Allan Lichtman: President Trump Will Lose

[lpetrich]

Opinion | Allan Lichtman Predicted Trump's Win in 2016. Now He's Ready to Call 2020. - The New York Times

Allan Lichtman has some criteria which he calls "The Keys to the White House"

In 1981, he met a Russian, Vladimir Keilis-Borok, an expert on earthquake prediction. VKB proposed using his prediction expertise to predict the outcomes of US Presidential elections, with the analogy of an earthquake being like a change in power. AL thought that VKB was nuts at first, but he then went along.

They then looked at Presidential elections since 1860, and they came up with 13 keys:

• Political Keys
  • 1. Incumbent-Party Mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U. S. House of Representatives than it did after the previous midterm elections.
  • 2. Nomination Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent-party nomination.
  • 3. Incumbency: The incumbent-party candidate is the sitting president.
  • 4. Third Party: There is no significant third-party or independent campaign.
• Performance Keys
  • 5. Short-term Economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
  • 6. Long-term Economy: Real annual per-capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.
  • 7. Policy Change: The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.
  • 8. Social Unrest: There is no sustained social unrest during the term.
  • 9. Scandal: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.
  • 10. Foreign or Military Failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
  • 11. Foreign or Military Success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
• Personality Keys
  • 12. Incumbent Charisma: The incumbent-party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.
  • 13. Challenger Charisma: The challenging-party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.

A candidate must have at most five false keys to be (re-)elected.

AL correctly predicted 1984, 1988, 1992, and 1996. The popular-vote winner in 2000 (the first popular-electoral divergence since 1888). 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016.

AL's theory is that a Presidential election is essentially a referendrum on the previous President's performance, including the same President if he is running for re-election.

 

[lpetrich]

The keys for this election:

• Political Keys
  • 1. Incumbent-Party Mandate (gain in House in midterms): False.
  • 2. Nomination Contest (none): True.
  • 3. Incumbency: True.
  • 4. Third Party (no such challenger): True.
• Performance Keys
  • 5. Short-term Economy (good): False.
  • 6. Long-term Economy (good): False.
  • 7. Policy Change: True.
  • 8. Social Unrest (none): False.
  • 9. Scandal (none): False.
  • 10. Foreign or Military Failure (none): True.
  • 11. Foreign or Military Success: False.
• Personality Keys
  • 12. Incumbent Charisma: False.
  • 13. Challenger Charisma (lack of it): True.

True: 6, False: 7

Prediction: Trump will lose.

 

[lpetrich]

Trump is headed for a win, says professor who has predicted 30 years of presidential outcomes correctly - The Washington Post

The keys for the 2016 election:

• Political Keys
  • 1. Incumbent-Party Mandate (gain in House in midterms): False.
  • 2. Nomination Contest (none): True.
  • 3. Incumbency: False.
  • 4. Third Party (no such challenger): True.
• Performance Keys
  • 5. Short-term Economy (good): True.
  • 6. Long-term Economy (good): True.
  • 7. Policy Change: False.
  • 8. Social Unrest (none): True.
  • 9. Scandal (none): True.
  • 10. Foreign or Military Failure (none): True.
  • 11. Foreign or Military Success: False.
• Personality Keys
  • 12. Incumbent Charisma: False.
  • 13. Challenger Charisma (lack of it): True.

True: 8, False: 5

One more key and the Democrats are down, and we have the Gary Johnson Key. One of my keys would be that the party in power gets a "false" if a third-party candidate is anticipated to get 5 percent of the vote or more. In his highest polling, Gary Johnson is at about 12 to 14 percent. My rule is that you cut it in half. That would mean that he gets six to seven, and that would be the sixth and final key against the Democrats.

AL noted that Trump is a very unusual sort of President:

Donald Trump has made this the most difficult election to assess since 1984. We have never before seen a candidate like Donald Trump, and Donald Trump may well break patterns of history that have held since 1860.

We've never before seen a candidate who's spent his life enriching himself at the expense of others. He's the first candidate in our history to be a serial fabricator, making up things as he goes along. Even when he tells the truth, such as, "Barack Obama really was born in the U.S.," he adds two lines, that Hillary Clinton started the birther movement, and that he finished it, even though when Barack Obama put out his birth certificate, he didn't believe it. We've never had a candidate before who not just once, but twice in a thinly disguised way, has incited violence against an opponent. We've never had a candidate before who's invited a hostile foreign power to meddle in American elections. We've never had a candidate before who's threatened to start a war by blowing ships out of the water in the Persian Gulf if they come too close to us. We've never had a candidate before who has embraced as a role model a murderous, hostile foreign dictator. Given all of these exceptions that Donald Trump represents, he may well shatter patterns of history that have held for more than 150 years, lose this election even if the historical circumstances favor it.

