There Will Be a Debate?

Most readers will have heard by now that Joe Biden and Donald Trump have agreed to hold two presidential debates this year, in June and September. This is pretty big political news, obviously.

Truth be told, however, the site is still a one-man show right now, and that one man had a lot of things related to his job that needed to be accomplished Wednesday. We have a fair bit to say about this subject, and would rather do it right than do it quick. So, we will have the story, and our comments, tomorrow.

This delay does offer an opportunity, and that opportunity is to conduct an insta-poll of the readers. So, if you're interested in participating, here are the questions:

1. Which debate(s) do you expect to watch?
2. Which debate(s) do you expect to actually happen?
3. Do you think the debates will affect the election?
4. If so, which candidate is more likely to benefit from the debates?
5. Would you like to see Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on stage?
6. What is one question you would like to see asked of Trump?
7. What is one question you would like to see asked of Biden?

You can click here to answer; we have choices for the first five questions, while the final two are open-ended. Note also that all questions are optional; you can skip any you don't want to answer. If you plan to participate, please get your responses in by 9:00 p.m. PT. (Z)

LA-06 Is Back in Black

Meet the new map, same as the old map. That's two rock and roll references in the first 14 words of the item (including headline). Don't tell us this site has nothing for the kiddies. Anyhow, the district map saga in Louisiana has taken another turn, as the U.S. Supreme Court stayed a decision made a couple of weeks ago by a three-judge panel, thus restoring a district map that features two majority-Black districts (LA-02 and LA-06) instead of just one (LA-02). The reasoning in the Court's order was that it's too close to the elections to be swapping maps (this is known as the Purcell Principle).

The order was unsigned, but there were three dissents, so that means the vote was either 6-3, 5-3, 4-3 or 5-4. And if you endeavored to guess who the three dissenters were, you would almost certainly be wrong. In fact, the three dissenters were the three liberals. Associate Justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor did not explain themselves, and Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson only explained herself briefly, but apparently their concern is that they don't want to set a precedent that 6 months from an election is "too close." Given Louisiana's jungle-style approach, their primary is on Election Day, and Jackson, at least, thinks there was still time to address this situation and create a permanent resolution, as opposed to kicking the can down the road.

If you guessed that Louisiana Republicans were unhappy with the decision, well, you'd be wrong again. There was much praise from that side of the Bayou State aisle yesterday. The official reason is that the state needs plenty of time to get ballots right, and switching maps at a late date creates too much time pressure. Maybe that's true. Or maybe the LA GOP is happy about the same (potential) precedent that made Kagan, Sotomayor and Jackson unhappy. Or maybe it's that the guy who is likely to lose his seat is Rep. Garret Graves (R-LA). He's tight with Kevin McCarthy, which means he's not especially popular with Donald Trump or with Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA). Oh, and Graves has also butted heads with Gov. Jeff Landry (R-LA).

With the old map back in place, the favorite to win the seat is state Sen. Cleo Fields (D-LA), who served in Congress back in the 1990s. That said, there's still another month to get on the ballot, so more contenders could toss their hats into the ring. In any case, the Democrats' path to retaking the House just got a tiny bit easier. (Z)

Who's Gonna Win This Thing?, Part II: Keep an Eye on William Davis

Yesterday, we had "Who's Gonna Win This Thing?, Part I: The Siena Poll," in which we wrote that there's a lot of wonky stuff going on in the New York Times/Siena swing-state polls that are getting so much attention. We wrote, at that time, that we planned a couple of companion items today. That has now grown to "three companion items," courtesy of reader M.M. in San Diego, CA. This very item is the unplanned one, and while we were a little critical of the Times yesterday, today we give them credit for running a useful iteration of a fairly well-known polling experiment.

Here is the setup, which was executed not by The Times/Siena, but instead by The Times/Ipsos. They asked poll respondents two key questions (among a bunch of others). Here they are:

Long Question

Thinking about the presidential election in November, if the election were held today, whom would you vote for if the candidates were...

1. Joe Biden, the Democrat
2. Donald Trump, the Republican
3. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the third-party candidate
4. Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate
5. Lars Mapstead, the Libertarian Party candidate
6. William Davis, the third-party candidate

Short Question

Thinking about the presidential election in November, if the election were held today, whom would you vote for if the candidates were...

1. Joe Biden, the Democrat
2. Donald Trump, the Republican
3. Other (specify)

And now, here are the third-party results when the long question is asked first:

1. Kennedy: 7%
2. Mapstead: 2%
3. Stein: 1%
4. Davis: 1%

And here they are when the short question is asked first:

1. Kennedy: 13%
2. Stein: 3%
3. Mapstead: 1%
4. Davis: 1%

So, Kennedy picks up 6 points in the second condition, Stein picks up 2 and Mapstead loses 1.

