Since we are heading into the big primary contests, I thought I'd post a few thoughts on Election 2008.
I will do this in a series of posts over the coming weeks to review the Presidential race and the races for House and Senate. Today's post is an examination of the general history of Presidential races and why the odds heavily favor the Democrats.
If we look at the history of elections from 1789 to present we find that there are eight instances of one party holding the White House for more than two terms in a row, mostly in the 19th century.
By contrast we have fourteen instances where there was either one or two term control. So just from the front, the historical trends favor a switch after 2 terms of one party.
If we then look at the examples of more than two terms of control we find that one or more of three conditions existed.
(1) One party was clearly the nationally dominant party. Examples of this were seen with the Republicans after the Civil War or the Democrats during the FDR era.
(2) The President after 2 terms was very popular. Examples of this were seen under Jackson, both Roosevelts and Reagan.
(3) There was some major national crisis. We saw this under FDR or during the Reconstruction period after the Civil War.
Looking to 2008, none of these conditions exist. The parties are pretty evenly divided, President Bush is not popular and there does not seem to be any 'keep the incumbent in' kind of crisis.
Another way of looking at things from a historical standpoint is to use the 'Keys to the White House'. The keys were developed by Allan Lichtman more than 25 years ago and have been very accurate in predicting nearly every election.
The basic premise is there are 11 key factors at play and when one party controls a majority, they win the White House.
The keys and the party controlling them shape out as follows.
1. Incumbent party mandate: Did the President's party win more seats that in the previous mid term election ?
Since the GOP did worse in 2006 than 2002, this favors the Democrats (1-0)
2. Nomination contest: There is no serious battle for the incumbent party nomination.
Since we have a number of GOP contenders and the race looks to go for a while, this favors the Democrats (2-0)
3. Incumbency: The incumbent is running for re-election.
Bush is not running, so this favors the Democrats (3-0).
4. There is no third party candidate.
We don't know this one yet, so call it a tie. Democrats lead 3-0-1.
5. Short term economy: There is no recession.
Between rising unemployment and the housng crunch this year does not look good and a regardless of where the numbers come in, most voters are likely to consider it a recession. Democrats now lead 4-0-1.
6. Long term economy: The economy during the last 4 years has grown as much or more than the economy during the prior 8 years (IE 2005-2009 versus 1997-2005).
This one is close, but given how 2008 looks and again taking into account public perception it goes against the GOP. They now lead 5-0-1.
7. Policy Change: The incumbent has made major changes in national policy.
This one is debatable, Bush has had some major setbacks in terms of Social Security reform but they did change Medicare significantly, so just to be fair I will give them this one. Democrats lead 5-1-1
8. Social unrest: There is no major social unrest.
This one is close given the harshness of modern politics, but compared to the 1960's we are pretty stable. Another point for the GOP but Democrats lead 5-2-1.
9. Scandal: There is no major scandal
I would argue that compared to some past scandals Bush himself has been largely untouched, but there is a lot of stink around him, so a point for the Democrats who lead 6-2-1.
10. Foreign Policy Failures: There have been no major failures in foreign or military policy.
Iraq obviously comes to mind and while arguably the jury is still out, public perception (which is after all the key to voter views) sides with the Democrats.
They now lead 7-2-1.
11. Foreign Policy Success: The opposite of #10 of course.
While Bush did pretty well in many ways after 9/11, I don't think you can give him this one. Democrats lead 8-2-1
12 and 13 deal with the relative charisma of the Incumbent and Challenger party candidates, which of course we don't know. However no republican looks to meet the Reagan/Clinton/JFK level so #12 goes against GOP. #13 could favor Dems if Obama wins but for now it is a tossup
Final score. Democrats win 9-2-2.
So setting aside completely the issues of Bush/Clinton/etc we find that the major historical trends which have held up for the last couple centuries strongly favor a win by the Democrats in the 2008 Presidential Race.
In my next post I will look at the odds on the Congressional races from a historical viewpoint.
