to your age and physical health. (Biden will have some canned line ready for this but it's a valid question. I'd like both of them to have to answer it.)

3. To Joe Biden, "Tell the American people why withdrawing from Afghanistan benefitted them."

I could do an hour on this. Joe only needs to do a minute and a half.

4. To Donald Trump. "You are awfully fond of Vladimir Putin,  the House of Saud, Xi Jinping and Kim Jung Un. Do you believe it is important for America to promote democracy abroad?"

5. To Joe Biden. "Do you regret any of  the policy choices you made that led to the high inflation we experienced in 2022 and 2023?"

6. To Donald Trump, "One third of American women now live in states with total or near-total bans on abortion. This is because three of your appointees voted to overturn Roe vs. Wade. Do you think that was good for America?"

7. For both of them. "Why do you think tariffs on imports are a good idea? Why do both of you think that your tariffs work but the other guy's don't?

I'd also like to see them have to answer some of the questions for the naturalized citizenship test, but that's a bit too much to ask for.

III. The Response.

Hopefully Biden has a good night like he did on the State of the Union. Hopefully he avoids losing his cool at the loser eight feet away from him. Hopefully he smiles and looks up beat. Hopefully the American people remember how crazy and unpleasant Donald Trump is.

But both sides will declare victory. That's how they do. And if the polls are bad for Trump, he'll roll out his VP announcement to change the subject. 

 

2024 Begins (Iowa Caucuses)

 Tonight some modest number of Iowans will brave sub zero temperatures and lumber their way to fire houses and gymnasiums to begin the formal process of picking the 2024 Republican presidential nominee. His name is Donald Trump.

But four other bozos are trying to upset him. So let's play along. Here is my official prediction for tonight:

      Trump 53%

      Haley 21%

      DeSantis 20%

      Ramaswamy: 5%

      Hutchinson: 1%.

So there will be something to watch for tonight-the battle for second place. If DeSantis doesn't win second, he will have to give some consideration to dropping out. But I suspect he will stay around for awhile. Hutchinson will probably drop out tonight. Ramaswamy has nothing better to do with his time.

So what happens next?

New Hampshire, of course. There have been some polls that showed NH being more competitive than Iowa. If you squint, you can convince yourself that Nikki Haley will make it close. Maybe only lose by ten points. New Hampshire does have a history of rejecting Iowa's winner. And there will be some number of Democrats who choose to vote for her since the Democratic primary is not sanctioned by the party and Joe Biden isn't even on the ballot there.

 But Trump's going to win. Probably by closer to 20 points than to ten.

Then the race turns to South Carolina. Nikki MUST win there to even pretend she can beat Trump. If she loses her home state, (and I expect she will), then she'll be out of the race promptly.

In a normal year, there wouldn't be any candidates left to run against Trump. But, this year, there's this other thing.

This Other Thing.

Donald Trump is facing four separate criminal trials: one in New York that no one cares about, one in Florida that the judge is set on delaying as much as possible, one in Georgia that is complicated by the number of co-defendants and one in Washington DC that is set to being on March 4th.

I think there's a chance that one or more Republicans will stay in the race even after getting drubbed in the early primaries because they will know that chaos is likely to come and they will want to grab as many delegates as possible before that happens.

Trump is desperate to get this trial delayed. And he might succeed. But I think it will go, if not on March 4th than sometime before May. If that trial goes, he is very likely to be convicted of at least one felony. That would normally get him him thrown of the Republican ticket but the Republican party in 2024 is anything but normal. Trump will appeal his conviction and cry foul, as he always does when he faces a setback. By April 2nd, more than 3/4 of the delegates will have been awarded but a conviction would leave at least some doubt on the identity of the nominee. 

One or the other-an acquittal or a persistent march through to the required delegate number, Donald Trump will be the nominee. He will not get out of the race gracefully. He controls the party apparatus thoroughly enough he will ward off any legal or technical challenges.

I suspect that no later than June 1st, the world will realize that Donald J. Trump will be the Republican nominee for President on Election Day, 2024. 

