RadixJournal - Words, Words, Words

00:00:00.000 I think what we're going to see in two and a half weeks is the ultimate mixed bag of

00:00:09.200 a midterm because there are some countervailing forces that I think are going to cancel each

00:00:22.240 other out basically. And it's going to be really hard to come up with a firm narrative for the

00:00:31.420 midterms. One of the most interesting countervailing forces is just simply the psychological fact

00:00:41.140 that midterms usually go well for the party out of power. So this was actually the economist in the

00:00:50.800 40 midterm elections to have taken place since 1862. So they're going back to the Civil War.

00:00:57.840 The president's party has lost seats in the House of Representatives 36 times. So that is a remarkable 0.90

00:01:04.520 trend. And then you can even look in the modern political era post-FDR and 11 of the past the

00:01:14.800 13 presidents have suffered midterm losses two years after being elected. So there seems to be this

00:01:24.480 macro collective psychology to the stuff where two short years after a president is elected,

00:01:36.000 there's a hangover, people have buyer's remorse, et cetera. And they knock him out of power,

00:01:43.520 where they knock his party out of power rather in the Congress. And so I just think there is this

00:01:51.840 natural tendency that really is kind of irrational and is based on collective psychology, the madness of

00:02:00.920 crowds, you could say, that is pointing towards a GOP victory. And this certainly played a major role

00:02:08.340 in 2018 where we saw a huge wave election, one that was obscured a bit by the Senate, but was still

00:02:19.040 real and was a wave election very much like 2006, 2010, 1994, et cetera. And in some ways, even more powerful.

00:02:30.000 So there is this other factor that comes into play, which is the turning point or the inflection point

00:02:42.720 or the kind of major event where you might even be seeing a kind of realignment take place.

00:02:53.740 So in 1992, Bill Clinton won 75% of the non-college educated white vote. And by 2016, that had reversed.

00:03:10.340 Trump was winning 75% of that vote. And 1994, even though this trend, this like general realignment

00:03:20.080 was happening for a long time, it was even happening in the 70s. And you could certainly see it in the 1980s.

00:03:28.180 But by 1994, we just had this polarization where you had

00:03:34.380 recognizable red states and blue states.

00:03:39.320 And we'll shortly get to a point where Clinton and Al Gore will lose their home states in the presidential election,

00:03:51.000 which was pretty unimaginable in previous times. And now is just certain, you know,

00:04:01.220 in a presidential election, Mississippi is going to be red. There's no question about it.

00:04:05.700 It's not debatable, et cetera. And 1994 kind of crystallized that.

00:04:13.260 In 2002, the GOP actually won a resounding victory and they increased their dominance.

00:04:24.140 Whereas if you had looked at that kind of like midterm trend, you would say, ah, that 2002,

00:04:29.740 George W. Bush won in 2000. It was actually a hotly contested election.

00:04:33.240 This will be a time for a shift. But it wasn't a shift because it was pre-Iraq war and post 9-11

00:04:43.040 enthusiasm and terror war mania. There was actually a famous case of a man, I'm forgetting his name at

00:04:53.740 the moment, but he was a Southern Democrat and he had like lost multiple limbs in Vietnam.

00:04:59.880 And he was accused of not being a patriot and being on team Osama bin Laden when he lost.

00:05:10.780 Pretty remarkable. It was also the age of freedom for eyes and all that kind of stuff.

00:05:14.540 By 2006, the public opinion on the Iraq war had shifted dramatically and Bush kind of had his

00:05:24.680 comeuppance then. His, I think it was called the thumping where he lost big in the house,

00:05:32.320 Nancy Pelosi took over, et cetera. Nancy Pelosi also immediately said that she would not impeach 1.00

00:05:38.540 George W. Bush. Again. So that was a kind of, so 94 was a kind of inflection point, turning point. It

00:05:50.440 solidified realignment. And I think 2006 was kind of an inflection point in the post 9-11 era.

00:06:03.100 Uh, 2018 was definitely an inflection point in terms of the, uh, anti-Trump coalition, particularly

00:06:10.820 suburban whites. So college educated whites going over to the democratic party, which they did,

00:06:16.980 uh, to a huge degree. Um, and so, you know, you could say that 2022 might be something similar.

