Alan Lictman Has Made His 2020 Presidential Prediction

[Me.]

“History professor Allan Lichtman is used to being right.

He has correctly predicted the winner of each presidential race since Ronald Reagan's reelection victory in 1984 using his "13 keys" system. (It's worth mentioning that in 2000, Lichtman predicted that Al Gore would win the election. Although Gore won the popular vote, he ultimately lost the presidency to George W. Bush after the Supreme Court ruled to stop the recount for Florida's electoral votes. Lichtman stands by validity of his prediction.)

Now, Lichtman and his "13 keys" are ready to call 2020.
In an interview with CNN, Lichtman was definitive in his answer: "The keys predict that Donald Trump will lose the White House this year."…

“When asked if the key model could account for something as cataclysmic as the Covid-19 pandemic, Lichtman remained confident. "Look, retrospectively and prospectively, the keys go all the way back to 1860. They are what we call a robust system. So, I don't fiddle with them. They've lasted through enormous changes in our politics, in our economy, in our democracy. Don't fiddle with the keys," he explained.”

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/07/us/allan-lichtman-trump-biden-2020-trnd/index.html

[mr_lebowski]

1. ohpleaseohpleaseohpleaseohplease ... nt

[underpants]

2. Saw him on Smerconish. It was a tease on his new book.

His 13 keys were listed and they were all bad for Trump by any measure.

[unblock]

4. Well not all the keys, but enough.

4 years ago litchman waited until the last minute to make his call, maybe it was just a day or two before the election. Some of the keys weren't obvious. I think at the time he gave Donnie the Challenger Charisma key, even though his appeal was (and remains) narrow. He doesn't get the Incumbent Charisma key this time.

He certainly gets the Incumbent key, and some others. No foreign policy/military debacle, because it's hard to call it a "failure" when he set about it deliberately. So he gets that key. And he changed policy, another key, even if all his changes were for the worse.

From a political perspective, he disastrous handling of the pandemic helps us immensely, basically giving us 3 keys: short term economy, long term economy, and protest.

Obviously the protests aren't aimed at his handling of the pandemic, but it's all related. It's a lot easier to protest when the failure-in-chief cost so many people their jobs gave them plenty of free time with which to protest....

In any event, it's pretty clear that the fundamentals are not looking good for keeping the status quo. That's why donnie is becoming desperate and trying to amp up the cheating.

[Awsi Dooger]

7. Subjective overload makes the concept a toss for me

The problem with this type of thing is they are desperate to make everything fit. Since it only happens every 4 years nobody is impressed with a 10-3 record, even though that type of percentage is phenomenal in any speculative venture.

The obsession to go back and "catch" every cycle as a winner leads to absurd backfit tinkering and ludicrous rationalization that one year the electoral college is the reference point, and another year the popular vote.

The other guy with the primary model has more sensible criteria. Anything like this should be math based. But he's another one who doesn't seem to have the patience for even a single defeat. If this one loses -- let's hope -- I'm sure he'll smother something to get rid of the Trump 2020 call and haul in another variable to catch Biden 2020 as winner.

[unblock]

13. Yeah, he lost a lot of points with me when he called it for Donnie in 2016

It stank of a media strategy rather than an objective political science assessment. He gave Donnie the charisma key even though he didn't have the broad appeal candidates needed to get that key in other elections.

That let him call it for Donnie, the long-shot candidate. This would make litchman a media darling when he was one of the very few modelers picking the unlikely winner. And if Hillary won, he'd still have a great record and could simply say he misjudged Donnie's charisma.

And yeah, as it turns out, he could have called it for Hillary and claimed victory anyway on the grounds that she won the popular vote.

I'd prefer if it just said some races are toss ups. Or, like you said, he just accepts that he got it wrong once or twice, no model is prefect. Obvious data mining fallacy to think past perfection makes future predictions perfect.

[RickGeneric]

3. Yes... but

The Dems need more passion. How many hand-painted signs for Biden have you seen in rural areas? (there are 1000s for Trump).

