On November 5th I will cast my vote for Kamala Harris. As a former Republican legislator, now a registered Independent, I cannot in good conscience vote for Donald Trump. Neither can I support a candidate down the ballot who embraces so-called MAGA rhetoric or the fallacious notion of Christian Nationalism. Though I am wholeheartedly endorsing Harris, I do not believe she will win the election. Rather, I believe the man I disparagingly refer to as “Orange Julius” will return to power.
Historian Allan Lichtman’s famous “13 keys” shtick garners a great deal of attention from the mainstream media every presidential election cycle. This year Lichtman is confidently predicting a Harris victory. While the American University professor claims to have accurately predicted the outcome of 9 out of the last 10 presidential elections, in fact, he has only predicted 8 out of 10. In 2000 he predicted Al Gore would win. Lichtman was mistaken. In 2016 he predicted Trump would win the popular vote; again, he was mistaken. After each inaccurate prediction Lichtman changed his “formula.” By moving the goal posts every time one misses the target, it’s certainly easy to declare oneself a sage.
Like Professor Lichtman, I have no credentials to qualify my predictions, yet I’ve been predicting election outcomes since Clinton v. Dole with 100% accuracy – and no “keys.” Still, with every fiber of my being, I want my prediction this year to be proven wrong.
However, I think the race was over long before it began. I suspect that independent and undecided voters made up their minds shortly after the midterms. I believe they're voting based on how the price at the pump, inflation at the checkout, and skyrocketing prices in the real estate market have impacted their wallets over the last four years. Whether or not their perception of the situation is entirely accurate is frankly irrelevant. There isn’t a headline nor a shred of evidence to the contrary that will convince them otherwise. Terms like “shrinkflation” and “corporate greed” are sadly meaningless to a group of voters who see themselves as financially struggling. Granted, all economic reports appear to indicate that Americans are still dining out and spending on entertainment and other non-essential items. However, it’s costing them more, and many of them place the blame squarely at the feet of the Biden Administration. For this largely non-partisan voter bloc, their bank balance is the litmus test for both the American economy and ultimately the upcoming election. For them, catchphrases like “Hope” or “Yes, we can” will not lower prices. Thus, I anticipate they will likely cast their ballots for the candidate under whose previous presidency they believe they were better off financially.
Personally, I don't for a moment believe there will be some sort of economic prosperity under Orange Julius. Our nation has been in a financial tailspin for decades. The military industrial complex and our delusions of grandeur have been in large part the cause of trillions of dollars’ worth of debt. While we frivolously spend to maintain the guise of American greatness, our schools are underfunded, our roads are deteriorating, and our industrial capabilities are being sold off to overseas investors. Will any of these improve during the reign of Orange Julius? I doubt it. Rather, I anticipate that the so-called party of limited government will be more involved in our day-to-day lives than ever before.
Though Lichtman’s prophetic abilities are up for debate, the book "Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle" by Chris Hedges is just as timely today as it was when it was written in 2010. It's eerily prophetic. While there are numerous passages I've highlighted in the book, one in particular strikes me as especially relevant in these final days leading up to what could prove to be a turning point in American history:
It was the economic meltdown of Yugoslavia that gave us Slobodan Milosevic. It was the collapse of the Weimar Republic that vomited up Adolf Hitler. And it was the breakdown in czarist Russia that opened the door for Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks. Financial collapses lead to political extremism. The rage bubbling up from our impoverished and disenfranchised working class presages a looming and dangerous right-wing backlash. I spent two years traveling the country to write a book on the Christian Right called American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America. I visited former manufacturing towns where for many the end of the world is no longer an abstraction. They have lost hope. Fear and instability have plunged the working classes into profound personal and economic despair, and, not surprisingly, into the arms of the demagogues and charlatans of the radical Christian Right who offer a belief in magic, miracles, and the fiction of a utopian Christian nation. And unless we rapidly re-enfranchise our dispossessed workers into the economy, unless we give them hope, our democracy is doomed.
Democracy is indeed a very fragile experiment. I have a terrible premonition that I will be woefully revisiting the aforementioned passage several times over the next four or more years. For the sake of our nation, I certainly hope I’m mistaken.