Fall is a busy time for us. I may not enter much here before the election – a notion that I am confident will brighten your weekend 😉– and I particularly don’t expect to comment much after today about the parties’ respective chances in the November elections. (I know; I will no more than say this than some pundit will make some observation that drives me to expound here. 😊) I’ve already noted in these pages that polls cannot be trusted and that the election pits culture and visceral loyalty against the economy (although “culture” may cut both ways, including the galvanizing effect that the Trump Regime’s ICE activities may have on Latino voters). I will add only this: it seems a fool’s errand to predict the electoral sentiments of a citizenry that in 2024 was collectively capable of electing to our highest office a man blatantly guilty of sedition.
One hears pundits yammering about the effect that Republicans’ campaign funds might have on electoral outcomes. I think the effect will be minimal. First, the Republicans’ ads will all be about malignant nonsense, and anybody who might be persuaded by these ads is already going to vote Republican. Second, Vice President Kamala Harris outspent Mr. Trump in 2024, and it obviously did her no good. Third, no ad the Republicans run will have as great a persuasive power as the gas, diesel, and food prices Americans see daily.
I indicated in a post not long ago that I considered Democrats’ chances of winning a majority of the Senate seats this November akin to drawing to an inside straight. I still think so, but wish that I had included a reference to one additional race in that note: Democratic Kansas Senate Nominee Rev. Adam Hamilton’s challenge to U.S. KS Sen. Roger Marshall. Kansas is obviously a Bible Belt farm state hurt by tariffs and diesel prices. Rev. Hamilton, who has previously registered as a Republican and is obviously not a wild-eyed progressive, is a pastor of the largest United Methodist congregation in the United States. The New York Times has reported that Mr. Marshall, a medical doctor, has sued over 700 patients for overdue medical bills with approximately 80 of these being arrested for missing court. (While other elections may be culture v. the economy, this one feels like the Lord against the Money Changers. 😉) Although I rate Rev. Hamilton’s victory prospects in the “Well … well … maybe” category, this is still a delicious race. 😊
Let’s consider the prospects for an October surprise. I don’t see much that the President can substantively do at this point to help Republicans’ prospects. Not even MAGAs believe his promised $5,000 bribe if Republicans maintain control of both houses of Congress, and even if he reduced tariffs and/or settled the Iran War tomorrow, it’s now too close to the election for these maneuvers to materially positively affect the American economy. While one can never underestimate Mr. Trump’s willingness to subvert our democracy – and thus, there is a high likelihood that he will attempt to depress voter turnout through machinations such as stationing ICE agents at Latino polling places, and he will certainly use alt-right media propaganda to attempt to sow doubt about an overall adverse outcome – he may well face the same difficulty that Viktor Orbán did earlier this year in Hungary: given the widespread expectations that Mr. Trump and his ilk are going to suffer a shellacking at the polls, if such an electoral rout does occur, it will be difficult for him to persuade most Americans – who, by definition, will have voted against him and his cabal — of election fraud. If there is an objective October surprise, I will venture that it could be a very negative one for the President. If anything is currently propping up Republicans’ electoral prospects, it’s the U.S. stock market. About 60% of American adults own stocks (including 60% of retirees, traditionally a core Republican segment). For some time, the domestic equities market has been generally propelled by investment in entities related to artificial intelligence (“AI”). (AI is obviously a subject well worth a future post.) October is the witching month for stocks. Obviously no one should take investment advice from me, but given our current environment of rising inflation, rising interest rates, a depressed housing market, and widespread suspicion of artificial intelligence, if equity investors turn squeamish on AI stocks during the next month, such would not bode well for the U.S. stock market as a whole. If there is a significant correction before the election, it is not unreasonable to suggest that such would materially harm Republicans’ electoral prospects.
Finally: I try to refrain from making predictions in these pages whose accuracy can never be determined, but here I will: today, the election results we are going to get in early November are already fixed. For all the hoorah and money that will be expended between now and election day, I will venture that except for a stock market collapse – which would arguably only worsen Republicans’ apparently dire electoral prospects — we would get virtually the same result if the election was held next Tuesday as we will a little over four weeks from now.
Of course, we’ll never know whether this pontification was accurate or, as is so frequently the case, was only so much Noise. 😉
We’ll see what happens.