He is also unusual in being very low on the Big Five personality trait of  Conscientiousness Conscientiousness | Psychology Today - most Presidents have been high in that trait, something typical of people with academic and/or career success.

 

[lpetrich]

AL continues:

I think the fact that he's a bit of a maverick, and nobody knows where he stands on policy, because he's constantly shifting. I defy anyone to say what his immigration policy is, what his policy is on banning Muslims, or whoever, from entering the United States, that's certainly a factor. But it's more his history in Trump University, the Trump Institute, his bankruptcies, the charitable foundation, of enriching himself at the expense of others, and all of the lies and dangerous things he's said in this campaign, that could make him a precedent-shattering candidate.

He also says that he doesn't use polls in his predictions. He concluded by saying that predictions are not endorsements.

I have his book, and I'll be extracting the numbers from it and running my own data analyses. Can one predict margins of victory?

 

[Harry Bosch]

Opinion | Allan Lichtman Predicted Trump's Win in 2016. Now He's Ready to Call 2020. - The New York Times

Allan Lichtman has some criteria which he calls "The Keys to the White House"

In 1981, he met a Russian, Vladimir Keilis-Borok, an expert on earthquake prediction. VKB proposed using his prediction expertise to predict the outcomes of US Presidential elections, with the analogy of an earthquake being like a change in power. AL thought that VKB was nuts at first, but he then went along.

They then looked at Presidential elections since 1860, and they came up with 13 keys:

• Political Keys
  • 1. Incumbent-Party Mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U. S. House of Representatives than it did after the previous midterm elections.
  • 2. Nomination Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent-party nomination.
  • 3. Incumbency: The incumbent-party candidate is the sitting president.
  • 4. Third Party: There is no significant third-party or independent campaign.
• Performance Keys
  • 5. Short-term Economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
  • 6. Long-term Economy: Real annual per-capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.
  • 7. Policy Change: The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.
  • 8. Social Unrest: There is no sustained social unrest during the term.
  • 9. Scandal: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.
  • 10. Foreign or Military Failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
  • 11. Foreign or Military Success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
• Personality Keys
  • 12. Incumbent Charisma: The incumbent-party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.
  • 13. Challenger Charisma: The challenging-party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.

A candidate must have at most five false keys to be (re-)elected.

AL correctly predicted 1984, 1988, 1992, and 1996. The popular-vote winner in 2000 (the first popular-electoral divergence since 1888). 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016.

AL's theory is that a Presidential election is essentially a referendrum on the previous President's performance, including the same President if he is running for re-election.

It's fool's gold. Here's the problem, democrats are losers. We are the larger party, by substantial numbers. And yet republicans beat us over and over again. Democrats celebrate when they beat other democrats in primary's. Republicans celebrate when they beat democrats in races.

 

[Jarhyn]

Opinion | Allan Lichtman Predicted Trump's Win in 2016. Now He's Ready to Call 2020. - The New York Times

Allan Lichtman has some criteria which he calls "The Keys to the White House"

In 1981, he met a Russian, Vladimir Keilis-Borok, an expert on earthquake prediction. VKB proposed using his prediction expertise to predict the outcomes of US Presidential elections, with the analogy of an earthquake being like a change in power. AL thought that VKB was nuts at first, but he then went along.

They then looked at Presidential elections since 1860, and they came up with 13 keys:

• Political Keys
  • 1. Incumbent-Party Mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U. S. House of Representatives than it did after the previous midterm elections.
  • 2. Nomination Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent-party nomination.
  • 3. Incumbency: The incumbent-party candidate is the sitting president.
  • 4. Third Party: There is no significant third-party or independent campaign.
• Performance Keys
  • 5. Short-term Economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
  • 6. Long-term Economy: Real annual per-capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.
  • 7. Policy Change: The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.
  • 8. Social Unrest: There is no sustained social unrest during the term.
  • 9. Scandal: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.
  • 10. Foreign or Military Failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
  • 11. Foreign or Military Success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
• Personality Keys
  • 12. Incumbent Charisma: The incumbent-party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.
  • 13. Challenger Charisma: The challenging-party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.

A candidate must have at most five false keys to be (re-)elected.

