Have your Predictions Lauged at in JUST THREE YEARS! 2012 Predictions

[pbrower2a]

 
Obama/ Biden vs. Huckabee/ Gingrich

Obama wins about 56% of the vote with a 62% approval rating.

Huckabee does better than any other imaginable GOP nominee and holds onto the Inner South because of his cultural ties to an area of comparative homogeneity. Romney won't run with him, and he picks Gingrich to offset his "hick" image by adding a right-wing intellectual to his ticket.  He picks up nothing that McCain didn't win in 2008. He still loses neighboring Missouri... and Obama picks up West Virginia because his infrastructure projects are good for coal (big input into steel production).  Arizona? No surprise as Huckabee has no ties. Texas is really close due to demographic change. Obama picks up Montana and the Dakotas.

Huckabee of course does badly in the northern US  -- and Utah shows the folly of offending the LDS church through Huckabee's offensive statements that appear heavily on Utah television -- and Gingrich's family life. In an election in which Utah doesn't matter much, the Mormons teach Americans a lesson  -- don't offend Mormon sensibilities and expect to win the state even if you are a conservative Republican.   

[pbrower2a]

Sarah Palin wins in 2012? Not with the pathological family, and not with the same level of rhetorical inanity.

If Californians are moving to Arizona, then that would make Arizona much more likely to vote for Obama.

[pbrower2a]

Ok, I'll do this:

Barack Obama/Joe Biden(D) vs Sarah Palin/Mike Pence(R)

President Obama's approval ratings are in the mid fourties, the economy is unchanged, to a little worse. The Republican Party has rebuilt on the back of grassroots started by the "Tea Parties". In 2010 Republicans net gained two Senate Seats and 5 Governor's seat.

Even if the economy stabilizes at a lower level than it was in November 2008, such will be a boon to Obama. That implies that the Dubya-era meltdown is over and people are making genuine progress. People will by then recognize that the illusion of prosperity under Dubya was exactly that, and they will still hate him and distrust the GOP so long as it fails to distance itself from him.

"Tea parties"? FoX Propaganda Channel played them up, overstating their significance and the size of participation. Those will get smaller and less relevant every time.

[pbrower2a]

Some GOP Senate seats are extremely vulnerable in 2010 -- open seats in Ohio, Florida, and  New Hampshire, and seats held by Bunning (KY), Vitter (LA), Burr (NC) and Thune (SD). Bunning isn't up to the job anymore, Vitter has a sex scandal, and Burr and Thune have shaky seats in a year in which the GOP is still in trouble.  The Democrats in obvious trouble are Burris (IL -- tied to a disgraced ex-Governor) and Bennet (CO). Another imaginable GOP pickup in the Senate is WV -- should Robert Byrd die before November 2010.

One worth noting: should Sarah Palin try to win a Senate seat from an incumbent Republican Senator -- consider the folly -- then Ms. Murkowski might pull an Arlen Specter on the GOP. 

[pbrower2a]

Some GOP Senate seats are extremely vulnerable in 2010 -- open seats in Ohio, Florida, and  New Hampshire, and seats held by Bunning (KY), Vitter (LA), Burr (NC) and Thune (SD). Bunning isn't up to the job anymore, Vitter has a sex scandal, and Burr and Thune have shaky seats in a year in which the GOP is still in trouble.  The Democrats in obvious trouble are Burris (IL -- tied to a disgraced ex-Governor) and Bennet (CO). Another imaginable GOP pickup in the Senate is WV -- should Robert Byrd die before November 2010.

There is still over a year left until the 2010 election, that is like 10 years in politics. If you remember up until the end of September the 2008 Presidential election was very close and just over night Obama's numbers jumped up and stayed that way. So anything can happen. And to think that they will just make you plain stupid.

Wow! Ill need to talk about several years, so be patient.

Some things are just more possible than others. The GOP made gains in the Senate in 2004 that will be vulnerable in 2010. Several states are likely to be less R in 2010 than they were in 2004 -- and that suggests vulnerability for some incumbents and difficulties for some Republicans running for open seats. America has changed significantly in its politics since 2004. This time as many Democratic seats up for re-election as Republican seats -- largely because Obama, Biden, and Clinton are no longer Senators. Two of those abandoned seats look safe under almost any circumstances. The third depends upon when and if Roland Burris does the honorable thing. That's nothing that I would bet on if I were a gambler.

2012? Obama will have to fail badly as President. That will take a Hoover-like economic meltdown or some diplomatic or military catastrophe. Such is possible, but no more likely for him than anyone else. So far he seems a very slick, flexible, and cautious politician -- which implies that he won't likely commit to a catastrophe on what he alone thinks some high principle. Random chance (Democrats will finally have more Senate seats to defend than will Republicans) alone suggests that the Republicans will have a good opportunity to pick up some Senate seats through random chance alone in 2012. Obama could then win a landslide victory while the Republicans finally pick up a Senate seat or two.

