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Political Predictions 2016
The hangovers should be wearing off or at least minimized with some comfort food. The 2015 reviews are in and they aren’t good, but that’s okay. God gave us a great big windshield and tiny rearview mirror.
It is time for political predictions and wagering is encouraged.
Every quadrennial election is the most important and/or pivotal in our nation’s history. That trend continues in this new year.
Ricochet is at its best when everyone participates and adds new categories, but we need a starting point. Please offer your predictions of the following and feel free to include a brief (brief: men’s underwear or less than 10,000 words — I am looking at you Ryan M, James Madison, and James of England) narrative supporting your positions.
Republican Primary: Who is the nominee and how do they get there? Bonus points for predicting a running mate.
Democrat Primary: Who is the nominee and how do they get there? Bonus points for predicting a running mate.
General Election: Who wins. Any surprises in the swing states?
Senate: Do Republicans retain a majority? The map is stacked against them this year. If you predict a Republican President does he or she have coattails? Bonus points: if Republicans retain the Senate do they increase their margin or does it dip slightly?
House of Representatives: I’ve not seen any plausible scenarios that this goes back to the Democrats, but feel free to prove that conventional wisdom incorrect. Do Republicans increase their margin?
Published in Politics
Anyone who had any participation in the G.W. Bush administration working on the budget will have a hard time getting support from a fiscal conservative/Tea Party/limited gov’t type.
That is a very bold prediction.
I don’t understand why conservatives stay home if Cruz or Rubio lead the ticket.
I live near one of the leftie hotbeds in NC (Chapel Hill/Carrboro). In 2008 a gringa “Hispanic Rights Activist” bragged [on the radio!] that she had helped (I think) 16 illegals to register to vote, allowing them to use her home address as theirs, and vouching that they had lived there more than 30 days. At that time, citizenship could be simply asserted. I don’t know if that’s still true.
NC is not The South for those purposes. Obama won North Carolina in 2008.
A dagger plunged far deep, young James…
I wish we talked more about this.
On a summer day I (Piers J. Plowman) beheld a vision of “a field full of folk,” but since the room looked pretty much like the above L.J. Jordaan cartoon from the end of WWII, but with updated cultural references, when I awoke, I wouldn’t put a whole lot of store in it.
Republican Primary: Following a series of hot flashes followed by “yeah, buts…” (he looks like a penguin, he’s in the back pocket of Big Sugar, she went to Stanford yet her notion of a proper dessert wine is simply outre , etc.) and frequent squirrel sightings, the convention deadlocks. Rick Perry emerges on the 47th ballot. Everyone says, “At this point he’s the only person in the Republican Party I don’t actively hate, despise, loath, or fear. And frankly, I’m very tired.” Some Cassandra (possibly George Will) notes everyone says exactly this and cites The Manchurian Candidate, but TOO LATE, and besides…Cassandra. Ted Cruz is the running mate. Because you can’t have too many people from Texas on the ticket. And “Let’s Just Start Over” becomes the campaign slogan (narrowly besting “Git R Done”–intractable copyright problems). The punditry resigns en masse to begin books on H. L. Mencken or the new electoral paradigm with titles like 17th and Walking Backwards: the New Key to Electoral Victory and Lose to Win: So That’s What Jeb! Meant.
All further prediction is superfluous for the Golden Age is upon us.
Anyone who can scream “Kill gringos” in better Mexican peasant Spanish than Rubio and Cruz can speak.
Establishment Derangement Syndrome.
Thanks CT. I still don’t understand the term? Do I have EDS?
When you hear the name “Mitch McConnell” do you find yourself wanting an F-14 with air-to-ground loadout and enough range to reach DC?
Yes
Do you consider beating the GOP Establishment to be a higher priority than beating the Democrats?
Do you think “The Establishment hates him” is, by itself, sufficient reason to support a candidate?
And, at the risk of beating the proverbial dead horse, do you think a guy with a 97% ACU rating is “center-left” solely because the Establishment likes him?
It is hard to tell the difference between the two other than they serve different donor constituencies neither of which includes me.
Both wish to grow the federal government, just at different rates and in different directions. Both think they are more effective managers of a debt funded welfare state.