Meanwhile....

Meanwhile Joe Biden will safely, surely move his way through the primaries. Dean Phillips might do some numbers in New Hampshire, since Biden's name isn't on the ballot. But that won't move the needle and Joe Biden will vacuum up most of the delegates elsewhere. By May, the electorate will finally accept what has been obvious to anyone since November of 2020-Joe Biden will be the Democratic Nominee for President in 2024.

He certainly deserves to be. He has been a great president, both domestically and on foreign policy. He got important and productive legislation passed at home. And he has stood for America's commitment to Democracy and our alliances abroad. It's been over two years since an American service member lost their life in foreign combat. But NATO is stronger than ever. Russia looks week and despite some caterwauling from the Tiktokigentsia, he made the right decision to support Israel's right to defend itself against the brutality unleashed by Hamas on October 7th.

And oh yeah, a year ago most economists thought we would be in a recession by now. We ain't. In fact, the economy is growing great, job growth has been incredible and real wages are up. If this is news to you, you need better news sources. Because the media narrative has been quite different and the zeitgeist of the electorate seems to be "Economy Good when Gas Prices Low" which is exceptionally stupid.

The General.

Biden's success does not assure him of an easy election. His age is a negative. The public is weary of the situations in Ukraine and Israel. Many voters are not sophisticated enough to understand that Biden's policies have been principled and productive. They just want the world to be safe and normal, as long as it doesn't cost them anything to achieve that.

But sometime this summer, or early fall, the American people will realize that they have only two choices for President. I expect that gradual realization to favor Joe Biden. Because the other choice is a raging doofus. For all the talk of Joe Biden's age, Donald Trump seems to be older, more frail and in generally bad health. He's also nuts. Like, really, really nuts. Talk to the Pepsi machine at the laundromat nuts.

That doesn't mean he can't win. In fact he has a plan to do just that. His job is to convince people that every problem in the world is Joe Biden's fault. His biggest assets are the migrants who are showing up at the border every day and being promptly bussed to cities that Trump wants to make look bad. Those cities are legitimately straining at the burden. I doubt that House Republicans will agree to any package of compromises that allow improvement in this situation. (To be clear, yes I believe the Republican party is intentionally setting out to let many thousands of poor people make their way to this country so they can be dumped out on the street and make Joe Biden look bad. If this works, the first people to suffer will be those very unfortunates who are currently being used as pawns in this game.)

This Shit Can Work.

Four Years Ago when I did my first post about that election, I declared the race a dead heat. I said Biden lead in 268 electoral votes and Trump in 260. My best guess was that Wisconsin would determine the winner. That was before COVID-19. By April I said that Biden was the modest favorite to win. 

That's about where I am right now. It's customary to say something about "if the election were held today." But the election is not being held today or a week from now. A large swathe of the electorate still thinks that a bunch of farmers in Iowa tonight and another bunch of Boston suburbanites will get together this month to hand them choice more palatable than Biden and Trump. But that will not happen.

Both parties are sticking with their choice from last time. Neither party thinks that is ideal, but both think it is better than the alternatives. For Democrats, they have to run on Biden's record. Not nominating him would make that suspect. And incumbency is powerful while competitive primaries are usually fatal for the incumbent party. For Republicans, the majority of their membership simply love Trump for what he represents a rich guy who is proud of his own ignorance. He also gives legitimacy to their prejudices and simplistic solutions.

This campaign will be ugly. Trump will try to make Americans afraid of immigrants and foreign allies and taxes and math. Biden will beat the drums of abortion rights, prosperity and the importance of remaining committed to democracy here and abroad.

Biden is vulnerable, as is every incumbent to world events. A terrorist attack, a disruption of shipping lanes or a huge setback in Ukraine would make him look weak and his foreign policy look like a failure.

I'll do my first official forecast after the first few primaries. But if I had to bet right now, Biden will win the popular vote by three or four points. I don't see him expanding the electoral map. Maine's 2nd congressional district and North Carolina are his only really plausible pickup opportunities. He very well could love Georgia and/or Arizona. Some think Nevada will go red, but I think Trump's negatives will keep that home. Let's say Biden 293, Trump 245. 