00:06:30.560 It might be a kind of inflection point macro election when it comes to Roe v. Wade. Roe v. Wade is

00:06:42.880 popular. It is more popular than it was just six months ago. Uh, you could make the argument that

00:06:54.280 that's just, there's going to be a shift, even if, you know, and just, just out of pure hatred of

00:07:02.840 it. It's not like you, you elect congressmen and they can reverse the Supreme court decision, but

00:07:08.580 they could codify Roe v. Wade, of course, but it's a, just a kind of macro trend maybe does indicate

00:07:17.920 some kind of realignment, this ongoing realignment, which I've been talking about for a long time,

00:07:22.140 which is actually the exit that is whites moving to the democratic party, moving away from the

00:07:30.060 so-called populist party of Trump. Um, and the Democrats achieving a kind of high, low coalition

00:07:37.340 of high IQ whites, low IQ blacks in a coalition that is against the midwit IQ whites and Hispanics. 0.89

00:07:53.500 I think that is the new coalition as we understand it. And I think that will actually last a long time

00:08:02.840 and it's going to be major and all of the kind of majority strategy stuff and sailor strategy.

00:08:10.680 I think that is, um, increasingly going away. Um, there is not going to be a white in gathering 1.00

00:08:17.640 in the GOP as Sam Francis wanted and prophesied. Uh, so I do think that's a factor. Although I,

00:08:27.760 I also think that the Democrats have blown it a bit here. Um, they haven't, I don't see the urgency

00:08:38.800 and, you know, for instance, I've told this anecdote before, so I, you guys might be getting

00:08:43.920 tired of it, but I'll tell it again. Um, so last good Friday, I was actually meeting, uh, someone

00:08:53.760 for dinner down in Kalispell and, um, which is, you know, if, if Whitefish is a resort town,

00:09:02.880 little snobby, maybe a little hippie as well. Kalispell is definitely, you know, it's nice of course,

00:09:09.760 but it's definitely a blue collar place. And I was driving down there and so it was good Friday

00:09:19.360 and maybe I was being a bit sinful, you know, eating, drinking cocktails on Good Friday,

00:09:27.360 but we'll put that aside. We'll put my, the fate of my soul aside from them. And, um,

00:09:34.960 there were this, there's this massive rig that was driving down there and it, there was a pirate flag

00:09:41.360 on the back of it and it was honking its horn really loudly and rubbing its engine. And I was just

00:09:46.640 thinking like, what is going on? What is this? And then as I got down to Kalispell to park,

00:09:54.080 there were this car that had a Confederate flag and a Trump flag and an American flag.

00:10:01.680 And it was doing wheelies. So it was like, um, or donuts rather. So it was slamming on the brakes

00:10:09.840 and slamming on the accelerator at the same time. And so basically, you know, it was burning rubber,

00:10:17.760 basically smoke was flying up in the air and then the, the, the light turned green and it like sped

00:10:24.160 down the road. There's all of this honking. And I was just thinking, what in the hell is this?

00:10:30.000 And I, I turned to this woman who was a, uh, who, she was just standing next to me. She was a, 1.00

00:10:37.200 you know, fairly nice looking woman. And I was like, what is going on? I was like,

00:10:41.200 is this about good Friday? She was like, it's the Trump people. And she was obviously annoyed. So

00:10:49.440 every Friday for effectively no reason, they go out and just raise hell on behalf of Trump.

00:11:02.320 And I think even the fact that they were doing this on good Friday might be somewhat significant

00:11:08.640 in the sense that they were mostly secular, but it was a class based

00:11:16.640 populist revival effectively about nothing about no real issue other than maybe the 20 to 20 election

00:11:26.160 or Donald Trump himself, or just let's go, Brandon, you know, we hate liberals.

00:11:31.600 And as I was walking out a couple hours later, walking out for dinner and this car pulled up

00:11:38.800 and a guy got out and he just yelled at me. He said,

00:11:43.840 Fuck, fuck, fuck Joe Biden. Fuck the liberals. And he got back in his car and drove back. 1.00

00:11:49.520 And I was just thinking, what has just happened? And I don't think at all he knew who I was.

00:11:56.640 Um, I, I, I, I think he just saw me as a guy who was fairly well-dressed and thus must be liberal.

