Political Prophesies

April 2nd, 2008 in Featured Posts by Hillel Aron

Despite having no interest in college basketball, I do, for some reason, love making predictions.

I also love The McLaughlin Group (for a good primer, watch this). Each episode ends with the panelist giving predictions that can range from the mundane (the prime minister of Australia will lose re-election) to the bizarre (the next man on the moon will be Chinese!)

So in the spirit of both The McLaughlin Group and March Madness, I’d like to present my very own predictions.

April

National polls between Obama and Clinton will continue their double helix-like pattern.

McCain’s numbers will continue to look strong, terrifying Democrats.

The ugliness of the campaign will hit a plateau: the two April debates will be relatively cordial, while campaign surrogates will continue to say outrageous things.

The question of what-exactly-Obama-heard-Reverend-Wright-say-when will persist, mostly due to the absence of actual news.

The Hillary-is-dishonest meme will persist as well. Newspapers will trip over themselves to shoot down her First Lady experience claims.

Hillary’s tax returns will reveal… nothing too exciting.

Hillary Clinton will win Pennsylvania by about 12 points. The amount of delegates she picks up will be unusually high — about 20, due to Pennsylvania’s many odd-number delegate districts (Al Giordano has a good post about delegate numbers here).

The media will crow about Hillary’s comeback for three or four days before reality sets in once again; after all, Obama will still be ahead by more than 100 delegates.

May

Obama will win both the Indiana and North Carolina primaries. His margin in North Carolina will be large, although his share of the white vote will be small. His margin in Indiana will be closer to five points. There will be more calls for Hillary to resign, some of which will come from inside the campaign.

Hillary will win West Virginia.

Obama will take Oregon, Hillary Kentucky — but only barely.

Late May / Early June

The floodgates will open up, and Superdelegates will flock to Obama, often in blocks. Hillary will take Puerto Rico, Obama Montana and South Dakota. Hillary will drop out soon after these last two primaries.

June — November

The media will begin scrutinizing McCain much more than they have. Obama surrogates and independent 527s will start attacking him almost immediately. McCain’s numbers will start to go down.

The candidates mutual contempt for each other will be apparent early on.

The Barack-Obama-Muslim-Manchurian-Candidate meme will be replaced by the Barack-Obama-Secret-Black-Nationalist meme.

John McCain will pick Charlie Crist as his running mate.

Barack Obama will choose as his running mate… oh, I don’t know… Michael Bloomberg! (This is my 13-seed pick). But even if I’m wrong, Obama’s running mate won’t be Hillary Clinton, Bill Richardson, or Al Gore.

The Iraq War and National Security will once again take center stage as the main issues of the election. Some troops will return home in July, but troop levels will remain above pre-surge levels. No political progress will be made in Iraq.

Almost all Hillary supporters (like former Dean supporters) will end up supporting Obama, contrary to what current polls say.

Obama will out-raise and outspend McCain by an enormous amount.

The McCain-had-an-affair storyline will continue to pop up, but without any hard evidence. His connection to lobbyists, however, will be more problematic.

As McCain’s poll numbers sink, conservatives will start to snipe at him on immigration and tax cuts.

Ron Paul will not run as a third-party candidate. Ralph Nader will not have a major impact on the election.

November and Beyond…

Barack Obama will win the election. He’ll lose some 2004 battleground states like Florida, but he’ll win some purple states like Virginia, Colorado, and Indiana.

Democrats will pick up around 15 seats in the House, and three seats in the Senate.

Hillary will run for Governor of New York.

The next man on the moon will be Chinese.

– Hillel Aron