The General Election Gets Underway to Great Stability (The Road to 270, Take 8)

My last Road to 270 post is only six days old. It was written at the tail end of a brief spate of polls that showed some signs of hope for Donald Trump. Less than a week later, his convention ripple has flattened. 

Joe Bid leads the Real Clar Politics average by 7.1 points and the FiveThirtyEight polling average by 7.5 points. He has a clear lead in almost every true swing state.  In Nate Silver's model only one state is categorized as a "toss-up", which means neither candidate has a greater than 55% chance of winning.  That state is North Carolina. Mr. Silver's forecast has Joe Biden winning North Carolina 53% of the time.  The second closest race is Ohio, which Trump is currently winning in 57% of simulations.

A lot of the concern about Biden's momentum was based on a stutter-step in the 538 model.  When Trump got the slightly more favorable post-convention bounces, Biden's chances of winning dipped below 70% for a time, which changed the characterization of the race from "Biden Favored to Win" to "Biden Slightly Favored to Win."

A few days ago Nate tweeted out an important explanation of how his model works.  His mode factors time remaining quite heavily.  Polls a few months out are subject to a lot of change, and Nate balances those out by considering previous voting behavior and partisan fundamentals in each state. If you click on his Wisconsin forecast, you learn that "Right now, 56% of the forecast for North Carolina is based on polls and 44% relies on factors like demographics and past voting patterns." As the election gets closer, the polls will count more and the other factors less.  Silver summarized this effect by saying that if the election were being held that day, Biden would be about a 90% favorite to win.

So the difference between the Economist's bullish forecast and Nate's more guarded forecast is time.  As a general principal, I tend to favor Nate's logic.  But you do have to consider the specifics of this election.  A lot can go wrong in eight weeks, but Trump's biggest obstacle seems to be that the American people have firmly fixed views of him, and they tend to be negative. 

Trump will get over 40% of the vote. He might get over 45%. Because the electoral college structurally favors Republicans, that might be enough for him to win.  But so far he has tried several approaches to attacking Biden and none of them have worked. I simply do not think that he's going to be able to make up for his three years and eights months of shitty, incompetent, and corrupt governance. Trump will fight hard and he will fight dirty. But he is a the under dog, and for very good reason.

The only real news this week was that Trump's campaign may be having financial troubles.  Biden raised $364 million dollars in August.  That is more than Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump combined to raise in August 2016.  Trump has not yet released his number for August.

I think some of the reporting on his cash woes is a bit overstated. I do not think he will have any trouble being on the air waves in the closing weeks of the election. But big Republican donors can read polls too. If they think Trump can't win, they may start diverting funds to important Senate races.

I revise my forecast slightly by giving Biden an 85% chance of winning. That is up from 83% last week and back to where I had it 3 weeks ago.  My prediction remains Biden 334, Trump 204 in the Electoral College. Nothing I have seen recently has convinced me that a single state has changed. 

I think Biden will sweep the Big 3 Rust Belt states that swung the election last time (WI, MI and PA). I also think he will win Arizona and Nebraska's 2nd congressional district. I remain cautiously optimistic that he will win Florida and I favor him slightly in North Carolina.  

The states to watch for an expanded map are, in order, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio and Texas. For now, I assume Trump will sweep them.

Forecast	Current %	Current EVs	Previous	Changes
Spider Stumbled	85.00%	334-204	83/334	Biden up 2% probability
JHK Forecasts	77.40%	334-204	79.7/335	Biden down 2% and ME-1 to Trump
270towin.com	N/a	278-169-91	278-169-91	None
Predicitit.com	57.80%	319-219	55.3/319	Biden up 2.5% probability.
Sabato Crystal Ball	N/a	268-204-66	268-204-66	None
The Economist	84.00%	335-203	84%/352	None
FiveThirtyEight	72.00%	334-204	70%/319	Biden up 2%, NC to Biden