00:12:08.560 And thus it reveals a kind of class aspect to this. I was wearing, you know, a hip leather jacket and

00:12:17.280 some jeans and whatever. Well, it's not like I was wearing a tuxedo or anything, but I, I was dressed

00:12:23.680 differently than the kind of working class wear out here, which I guess is like, what is it called?

00:12:31.200 Carnhart or something. I see a lot of that. Anyway, um, it's a secular class based

00:12:42.240 revolt. So in the primary season in Kansas, they put abortion on the ballot and they basically

00:12:50.640 protected it, generally speaking. And they're that one by in a landslide and it outperformed

00:12:58.720 democratic candidates who are running. So that should also kind of tell you something that there is,

00:13:06.640 there is some kind of force that might be a macro trend and towards realignment, realignment that's out

00:13:15.520 there. Um, but I, I'm wondering whether it's going to be enough. The other interesting factor

00:13:27.200 is that you have some major Republicans who are underperforming Donald Trump's 2020 score.

00:13:42.160 And these are actually the teal Republicans, this, you know, the new wave of populism,

00:13:48.320 the smart populist. And so I'm thinking of J.D. Vance and Blake Masters in particular. So

00:13:54.080 Arizona was 50, 50, more or less. And Masters is pretty significantly underperforming the Democratic,

00:14:02.720 the Democrat Mark Kelly, who is a kind of centrist candidate, is also a good candidate.

00:14:08.960 J.D. Vance is also apparently leading, although I have seen polls that show Tim Ryan leading.

00:14:16.880 Tim Ryan is a very centrist Republican, excuse me, Democrat. Um, and that's actually his brand.

00:14:24.400 Uh, so it's not like he's running against AOC or something, but nevertheless, Trump won Ohio by more

00:14:32.960 than 55% and J.D. Vance might very well lose. So you could, and you can see a similar story in

00:14:41.840 Pennsylvania. OZ is a weird candidate. OZ has been five points behind, although from everything I've

00:14:50.000 heard, I checked under this morning, OZ is still losing, but it is a lot closer. So basically there

00:14:58.640 are these countervailing forces and I don't know which one is going to overwhelm the other. Um, there's the

00:15:10.960 midterm force, this weird collective psychology. There is the, um, middle to upper class white realignment 0.61

00:15:22.560 and a kind of, uh, uh, you know, um, uh, enthusiasm based on Roe v Wade that's out there. There is still

00:15:33.040 a kind of burgeoning class dynamic of Trump supporters that's out there. Uh, there is also the factor of

00:15:43.760 redistricting and that makes it to the point where the Democrats really have to win about 55,

00:15:52.400 to 57% of the vote to make gains in the house. And I'm not sure they're going to, that is the total

00:16:02.320 vote spread out nationally spread out as articulated in these districts. Uh, because basically the way we

00:16:12.240 do elections, the United States just favors rural voters. I mean, in the Senate, it's almost ridiculous,

00:16:18.640 the degree to which Wyoming is favored over Canada. They both have two senators. Wyoming has 500,000

00:16:26.240 people. Um, California, did I say Canada? California has 60 million. It's the size of Germany.

00:16:33.840 So I just feel like there are these countervailing forces. It's very difficult to predict it. And I

00:16:42.320 think we're just going to end up in this weird mixed bag. I kind of want to make the call that 0.98

00:16:51.840 Democrats are actually going to take both the house and the Senate, but looking at the numbers,

00:16:58.640 I think it's hard to really justify that. And so I am going to go with what I think is pretty much a

00:17:08.240 consensus opinion, which is that the Republicans are going to take the house. I think they're going

00:17:14.560 to take it by a small amount. And I think the Democrats are going to like cling onto power in the

00:17:22.960 Senate. It will be 50, 50 again. If they get a 52, that would be considered a victory. I think it is just

00:17:31.040 going to be this mixed bag or wash and both sides are going to claim victory. Both sides are going to see

00:17:41.120 it as a loss. That is my prediction at this point, but in a weird way are not so weird, but I do think it's

00:17:53.600 worse for Republicans because it's just set up for them to have a roaring victory. And if they can't

00:18:06.400 achieve that, I think that is going to be, that is going to tell them something important or tell us

00:18:12.400 something important, whether they learned their lessons. Unlikely.

RadixJournal - October 21, 2022

Words, Words, Words

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