Both disregard our posterity in favor of spending lust today.
Never given it much thought. I have considered who might be the best candidate to stop the Congressional Republican agenda such as the recent spendingpalooza. Ted Cruz has some credibility.
I’ve not considered the idea of “The Establishment hates him”
These rating systems are worthless. Similar to Grover Norquist and his infamous tax pledge.
The system can be gamed as evidenced by Cruz and Rubio and recent votes on farm subsidies. Quoting these bogus ratings is really just an admission of a citizen unwilling to do the homework required to hold their elected legislators accountable.
Republicans— Cruz takes IA, Trump takes NH, and then despite Trey Gowdy’s tireless campaigning for Rubio, Trump edges Cruz in SC. Christie, Bush, & Kasich drop out after SC and (mostly/ kinda) support Rubio but the voters select Donald Trump*. The press is certain that he’s going to pick Cruz for VP but, after Tim Scott, Mike Lee, Rick Perry, Scott Walker, Jim Webb and several others are rumored to be the pick Trump selects Sen. Jeff Sessions. The campaign theme is “Make America Great Again” sub theme: “Good Jobs for Americans!”
Democrats— Clinton wins the primaries handily but exits the race in July due to “health reasons” leaving a wide open D convention. Biden prevails on the 6th ballot and names Token Whocares as his running mate. The Biden/Whocares campaign theme is: “Relax, I Got This” The subtheme is: “Make Whocares the first _____ VP in US history!”
General Election— Landslide Trump/ Sessions. All swing states go R and they also pick up Michigan. Biden concedes at 8PM ET. The press writes thousands of what-coulda-been stories about their lost Hillary presidency and thousands more about how Joe didn’t get enough time to sell himself to the people. The Clintons divorce and ask the press to respect their privacy. The press complies.
House/ Senate— Republicans keep control but lose 1 Senate seat while gaining 4 seats in the House.
* Virtue signal: I am not a Trump supporter, just predicting.
A lot of predictions of Hillary experiencing health issues and leaving the race late in the game. Very intriguing.
A lot of wishful thinking. Hillary isn’t quitting the race unless she’s dead… and she probably has a contingency plan for that case, too.
Picture it as two firsts. She will be the first woman president, even if she’s also the first posthumous one.
This has always been my thinking as well. She will die before she steps aside.
What is interesting is if her health really did become an issue before the election. There aren’t any old wise people of the democrat party to tell her to step aside.
Well, for my part, I mean that’s what they’ll say is the reason. It might well be that their internal polling shows her getting shellacked by double digits plus. As with all things Clinton, we’ll not really know the truth.
I agree.
However, if their internal polling shows her getting shellacked. Who is their go-to alternative? Biden maybe?
Of course she has health issues now. Some documented, many rumored. But who in the Democrat Party would tell her to quit? There is no authority in the D party higher than her.
FIFY
On the 6th ballot according to…me.
It would take at least three more concussions to get her past Biden-level brain damage.
This is where I start asking questions about Obama and some of his extra Constitutional motives that gets shut down by the RicochetPTB.
Joe gives that comment 2 Thumbs Up!
No offense to Texans, but there are enough Texans of sound political persuasion that any time spent analyzing the Texas vote in the general election is time that could be better spent looking for the deeper meaning in a Trump or Cruz speech.
Thanks to the electoral college, if Trump stays in the race until New Hampshire, an third party run would essentially be write in only (he could run in a few states if he was quick after dropping out after NH, but he would be very unlikely to make a difference through them).
Obviously, as Nader showed us, a 2% vote share can make a big difference. Charles Aldrich (Libertarian) got 0.5% in the Minnesota Senate election in 2008, which turned out to be more than enough to get Al Franken into the Senate and Obamacare into law. Donald Trump in the general election debates would be a wild card, to put it mildly.
A month ago, Trump leaving and running third party would have been game over for us, an epic disaster for the party and the country, with Clinton winning the White House, the Senate, and the House. We’d have lost gubernatorial races, which just shouldn’t happen. Now, Trump could still lose us the election, but he’d just be one factor among many.