The purpose of the experiment was to illustrate two well-known phenomena, and to gauge how much they might be influencing this year's polling numbers. First, when respondents are given only two choices at the outset (with many presumably disliking both), then 18% of those folks become "third-party voters" when given the longer list. But when respondents are given the longer list first, only 11% of them are "third-party voters." We put third-party voters in quotes, because history shows that many (in fact, most) people who say they are going to vote third party in May or June or July don't actually do so in November. The devotion of those 7% who are only third-party when the questions appear in a particular order has to be particularly suspect.

Second, you might be wondering why you haven't heard about this William Davis character, who seems to have the support of 1% of the electorate. You can be quite sure that 1% won't actually be voting for him, since he's not actually a candidate for president. No, he's an editor at the Times. Obviously, some respondents are currently in the "anyone but these guys" phase of the cycle. Now, is that 1% people who don't want ANY candidate or party they've heard of? Or is it more randomly distributed among all the third-party candidates? If it's the latter, it's possible that a meaningful chunk of Stein/Mapstead/Kennedy voters aren't really for those candidates at all.

Ultimately, the point here is that the numbers for Kennedy are wildly unreliable (and note this effect has shown up in many other polls this cycle that were not experiments; he always does better if he's in the second list than in the first). The numbers will get... somewhat better, but there's always some percentage of people who stick to their third-party guns until the very second they have to cast their ballots. The question is whether Kennedy will bleed support at the usual third-party rate, or at a lesser rate because he's a prominent name. (Z)

Who's Gonna Win This Thing?, Part III: A Poll Gone Mad

Here is a poll that really should knock your socks off. It's the latest from NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist, and it included asking whether Joe Biden or Donald Trump would do more in a second term to weaken democracy. Overall, it was a near tie between the two, as 46% of respondents said Biden would weaken democracy as opposed to 48% of respondents who said Trump would. Among independents, 53% said Biden would weaken democracy as compared to 42% for Trump.

Whoa! There is one candidate on the ballot this year who has done more to weaken democracy than, arguably, all of his predecessors combined. This candidate politicized the position of attorney general, tried to use foreign aid to advance his own personal goals, tried to overturn an election result and, oh yeah, fomented an insurrection at the Capitol. If he's reelected, he has plans to implement some variant of fascism, and he almost certainly will try not to leave office when his term is up. The other candidate is tied with roughly 40 of his predecessors, Democratic, Republican, Democratic-Republican and Whig, with a score of 0 on a scale of 0 to 10, when 0 is "tried their level best to honor the Constitution" and 10 is "Trump."

Although this is nominally a subjective judgment, it's certainly clear to us that there's an objectively right answer as to which candidate is far and away the less likely to weaken democracy. If you accept that premise, then here are some theories as to what might be going on:

1. Trump supporters are being oversampled
   
   
2. Jokesters/Saboteurs are being oversampled
   
   
3. People who represent themselves as independents, but are not, are being oversampled
   
   
4. That Fox propaganda is propagating (propagandating?) very widely
   
   
5. Some voters want to ban abortion so badly, they are willing to deep six democracy to do so
   
   
6. Because it's a squishy question, some respondents are adopting... unorthodox interpretations. For example, "Joe Biden supports Israel, so he's a threat to democracy."

Anyhow, it continues the theme of this mini-series: There is good reason to take current polling, regardless of what it says or who it favors, with multiple grains of salt. (Z)

Who's Gonna Win This Thing?, Part IV: Lichtman Makes His Pick

Allan Lichtman, who is in many ways the poor man's Nate Silver, has been predicting presidential outcomes since 1984. He's 9-for-10 in that time, and he's now tentatively made his 2024 pick: Joe Biden. Lichtman actually tipped his hand a couple of weeks ago, but he was the subject of a big piece this week by blogger Chris Cillizza, whose uncritical approach to politics got him canned by CNN. Thanks to the Cillizza piece, Lichtman got a lot of headlines in the last few days.

Lichtman's system, for those who are not familiar, involves 13 "keys" he's identified. If 6 or more of Lichtman's keys are "false" for the party that holds the White House, they will lose. If less than 6 keys are "false," the incumbent party wins. Here are the keys:

1. Party mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than after the previous midterm elections.
2. 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.
5. Short term economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
6. Long term economy: Real 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/military failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
11. Foreign/military success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
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.

Lichtman has 7 "trues" for Biden: 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 9, 13. He has two "falses": 1 and 12. And he has four undecided: 4, 8, 10, 11. While his "final" prediction won't be made until August, he says the odds of all four of those keys turning against Biden are small. If even one of them turns in his favor, then that's only five "false" keys and Biden wins, according to the system.