Faint Signs of a Bounce (The Road to 270, Take 7)

This post is a day late and it will also be very brief. Since the Republican convention ended, the mood in the media has been an anxious anticipation of a tightening race. But 5 days after the Republican convention ended, we are seeing only a modest bounce for the incumbent. Biden's lead in the Real Clear Politics polling average dipped from 7.8 points to 6.2 points. It currently stands at 6.5. And Biden's chances in Nate Silver's forecast dropped slightly from a high of 73% down to 68%. It currently sits at 70%. Trump has gotten a couple fo decent polls. One poll of Michigan by a Republican pollster had him up by two. And a national poll conducted by Emerson right after the convention showed Biden's lead down to two. But the cross-tabs on that poll showed some screwy results, like Biden winning the suburbs but losing the cities. More importantly, Morning consult released a new round of battle groun polling yesterday tha showed Biden up in every swing state except North Carolina, where he was two points behind. The only state that showed significant movement was Arizona, where Biden's lead went up to 10 points. Two new national polls are out this morning, showing Joe Biden up by seven and eight points, respectively. So with both conventions behind us and Labor Day upon us, Joe Biden maintains a clear lead in national polls. He also has the upper hand in the electoral college and just announced a massive haul of $300 million dollars raised in August. His campaign is doing great. The biggest news fo the week might be that Donald Trump has embraced the notion that recent violence in Kenosha and Portland is a harbinger of things to come in Joe Biden's America. It has apparently not occurred to him or his senior staff that these events have happened in Donald Trump's America. No matter. If this gambit was going to work, we would be seeing more movement in his direction. There will be a flurry of polls in the next week or so. But for now, I remain confident that Biden is the heavy favorite. And I'm not sure what moves Trump can pull to change that dynamic. 

I. The Forecasts. I'm shaving one point of my forecast. I now give Biden and 83% chance of winning. I'm not flipping any states, so my official forecast is still Biden 319, Trump 219. Here is a look at how others see it:

II. The Paths. As the election gets in full swing, I thought it might be helpful to write a bit about what the most important states mean to the Biden campaign.

 

a. The Straightest Line. Hillary Clinton won 232 electoral votes. Her closest path to victory would have been to carry Pennsylvania (20), Michigan (16) and Wisconsin (11). Those three states would have gotten her to 278, but she lost each of them by less than one point. So the most obvious path for Biden is to do one point better in each of those states. 

But if something goes wrong, here is how he can make it up by winning something in the sun belt. 

b. The make-ups. 

If Biden loses Wisconsin (or Minnesota) he can make up for it by winning AZ, NC or FL.

If Biden loses Wisconsin AND Minnesota he needs to win FL or AZ AND NC. 

If Biden loses Wisconin (or Minnesota) and Michigan, he needs to win FL or AZ and NC. 

If Biden loses Michigan, he needs to win AZ, NC or FL. 

If Biden loses Michigan and Wisconin (or Minnesota), he needs to win any 2 among NC, AZ and FL. 

If Biden loses Michigan and Pennsylvania, he needs to win FL or NC AND AZ. 

If Biden loses Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, he wold need to win FL plus NC or AZ. 

c. The quirks. 

For all of the above scenarios, GA could do the job of NC. I think Biden is more likely to win NC, but this could be a year that rearranges some things. Also must note that NH could throw a monkey wrench in some of these secnarios, but it's only 4 electoral votes and I think Biden will do well there.

A Lot Has Happened But Nothing Has Changed. (The Road to 270, Take 6)