To be sure, standards of success may be higher in 2012 than in 2004, the last time that an incumbent President ran for re-election. That Dubya got away with a superficially-mediocre Presidency that had huge hidden damage undermining American prosperity due to economic folly in 2004 hardly suggests that Obama can get away with what Dubya did. Times are now more obviously dangerous than they were in 2004. It's just as well that the political standards will be higher in 2012 than in they were 2004. But that applies just as well to the Republicans as to the Democrats.  That is a wash.

So how does Obama have a successful Presidency?

1.  Do nothing stupid in foreign affairs. There will be enough dangers. 

2.  Don't promote any new speculative boom. It just won't work this time.

3.  Establish some appropriate reforms.

4.  Don't add new taxes or increase old ones unless they come with compensating services.

5.  Don't cheat on Michelle, especially with a white woman.
 

[pbrower2a]

Sarah Palin wins in 2012? Not with the pathological family, and not with the same level of rhetorical inanity.

If Californians are moving to Arizona, then that would make Arizona much more likely to vote for Obama.

Except if they are fleeing conservatives, which they have tended to be in the past.

Such explained Colorado during the last twenty years -- until the kids became liberals and large numbers of Hispanics moved in. Politically, Arizona is most similar to Nevada and Colorado.  More significant is that young Hispanics started voting.

John McCain won Arizona by less than the usual margin (10-15% that one usually expects for a Favorite Son), and even in a 50-50 split of the vote, Arizona would be a swing state in 2012. If you wish to see what the effect of a Favorite Son is, then look at South Dakota in 1972 (McGovern still lost) to North Dakota and Nebraska.

[pbrower2a]

Obama/Biden vs. Romney/Thune:

(Different color scheme -- but justified):

deep red        Obama/Biden    win 10% or more
medium red    Obama/Biden    win 5%-9.9%
pink                Obama/Biden    win under 5%
pale blue        Romney/Thune  win under 5%
medium blue  Romney/Thune  win 5-9.9%
deep blue      Romney/Thune   win over 10%

Popular vote: 52-47.

Romney fares consistently better than McCain did in the North and West (except Arizona) -- but only enough better to pick up Indiana and NE-02. Obama fares far better in the South than he did in 2008, picking up a bunch of states that he lost badly in 2008 due to economic performance. Romney fares about the same as McCain did in popular votes but much worse in electoral votes. 

[pbrower2a]

Obama/Biden vs. Huckabee/???:

(Same scheme as in the Obama/Romney projection):

deep red        Obama/Biden    win 10% or more
medium red    Obama/Biden    win 5%-9.9%
pink                Obama/Biden    win under 5%
pale blue        Huckabee/???  win under 5%
medium blue  Huckabee/???  win 5-9.9%
deep blue      Huckabee/???   win over 10%

Popular vote: 52-47.

With the same level of popular vote, Huckabee does better than Romney in picking up electoral votes because he can reach southern Whites -- only to be clobbered even harder Up North and in the West, which won't matter much. Political culture matters greatly for a challenger -- and the pale blue color for Utah shows that he had better make up with the LDS if he wants to avoid bad news from Utah. Obama picks up MT, ND, MO, AZ, WV, and NE-01; the Dakotas are the two closest states .

     

[pbrower2a]

Obama VS Generic Republican

If Obama's ratings are over 50%.

No way does Obama lose Minnesota if he wins Iowa by a huge margin. Minnesota is about D+7; Iowa is about D+3.

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Same warning, but add Wisconsin.

[pbrower2a]

This is not my prediction, but it is where things start from.

Some blogger who did some poll-watching with an algorithm, someone capable of assessing the bias in polling and did a good job of predicting the 2008 election, uses a system similar to mine. Someone at www.fivethirtyeight.com has combined multiple polls, election results, and the national trend to show how "Election June 2009" would go:   

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(Note well: anything not in any shade of blue gives Obama a positive rating, the lowest of which is 50.0% in Louisiana). Even those in pink look as if Obama would get 55% or more of the vote based on approval ratings alone, which implies that he would win them by double-digit margins. Really, anything in gray or the medium shade of blue, including --

T-E-X-A-S !

should be considered a toss-up for now.

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Key (different from the one you expect from me, but for approval ratings):

Near-black 70% or more
Deep red: 65-69.99%
Medium red: 60-64.9%
Pink 55-59.9%
Gray 50-54.9%
Blue 45-45.9%
Deep blue  44.9% or less

My new projection (I will add orange for states and in which Obama seems to have an approval rating above 52.5) based on Nate Silver (I can't copy his numbers, but I can put them in map form):   

Key:

GOP wins by 10% or more
GOP wins up to 9%

tossup -- Obama wins barely, if at all (under 5%)
Obama wins 5-9.9%
pink, red,  deep red, or near-black Obama wins by more than 10%


The near-black are DC, Hawaii, and Rhode Island, all hard to see. This looks like an electoral landslide similar to that of Eisenhower in 1956.