We've addressed this a bit in the Q&A, but we thought we would do it more fully here: We are not fans of Lichtman's system, for a number of reasons. To start, the questions are... imprecise. There's a lot of subjective judgment in there, since they rely on the meaning of phrases like "major changes" and "serious contest" and "significant third party." Also, there are too many things where the keys overlap. For example, the Middle East protests on campus—are those "social unrest," or are they a "foreign/military failure," or are they both?

In addition, the system is absolutely unable to predict the extent of a victory or loss. Looking backward, nine of the keys went against the Republicans in 1960, which is a high number and would seem to imply a blowout. And yet, it was one of the closest elections in history. To take another example, four keys went against the Republicans in both 1880 and 1924, which would seem to suggest similarly close outcomes. However, 1880 was decided by 0.9% of the vote and 59 EVs, while 1924 was decided by 25.2% and 246 EVs. If a system can't identify degrees of victory, that kind of suggests it's not measuring things very well. And that's before we get into the fact that applying subjective keys to an election after the results are already known can encourage squeezing the data to fit the narrative.

Most importantly, the thing that gets Lichtman so much press is that he called those 10 elections in advance with a 90% success rate. But, as we wrote a couple of weeks ago, that's not all that impressive. Consider:

• 1984: Lichtman picked Ronald Reagan, who won by 512 EVs
• 1988: Lichtman picked George H.W. Bush, who won by 315 EVs
• 1992: Lichtman picked Bill Clinton, who won by 202 EVs
• 1996: Lichtman picked Bill Clinton, who won by 220 EVs
• 2000: Lichtman picked Al Gore, who "lost" by 5 EVs
• 2004: Lichtman picked George W. Bush, who won by 35 EVs
• 2008: Lichtman picked Barack Obama, who won by 192 EVs
• 2012: Lichtman picked Barack Obama, who won by 126 EVs
• 2016: Lichtman picked Donald Trump, who won by 77 EVs
• 2020: Lichtman picked Joe Biden, who won by 74 EVs

Lichtman's batting average is being inflated quite a bit by blowouts. He's 3-1 in elections decided by fewer than 100 EVs, which isn't bad, but flipping a quarter would get you to 2-2, on average. And he's 1-1 in elections decided by fewer than 50 EVs, which is the exact same success rate as that quarter, on average.

We do like that Lichtman's approach emphasizes the importance of governance over campaigning (though it might go a little TOO far in that direction). Beyond that, however, his declaration that Biden is (tentatively) in the catbird seat in 2024? We just don't think it means very much. (Z)

Mitt Romney: Hey, Don't Forget I'm Tone Deaf, Too!

Before Gov. Kristi Noem (R-SD) was getting into hot water for her treatment of the family dog, Sen. Mitt Romney was getting into hot water for HIS treatment of the family dog. This is also the man who brought you such hits as "binders full of women" and "the 47%" and "Corporations are people, my friend." With such a tin ear, it's really remarkable he's had the political career he'd had. Guess family connections and money really do matter.

Yesterday, in the midst of his political swan song, Romney was at it yet again. Appearing on MSNBC, he declared that, "Had I been President Biden, when the Justice Department brought on indictments, I would have immediately pardoned [Donald Trump]." And why would Romney have done that? "Well, because it makes me, President Biden, the big guy and the person I pardoned a little guy."

It seems to us, given the Nixon precedent, that a pardon of Trump would have been a colossal mistake, serving to affirm that the president in general, and Trump in particular, need not concern themselves with adhering to the laws while they are in office (or after). Now, there are some counter-arguments that have some merit, like "Putting a former president on trial heightens tensions in the country." We don't buy those arguments, but they aren't completely crazy. On the other hand, sweeping aside the law and the justice system just to look like a big guy? To score some cheap PR points? That would be the kind of "let me focus on what's best for me, country and Constitution be damned" thinking that got Trump into trouble in the first place.

To this day, we still don't understand why Romney ran for the Senate in the first place. Clearly, he did not intend to stay around long enough to get any real power, since he's going to be one-term-and-out. And while he did oppose Trump on occasion, most obviously in the two impeachments, Romney did not use his platform in any meaningful way to rally the anti-Trump, old-school-GOP resistance (compare to Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger). What a disappointment Willard must be, to nearly everyone. (Z)

---

If you wish to contact us, please use one of these addresses. For the first two, please include your initials and city.

• questions@electoral-vote.com    For questions about politics, civics, history, etc. to be answered on a Saturday
• comments@electoral-vote.com   For "letters to the editor" for possible publication on a Sunday
• corrections@electoral-vote.com To tell us about typos or factual errors we should fix
• items@electoral-vote.com            For general suggestions, ideas, etc.

To download a poster about the site to hang up, please click here.

---

Email a link to a friend or share:

---The Votemaster and Zenger