The election is 10 weeks from today. It has been exactly 30 days since my last forecast. In those 30 days, the Joe Biden selected kamala Harris as his running mate and the Democrats held their modified mostly vitual convention from a small arena adjacent to a minor league baseball stadium in Wilmington, Delaware. Both Senator Harris and the convention have been well-received. The polls have been pretty steady. Biden's average in the "poll of polls" has been somewhere between seven and nine for most of the summer. At the moment it's about eight. The Republican convention started last night to decidenly mixed reviews. The early speakers were Nikki Haley and Tim Scott, who got mostly good reviews but the night ended with bizarre speeches by both Donald Trump Junior and his girlfriend, who appeared not to notice that she was addressing an empty room. For reasons unkown to this correspondent, they both finished their speeches several minutes faster than planned, leaving seven minutes of dead air time for the networks to fill with pundits desperately trying not to speculate about what caused that. The other item of interest to readers of this blog that happened since our last forecast is that Nate Silver finally published his forecast. The headline is that he gave Biden a 71% chance of winning, the exact same percentage that he gave Hillary of winning going into Election Day 2016. But I hvae to mention that the new website is an ugly, awful mess. The graphics are busy and stupid. It is difficult to get important information such as what polls have been added to the forecase recently. I'm still not sure why he took so long to publish, but we can safely rule out a desire to improve the viewing experience of his audience. I. My Forecast. I have not changes to announce. My previsou forecast had Biden at 334 and Trump at 204. I see no reason to change that. Last week I was wavering on putting North Carolina in Trump's column but we have seen gotten two polls that show Biden up by 4 and 3 points, respectively. That race will be close but Biden is the narrow favorite for now. II. Other Forecasts. Now that Nate Silver has joined the fray, I think we can make a chart to track where everyone stands.

With 70 days to go, there is something of a consensus-Biden is the favorite. He will probably win with a state or two to spare but things could get close. I am having a hard time seeing Trump make up all that ground though. The American people know him and they don't like him. The message of the Democratic convention was both straight-foward and true-the President is an asshole and maybe that shouldn't be so. The Republican convention seems to be a mixture of scaring people into thinking that their way of life is imperiled and that only Donald Trump can save them. That would have a lot more plausibility if we weren't still living in a pandemic as the rest of the world gets back to normal. Trump has a big enough base that he won't be blown out like McGovern or Mondale. He should even avoid Duakakis like numbers. I intend to update this blog every Tuesday between now and November 3rd. At some point, things will probably be close than they are right now. Maybe Biden will have a bad debate. Maybe the deaths from and new cases of COVID-19 will plummet enough to create a sense of relief. But it sure seems more likely that we'll thrash about with something like a 50 to 42 split for most of the coming months.

Being the Story of the Worst Person in the World and the Time He Spent Working for Donald Trump

The below post is a review of "The Room Where it Happened" by former National Security Advisor John Bolton.

I struggled with how to rate this book. It contains important historical information. The writing style is vintage prep school/Ivy league. It is unadorned with digressions or excessive color. No infinitives are split and ending a sentence with a proposition is a a proposition up with which he will not put. 

But he's also a raging asshole. The books contains no grace notes. He rarely credits anyone with any good ideas or for being helpful to him in carrying out his duties. There is not a whiff of humanity on display here. If you think I'm exaggerating consider that he at one point complains that former Chief of Staff John Kelly spent too much time visiting the grave of his son at Arlington National Cemetery. 

The details of daily life in Trump world are about what you expect. The President is a deeply unserious person, filled with personal rage and unable of paying attention to any subject more complex than a personal insult or longer than a matchbook. Whenever the subject of Iran comes up, he goes on a tirade about wanting to prosecute John Kerry for talking to the Iranians. Whenever the subject of Afghanistan comes up, he rails about how corrupt the president of Afghanistan is. Small problem there-the stories he tells are about Hamid Karzai who was has not been president of Afghanistan since 2014. 

But we already know what an ignorant buffoon the author's former boss is. What he can't help revealing is what a malevolent, remorseless prick he himself is. At one point he describes the night that Donald Trump reversed a decision to strike targets in Iran because the lawyers told him it could cause as many as 150 human deaths. (The mission was to avenge the loss of an unmanned drone over the Persian Gulf.) Bolton counters that the more accurate number was probably closer to 100 because one of the 3 proposed targets would probably not be located in time. He describes Trump's decision to back down thusly, "In my government experience, this was the most irrational thing I ever witnessed any President do."

