Election Prediction Update

Nothing much has changed.

I’m working my way through a book of essays by Adolph Reed, Jr. and Walter Benn Michaels, hoping to figure out how to approach the topic of ascriptive identity. Ascriptive (or ascribed) status is a longstanding social science concept that distinguishes between status based on characteristics thought to be inherent, and status that is achieved or earned. An obvious example is whether a culture chooses leaders by birthright (ascribed) or by some form of merit selection (achieved). Social scientists now talk about variations such as ascriptive identity, and even self-ascription. I feel confident this exercise will yield some useful insight, but it hasn’t quite gelled yet.

At the beginning of one chapter, Reed quotes an insightful press report:

A Harvard University study of more than 2,500 middle-income African-american families found that, when compared to other ethnic groups in the same income bracket, blacks were up to 23 percent more likely. “our data would seem to discredit the notion that black Americans are less likely”, said head researcher Russel Waterstone, noting the study also found that women of Africa descent were no more or less prone than Latinas. “In fact, over the past several decades, we’ve seen the African-American community nearly triple in probability”. The study noted that, furthermore, Asian-Americans.

The Onion, 30 November 2010, quoted in Michaels & Reed, No Politics But Class Politics at 75 (Eris Press 2022). Notably, the exclusion of punctuation from within the quotation marks appears to be an idiosyncracy introduced by Reed or his editors. The punctuation in the original Onion article is “normal,” or should I say normative.

Since I don’t have anything more useful than that, I thought it might be a good time for an update on my U.S. presidential election prediction made back in January. At that time I predicted:

1. If one of the two factions of the legacy uniparty replaces its doddering old fool at the top of the ticket, that party will win.

2. If neither faction replaces its doddering old fool and a third party candidate meets certain viability criteria, the third party candidate will win.

3. If neither faction replaces its doddering old fool and no viable third party candidate emerges, then Trump will win.

4. If both factions replace their doddering old fools, then I don’t know who will win.

I see no reason to change my predictions at this time, and I still think number one is most likely. Both candidates are looking significantly worse than they did six months ago. Although the opportunities to replace a candidate by any legitimate process have mostly passed, I don’t think either faction of the legacy uniparty gives a fig about legitimacy. Either Joe Biden or Donald Trump is probably going to disappear from the stage, whether by natural causes or otherwise. But I don’t think both factions will replace their candidates—America is just not that lucky anymore.

By the way, I do not think it matters at all who replaces Biden or Trump. Even if it is a total non-entity like Kamala Harris, I think she will win just because she is not Biden or Trump.

I do think the chances of a viable third party candidate emerging have gone way down. Kennedy is flaming out because he’s just as genocidal as the uniparty candidates and he seems to be running a pure ego campaign with no attempt to define whose votes he is going after. No Labels has quit, and nobody else is going to meet the criteria I specified in January.