My thoughts in September 2015...

[twenty42]

I was cleaning out my hard drive and found a document I wrote on September 4, 2015. I think it was going to be an Atlas thread, but it never materialized. I predicted a Republican win in the 2016 Presidential election, and listed some points that supported my claim. I found it amusing when I read it today...

"--Eight years of incumbency usually leads to the opposite party getting elected.

--At least two 2012 Democratic states (Colorado and Iowa) look solid red now, and Virginia is moving that way as well.

--2014 was a Republican avalanche in every sense of the term. People on the left say it was meaningless because 1994 and 2010 didn't exactly foretell the coming presidential elections, but those same people neglect the fact that the 2006 Democratic earthslide sure did.

--Something important that not many people seem to acknowledge...President Obama was one of only three presidents in history to receive LESS electoral votes in reelection than he did in his initial run. While the 2012 election is painted by most as a referendum on the president and the American people saying he was doing just fine, this starkly unusual circumstance of the incumbent president picking up zero states and losing two is seldom pointed out.

--Obama's approval ratings have been consistently in the 40s for over a year now.

--No Democratic candidate appears to have the coalition or the fanbase that Obama generated during both of his campaigns. Whether the nominee is Clinton or Biden, it is unlikely they will get as many voters to the polls as the president did."

I was dead wrong about CO and VA being solid R states (I was anticipating a Clinton-Rubio matchup to be fair), but I was right on about IA. I was also right that the Dems would run a low-energy campaign.

[AN63093]

--No Democratic candidate appears to have the coalition or the fanbase that Obama generated during both of his campaigns. Whether the nominee is Clinton or Biden, it is unlikely they will get as many voters to the polls as the president did."

I think this is the most interesting of your predictions.

Not only did it end up being true, but I think it says the most about future elections.  There's an argument to be made that the Obama coalition (particularly the '08 coalition) was unique to Obama, and maybe also unique to that particular year (2008).  In other words, that particular coalition cannot be re-created in 2020 and beyond.  Or perhaps it can, but maybe it requires a certain type of Dem candidate, and arguably there aren't any in the pipeline in that mold.  Clinton obviously wasn't the candidate that could do it.

That isn't to say the Dems can't win the White House (of course they can), but perhaps their best path going forward is going to be quite a bit different than Obama's path was.

[twenty42]

--No Democratic candidate appears to have the coalition or the fanbase that Obama generated during both of his campaigns. Whether the nominee is Clinton or Biden, it is unlikely they will get as many voters to the polls as the president did."

I think this is the most interesting of your predictions.

Not only did it end up being true, but I think it says the most about future elections.  There's an argument to be made that the Obama coalition (particularly the '08 coalition) was unique to Obama, and maybe also unique to that particular year (2008).  In other words, that particular coalition cannot be re-created in 2020 and beyond.  Or perhaps it can, but maybe it requires a certain type of Dem candidate, and arguably there aren't any in the pipeline in that mold.  Clinton obviously wasn't the candidate that could do it.

That isn't to say the Dems can't win the White House (of course they can), but perhaps their best path going forward is going to be quite a bit different than Obama's path was.

Funny thing is that I wasn't taking Trump or Sanders seriously at this point. I thought Clinton was going to sweep, and that it would come down to Jeb and Rubio for the R nomination. Guess that's why they count the votes.

[Deblano]

I "predicted" around that date (in fact months earlier) that there was a 50% chance of an "anti-establishment" Republican, particularly one that would address America's war-weariness in the face of a multi-polar world and would have concrete views that differed from the GOP national platform, winning the nomination and narrowly win the presidency.

However, my prediction was that the nominee would be Rand Paul, not Donald Trump.

[60+ GOP Seats After 2018 GUARANTEED]

I "predicted" around that date (in fact months earlier) that there was a 50% chance of an "anti-establishment" Republican, particularly one that would address America's war-weariness in the face of a multi-polar world and would have concrete views that differed from the GOP national platform, winning the nomination and narrowly win the presidency.

However, my prediction was that the nominee would be Rand Paul, not Donald Trump.

Did you actually predict Paul would win, or just wanted/hoped he would win?

[Deblano]

I "predicted" around that date (in fact months earlier) that there was a 50% chance of an "anti-establishment" Republican, particularly one that would address America's war-weariness in the face of a multi-polar world and would have concrete views that differed from the GOP national platform, winning the nomination and narrowly win the presidency.

However, my prediction was that the nominee would be Rand Paul, not Donald Trump.

Did you actually predict Paul would win, or just wanted/hoped he would win?

Both. I did always assume regardless that the GOP nominee would not be a "Traditional Republican" at least in rhetoric.

By Autumn 2015 I realized that Rand Paul was much more of a paper tiger election-wise than I expected. 

[dw93]

At this point in 2015, I thought a lot of things were possible for the GOP, I felt that if they truly thought the election was lost that they'd put Jeb! up as a sacrificial lamb (honestly to this day it surprises me that people thought Jeb! could win). If they felt they could win, the moderates and establishment Republicans would rally behind Rubio and he'd win the nomination. Another possibility was that the moderates and establishment end up doing what they actually did and split their support between Rubio, Jeb!, and Kasich, only Trump would still falter and exit the race and Cruz would be the nominee due to the divided field.

For the Democrats, it was in September 2015 that there was talk about Biden entering the race. I thought this was a possibility and if it were to happen, Bernie would either narrowly win the nomination due to divided opposition or the convention would be deadlocked and the nomination would be up for grabs. If Biden didn't run, even though I was a Bernie Supporter, I didn't think he had a chance at the nomination at that time (and didn't till early 2016) and felt the nomination was Clinton's to lose.

As for the general election, I thought (and thought correctly) that it'd be close and I felt it could go either way depending on who ended up becoming the nominees.