[LexVegas]

5. Bullshit. nt

[obamanut2012]

9. yawwwwwn

[lpbk2713]

11. You so funny.

[Awsi Dooger]

12. There would be more Biden signs minus the certainty of theft and property damage

That is not an exaggerated fear. Right wing nutcases are capable of anything. There are posters on Reddit who recount their Biden sign being stolen time and again. I have seen it in my neighborhood. Two Biden signs were each gone within two days.

I have a shirt that reads 864511320. I would have a Biden yard sign if right wingers were decent human beings.

[KS Toronado]

20. I like your numbers, needs to be on a T-shirt with BARS.

[DENVERPOPS]

26. Repubs

in our neighborhood and surrounding community USED TO send their teenagers out at night to steal the Dem yard signs.

Today is a different world, you can't count on them to just steal the sign, but do other things to your cars and property as well.

[Disaffected]

14. I haven't seen any either

But then, I don't live in the US so that might explain it.

[jaxexpat]

23. Yeah, with crayons.

[BannonsLiver]

25. Is this satire?

[Ohio Joe]

27. I've not seen a single hand painted sign in Colorado...

I've seen a handfull of 'Any Functioning Adult 2020' signs, and another handfull of 'Biden 2020' signs but that is it.

[brush]

6. Biden had more keys in his favor than trump, which is good...

but it wasn't a landslide so we have to keep working to get out the vote.

[Me.]

8. +

[unblock]

10. I'm a big fan of this model, even though it's a bit simplistic

I don't like that the keys can be a bit subjective (e.g., what exactly constitutes enough charisma or scandal or protest to win those keys) and some aren't timely (long term economy key might need economic data from after the election), and I think a binary true/false is overly simplistic.

Beyond that, it doesn't give a probability, it gives an outright pick, one or the other, which just can't be the right outcome of a model in a very close race that's basically a coin flip.

Having said all that, I really like that it focuses on fundamentals and tells us that the outcome is highly dependent on factors that can't easily be altered. People obsess over polls and veep choices and debate performances and so on and these things don't really matter; or at least, they don't have independent predictive power.

If the economy really sucks and people are in the streets protesting, and the incumbent doesn't have much charisma, but he does have scandals, and he hasn't had any major foreign policy/military victory, then people are going to vote for a change.

There's really not much Donnie can you to change these factors. That's why he's focused on cheating.

[James48]

15. I will continue to be concerned

Until Joe and ——- are sworn into office in January 2021.

Never never never let your guard down, even a little!

[Delphinus]

19. Yes.

We must continue to GOTV and register until we can't.

[CaptYossarian]

16. I'm anxious to know who's tlling Donald Deathtoll,

so we can add a murder charge to everything else.

Will Jared get the short straw? Stay tuned.

[James48]

17. Donald Deathtoll

OMG!

It fits so perfectly

[Sophiedillo]

18. That's great but...

Has he taken into account Trump's blatant cheating and Russia's intervention?

[Karadeniz]

21. He did say that there were a few unexpected events that could affect his system. I can't

Remember if cheating was one of them!

[Me.]

22. Not Sure To Which You Refer

"When asked if the key model could account for something as cataclysmic as the Covid-19 pandemic, Lichtman remained confident. "Look, retrospectively and prospectively, the keys go all the way back to 1860. They are what we call a robust system. So, I don't fiddle with them. They've lasted through enormous changes in our politics, in our economy, in our democracy. Don't fiddle with the keys," he explained."

[BannonsLiver]

24. Someone in another thread was trying to show off their self professed, fake expertise

They don’t know squat. I’ll stick with Lichtman

[Me.]

28. There's Always One

[BannonsLiver]

29. One?

This DU. We’re awash with Holiday Inn Express experts trying to play the big role, like they have some special insight.

[Me.]

30. You Got Me There

And boy are there some who like to play insider/big deal.