There is one slightly juvenile joy in this book. Bolton delights in shitting on the other members of Trump's inner circle. His criticisms of Nikki Haley wreak of sexism, but then again maybe she is a shallow egotist obsessed with her own political future. His treatment of Kelly and Jim Mattis are down right insulting. He is slightly ambivalent about Pompeo but ultimately throws him under the bus too. The only public figure that avoids Bolton's insults is Mike Pence. Some of that is probably genuine. Pence appears to at least be an adult and to have had some modest success in counseling against Trump's very worst instincts. But I suspect he real reason for this is much more base. John Bolton probably figures Pence is likely to be the Republican nominee next time around. And like any shallow egoist, he is a little too mindful of his own political future. 

The Epilogue is 12 page whine about why he was right not to testify in Trump's impeachment. His reasons for this decision are too stupid to detail but the short version is this-he didn't want to weaken the Executive branch. Because deep down, John Bolton is an authoritarian. He just was not happy about how reluctant the current authoritarian was to use military force.

For four years, I have tried to think of circumstances in which I might vote for Donald Trump. That has not been an easy answer. But I now have one that is easy to spot-I would vote for Donald Trump if the other candidate was John Bolton.

Just Kidding-The Road to 538, Just for Fun-Take Two.

I realized after my last post that JHK forecasts also ranks the contests by likelihood of outcome.  So I checked my rankings against their more sophisticated forecast and not surprisingly, there was a lot of similarity.

They are a little more confident than me that Biden will win Florida and (to a lesser extent) North Carolina.  I make him the modest favorite in both places but they are pretty bullish on him, especially in Florida. They give him an 82.8% chance of winning there. The scars of 2000, 2016 and especially 2018 make it impossible for me to go much higher than 60%.

Their forecast also gives Biden a shot in Alaska.  He is the heavy underdog there but at 10.7%, they give him odds roughly equal to picking a correct digit at random.  I don't see it happening for him. LBJ in 1964 is the only Democrat to ever win Alaska. And Trump's foolish drilling policies are popular there.

Here is the chart for comparison.I had to estimate their odds for some of the congressional district races in Maine and Nebraska.

Jurisdiction	Electoral Votes	Running Tally	JHK Chances of Biden Win
DC	3	3	100
Delaware	3	6	100
New York	29	35	100
California	55	90	100
Hawaii	4	94	100
Vermont	3	97	100
Massachusetts	11	108	100
Connecticut	7	115	99.9
Maryland	10	125	100
Illinois	20	145	99.9
New Jersey	14	159	100
Washington	12	171	100
Oregon	7	178	99.6
Rhode Island	4	182	100
Virginia	13	195	97.2
Colorado	9	204	96.6
New Mexico	5	209	99.4
Maine 1st CD	1	210	100
Maine	2	212	95.5
Minnesota	10	222	93.2
Nevada	6	228	90.1
New Hampshire	4	232	88.5
Michigan	16	248	92.7
Pennsylvania	20	268	87.9
Wisconsin	10	278	82.1
Arizona	11	289	73.3
Florida	29	318	82.8
North Carolina	15	333	75.1
Nebraska 2nd Cd	1	334	63 (Estimate)
Iowa	6	340	53.2
Georgia	16	356	51.9
Ohio	18	374	47.4
Maine 2nd CD	1	375	50 (Estimate)
Texas	38	413	30
Montana	3	416	5.2
South Carolina	9	425	6.8
Missouri	10	436	3.7
Indiana	11	446	4.1
Alaska	3	449	10.7
Mississippi	6	455	2.8
Kansas	6	461	1.8
Nebraska	2	463	0.2
Nebraska 3rd CD	1	464	0
Nebraska 1st CD	1	465	0
Tennessee	11	476	0.1
Louisiana	8	484	1
South Dakota	3	487	0.1
Utah	6	493	0.1
Alabama	9	502	0
Kentucky	8	510	0
Oklahoma	7	517	0
Arkansas	6	523	0
Idaho	4	527	0
North Dakota	3	530	0
Wyoming	3	533	0
West Virginia	5	538	0