AL correctly predicted 1984, 1988, 1992, and 1996. The popular-vote winner in 2000 (the first popular-electoral divergence since 1888). 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016.

AL's theory is that a Presidential election is essentially a referendrum on the previous President's performance, including the same President if he is running for re-election.

It's fool's gold. Here's the problem, democrats are losers. We are the larger party, by substantial numbers. And yet republicans beat us over and over again. Democrats celebrate when they beat other democrats in primary's. Republicans celebrate when they beat democrats in races.

This is fucking stupid. Not celebrating the movement of the party towards a more modern point of view is what allowed the republicans to become what they are in the first place, a party living in the past unable to cycle out worn down, obsolete, broken, and corrupted parts.

The democrats absolutely can and should do both, improving themselves, AND standing against the GOP in the general.

 

[Harry Bosch]

Opinion | Allan Lichtman Predicted Trump's Win in 2016. Now He's Ready to Call 2020. - The New York Times

Allan Lichtman has some criteria which he calls "The Keys to the White House"

In 1981, he met a Russian, Vladimir Keilis-Borok, an expert on earthquake prediction. VKB proposed using his prediction expertise to predict the outcomes of US Presidential elections, with the analogy of an earthquake being like a change in power. AL thought that VKB was nuts at first, but he then went along.

They then looked at Presidential elections since 1860, and they came up with 13 keys:

• Political Keys
  • 1. Incumbent-Party Mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U. S. House of Representatives than it did after the previous midterm elections.
  • 2. Nomination Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent-party nomination.
  • 3. Incumbency: The incumbent-party candidate is the sitting president.
  • 4. Third Party: There is no significant third-party or independent campaign.
• Performance Keys
  • 5. Short-term Economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
  • 6. Long-term Economy: Real annual per-capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.
  • 7. Policy Change: The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.
  • 8. Social Unrest: There is no sustained social unrest during the term.
  • 9. Scandal: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.
  • 10. Foreign or Military Failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
  • 11. Foreign or Military Success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
• Personality Keys
  • 12. Incumbent Charisma: The incumbent-party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.
  • 13. Challenger Charisma: The challenging-party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.

A candidate must have at most five false keys to be (re-)elected.

AL correctly predicted 1984, 1988, 1992, and 1996. The popular-vote winner in 2000 (the first popular-electoral divergence since 1888). 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016.

AL's theory is that a Presidential election is essentially a referendrum on the previous President's performance, including the same President if he is running for re-election.

It's fool's gold. Here's the problem, democrats are losers. We are the larger party, by substantial numbers. And yet republicans beat us over and over again. Democrats celebrate when they beat other democrats in primary's. Republicans celebrate when they beat democrats in races.

This is fucking stupid. Not celebrating the movement of the party towards a more modern point of view is what allowed the republicans to become what they are in the first place, a party living in the past unable to cycle out worn down, obsolete, broken, and corrupted parts.

The democrats absolutely can and should do both, improving themselves, AND standing against the GOP in the general.

Moving a party in a direction dosn't mean jack shit if you can't win the election. Again, this is one of the differences between the left and the right. The left celebrates beating the left; the right wants to win the election.

 

[lpetrich]

I'm now reading Allan Lichtman's keys book, and I am working on improving his analysis. In particular, I note that all of AL's parameter values are binary. Some of them were originally continuous quantities, like margin of victory, and I am now collecting them. I have already done that for margins of victory, third-party fractions, and Congressional party composition, and I have started on Presidential-candidate nominating conventions.

I used  Party divisions of United States Congresses for party fractions, and I've composed this list of major parties over time:
[TABLE="class: grid"]
[TR]
[TD]Fm
[/TD]
[TD]To
[/TD]
[TD]Party 1
[/TD]
[TD]Party 2
[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1788
[/TD]
[TD]1794
[/TD]
[TD]Anti-Administration
[/TD]
[TD]Pro-Administration
[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1794
[/TD]
[TD]1824
[/TD]
[TD]Democratic-Republican
[/TD]
[TD]Federalist
[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1824
[/TD]
[TD]1836
[/TD]
[TD]Jacksonian
[/TD]
[TD]Anti-Jackson
[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1836
[/TD]
[TD]1854
[/TD]
[TD]Democratic
[/TD]
[TD]Whig
[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1854
[/TD]
[TD]1856
[/TD]
[TD]Democratic
[/TD]
[TD]Opposition
[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1856
[/TD]
[TD]now
[/TD]
[TD]Democratic
[/TD]
[TD]Republican
[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]
There is approximate continuity over time for both parties, especially the first one.