“Debate performances can be overcome,” Allan Lichtman said. “At the first sign of adversity the spineless Democrats want to throw under the bus, their own incumbent president.”
When pressed about whether the questions surrounding Biden’s age and mental acuity are “fundamentally different” than his metrics as president, Lichtman doubled down.
“Debate performances can be overcome,” he said. “At the first sign of adversity the spineless Democrats want to throw under the bus, their own incumbent president. My goodness.”
So, he refuses to factor anything in if it doesn't fit his system... Literally refusing to acknowledge any health concerns
His system is this:
Lichtman is best known for the "Keys" system, presented in his books The Thirteen Keys to the Presidency and The Keys to the White House. The system uses thirteen historical factors to predict whether the popular vote in the election for president of the United States will be won by the candidate of the party holding the presidency (regardless of whether the president is the candidate).
So by his own argument that his system can't acknowledge a candidates fitness would come into play, logically I don't understand why he is speaking on who the specific candidate should be.
His hypothesis is that elections are mostly not about individuals. People vote for Team Blue or Team Red. And given the embrace by evangelicals of a criminal who has never read the bible, I think he may have a point.
The only individual characteristic that matters is incumbency, which is why Democrats shouldn't throw that advantage away.
The only individual characteristic that matters is incumbency.
Most other factors mostly do not depend on the individual who is running. For example, recession, military victories/losses, results of midterm elections, significant third party challenger, etc. The party can run anyone and it would not affect those points.
However, I overlooked another individual characteristic: there is an extra point if the incumbent is a victorious military leader or has significant appeal to members of the opposing party. The only person to get that point in this century was Obama, and only in 2008.
I don't think it means fuck-all. IIUC to win the necessary Electoral College votes, one has to win at least 37% of the popular vote in a 2-way (or mostly 2-way) race.