Cross posted to Central Sanity
I will do this in a series of posts over the coming weeks to review the Presidential race and the races for House and Senate. Today's post is an examination of the general history of Presidential races and why the odds heavily favor the Democrats.
If we look at the history of elections from 1789 to present we find that there are eight instances of one party holding the White House for more than two terms in a row, mostly in the 19th century.
By contrast we have fourteen instances where there was either one or two term control. So just from the front, the historical trends favor a switch after 2 terms of one party.
If we then look at the examples of more than two terms of control we find that one or more of three conditions existed.
(1) One party was clearly the nationally dominant party. Examples of this were seen with the Republicans after the Civil War or the Democrats during the FDR era.
(2) The President after 2 terms was very popular. Examples of this were seen under Jackson, both Roosevelts and Reagan.
(3) There was some major national crisis. We saw this under FDR or during the Reconstruction period after the Civil War.
Looking to 2008, none of these conditions exist. The parties are pretty evenly divided, President Bush is not popular and there does not seem to be any 'keep the incumbent in' kind of crisis.
Another way of looking at things from a historical standpoint is to use the 'Keys to the White House'. The keys were developed by Allan Lichtman more than 25 years ago and have been very accurate in predicting nearly every election.
The basic premise is there are 11 key factors at play and when one party controls a majority, they win the White House.
The keys and the party controlling them shape out as follows.
1. Incumbent party mandate: Did the President's party win more seats that in the previous mid term election ?
Since the GOP did worse in 2006 than 2002, this favors the Democrats (1-0)
2. Nomination contest: There is no serious battle for the incumbent party nomination.
Since we have a number of GOP contenders and the race looks to go for a while, this favors the Democrats (2-0)
3. Incumbency: The incumbent is running for re-election.
Bush is not running, so this favors the Democrats (3-0).
4. There is no third party candidate.
We don't know this one yet, so call it a tie. Democrats lead 3-0-1.
5. Short term economy: There is no recession.
Between rising unemployment and the housng crunch this year does not look good and a regardless of where the numbers come in, most voters are likely to consider it a recession. Democrats now lead 4-0-1.
6. Long term economy: The economy during the last 4 years has grown as much or more than the economy during the prior 8 years (IE 2005-2009 versus 1997-2005).
This one is close, but given how 2008 looks and again taking into account public perception it goes against the GOP. They now lead 5-0-1.
7. Policy Change: The incumbent has made major changes in national policy.
This one is debatable, Bush has had some major setbacks in terms of Social Security reform but they did change Medicare significantly, so just to be fair I will give them this one. Democrats lead 5-1-1
8. Social unrest: There is no major social unrest.
This one is close given the harshness of modern politics, but compared to the 1960's we are pretty stable. Another point for the GOP but Democrats lead 5-2-1.
9. Scandal: There is no major scandal
I would argue that compared to some past scandals Bush himself has been largely untouched, but there is a lot of stink around him, so a point for the Democrats who lead 6-2-1.
10. Foreign Policy Failures: There have been no major failures in foreign or military policy.
Iraq obviously comes to mind and while arguably the jury is still out, public perception (which is after all the key to voter views) sides with the Democrats.
They now lead 7-2-1.
11. Foreign Policy Success: The opposite of #10 of course.
While Bush did pretty well in many ways after 9/11, I don't think you can give him this one. Democrats lead 8-2-1
12 and 13 deal with the relative charisma of the Incumbent and Challenger party candidates, which of course we don't know. However no republican looks to meet the Reagan/Clinton/JFK level so #12 goes against GOP. #13 could favor Dems if Obama wins but for now it is a tossup
Final score. Democrats win 9-2-2.
So setting aside completely the issues of Bush/Clinton/etc we find that the major historical trends which have held up for the last couple centuries strongly favor a win by the Democrats in the 2008 Presidential Race.
In my next post I will look at the odds on the Congressional races from a historical viewpoint.
Cross posted to Central Sanity
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