Charles Hugh Smith – Based on this analytic structure, Trump may not just win the election in November–he might win by a landslide.
If we believe the mainstream media and the Establishment it protects and promotes, Trump has no chance of winning the presidential election. For starters, Trump supporters are all Confederate-flag waving hillbillies, bigots, fascists and misogynists. In other words, “good people” can’t possibly vote for Trump.
Even cartoon character Mike Doonesbury is fleeing to Vancouver to escape Trumpism. (Memo to the Doonesbury family: selling your Seattle home will barely net the down payment on a decent crib in Vancouver.)
For another, Trump alienates the entire planet every time he speaks.
The list goes on, of course, continuing with his lack of qualifications.
But suppose this election isn’t about Trump or Hillary at all. Suppose, as political scientists Allan J. Lichtman and Ken DeCell claimed in their 1988 book, Thirteen Keys to the Presidency, that all presidential elections from 1860 to the present are referendums on the sitting president and his party?
If the public views the sitting president’s second term favorably, the candidate from his party will win the election. If the public views the sitting president’s second term unfavorably, the candidate from the other party will win the election.
(Lichtman published another book on his system in 2008, The Keys to the White House: A Surefire Guide to Predicting the Next President.)
Author/historian Robert W. Merry sorts through the 13 analytic keys in the current issue of The American Conservative magazine and concludes they “could pose bad news for Clinton.”
If five or fewer are negative for the incumbent, the incumbent party will win the election. If six or more are negative, the incumbent party loses the election. Merry counts eight negatives for President Obama’s second term, which if true spells defeat for the Clinton ticket.
Whether the 13 issues are positive or negative for the candidates is of course open to debate, but consider what it means that Trump won the Republican nomination despite the near-universal opposition of the Establishment.
Consider that some polls found that 68 percent of adults think the country is on the wrong track and a recent average of six polls on the subject concluded that 64% of adults feel the nation is moving in the wrong direction.
This means 2/3 of the nation’s adults no longer buy into the Establishment/ mainstream media’s narrative that the economy is expanding nicely, things are going in the right direction and Hillary Clinton has a lock on the presidency.
Merry scored the economy as a positive for the incumbent party, but based on the public’s view of where the nation is heading, I suspect the reality that the economy is weakening rapidly can no longer be hidden from the voting public. If we score the economy as a negative, that’s nine negative keys for the incumbent party, well above the six minimum.
Based on this analytic structure, Trump may not just win the election in November–he might win by a landslide–with landslide usually being defined by an overwhelming advantage in electoral college votes or 60% of the popular vote.
As improbable as this may seem at the moment, consider the improbability of Trump capturing the Republican nomination. Consider the nature of Clinton’s support: a mile wide (encompassing the entire Establishment) but only an inch deep.
If the mainstream media has failed to persuade the American public that everything’s going in the right direction, why should anyone remain confident that they can persuade the American pubic that Hillary will be their president come heck or high water?
As I have noted before, there are very few ways left to stick your thumb in the eye of the elitist, predatory, self-serving Establishment that won’t get you tossed in prison other than voting against their candidate, which in this election is Hillary Clinton.
Memo to Clinton supporters: if you want to persuade the American public the nation is going in the right direction, you’ll have to actually change the direction rather than just promise more of the same.
C H Smith “My new book is #9 on Kindle short reads -> politics and social science: Why Our Status Quo Failed and Is Beyond Reform ($3.95 Kindle ebook, $8.95 print edition)For more, please visit the book’s website.”
Charles Hugh Smith is a Contributing Writer for Shift Frequency
SF Source Of Two Minds August 2016
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There are many ANTI-ESTABLISHMENT posts on this blog. That is as it has always been. Trump happens to be the Voice of the Anti-Establishment at this time. When Bernie was running, his anti-establishment concerns were posted.
And yes, I AM making a concerted effort to CORRECT THE RECORD that is very SKEWED in the mainstream media concerning Trump and his candidacy. That is what ALTERNATIVE MEDIA is all about.
I’m starting to find these observations from this writer to be a little naive. Why is it so difficult for Americans to understand their presidential voting system has been compromised for at least twenty years? John Kerry, Al Gore…the list of people who inexplicably surrendered the presidency in “close calls” or the like is a matter of record. It’s fixed.
Charles Hugh Smith is among the LEAST NAIVE of writers included on this blog. The internal polls – not the bought-and-paid for trash that appears on the mainstream LYING media – do not in any way reflect the poll results manipulated at the sampling level to favor Hillary Clinton. Some mainstream polls have as many as 65% Democrats to 35% Republicans and Unaffiliated in their 1,000 person samples.
As for the rigging. It’s very real. However, this election cycle – for the first time in the last 20 years Americans do have a chance to pick among candidates in which only ONE – Hillary Clinton – represents the status quo. The Republican neo-con status quo are all voting for Clinton. Never before have leading lights of EITHER party repudiated their party to PUBLICLY favor the other side. That permits thinking individuals to realize the hidden Globalists are not controlling both sides of the electorate in THIS American election. That is certainly NOT the case of elections – stolen and otherwise – over the past 20 years.
Americans can choose between the Status Quo and the Unknown – between NWO global control and retreat inside the American borders to fix NATIONAL concerns like employment, infrastructure, healthcare in this upcoming election cycle. If they choose not to vote that is certainly their right. However, based on the numbers registering for the first time to participate in this election (not ALL of whom are illegal aliens) it would seem that the American people ARE choosing to have a voice in who leads this nation.
They know the only way to overcome the rigging is with a landslide.