Paris MOU
“Enrique argues that, contrary to the current headlines, we’re in the 7th or 8th inning of defeating the coronavirus. He expects cases, hospitalizations, and deaths in the U.S. to plunge in the next six weeks, which, when combined with unprecedented fiscal and monetary stimulus, could lead to a 1999-style “melt up” in the markets going into the end of the year.”
Whitney Tilson, “We’re pitied & mocked; We may be through the worst of it”, daily newsletter
My approach when it comes to writing my monthly posts is to wait for that creative spark, after which a wall of words pours out. This month that process has been disrupted and instead of a single overarching narrative I have a jumble of thoughts bumbling around in my mind.
So, given that I will be away on holiday for the next two weeks, I thought I will give you a concise summary of my thinking on a range of subjects that I have covered before on my blog.
Let’s start with the big macro picture. I strongly recommend that you read the latest blog post by John Greer called “The Arc of Our Future” which explains why we are tracking the Limits to Growth BAU model and what is likely to occur in the coming decades. The short version is that the world is now facing a protracted and long-term economic and population contraction and the Covid pandemic appears to have been the trigger for that lurch down what Greer calls the Long Descent.
I have covered this extensively on the blog, see here, here and here, and don’t have a huge amount to add to the issue for now. The key will be whether the economic data over the next few years continues to track the peak and early decline as predicted in the LTG BAU computer model.
Forecasting Intelligence
In regard to Covid there is much discussion about a looming Second Wave of infections. My earlier prediction, based on Farr’s Law, was overly optimistic, even if actual death rates from Covid has broadly reflected the curve of the Law (particularly if you factor in the possibility of hidden deaths from Covid prior to February/March which was not picked up by the official data).
Either way, folks are still picking up the virus and that is shown by the active cases being reported around the world. Having read extensively on the subject I am reasonably certain that effective herd immunity kicks in when approximately 20% of the population has been infected by the virus. The massive surge of cases we have recently seen in the United States hasn’t been in New York region but in the South and West of the country which was comparatively unaffected by Covid earlier in the year.
I agree with the recent analysis by Goldman Sachs and the analyst quoted by the hedge funder Whitney Tilson above that cases, hospitalizations, and deaths in the U.S. will plunge in the next six weeks.
Zero Hedge
If, and it is a big if, this assessment is correct it will be a clear positive for President Trump’s re-election prospects.
Some readers have reacted with understandable skepticism to my last post where I outlined why I still thought Trump was more likely than not to win the election. Whilst I do think there is a logical pathway to a Biden win; a grim Covid and economic picture going into the Autumn, continued dysfunctional comments and tweets from the president and a gaffe-free performance by Joe Biden, I don’t think that’s the end of the story.
The Covid public health picture is likely to improve over the next few months, and with that the economy which is a key issue for the president. In the UK, the Tories under Boris Johnson had a horrendous Covid healthcare crisis yet are still comfortably ahead in the polls.The truth is that the majority of voter’s care more about jobs than predominately older folks dying of Covid. Harsh but true.
Wikipedia
The Tories were seen to have a relatively good economic Covid crisis even if they badly mishandled the public health side of Covid. I think something similar will happen in the United States should the virus abate over the next 6 weeks and the jobs situation start to recover into the Fall.
Joe Biden has lurched significantly to the Left, something that has barely been discussed so far, and his tax and spend policies are going to attract more attention once the election battle truly commences. Trump may be down but I still think he is not out.
And yes, for those who are interested, I have placed my own real money betting on such an outcome. Given the recent odds, even a relatively small deposit will yield a nice profit should I prove right and Trump does get re-elected. Odds on Trump getting re-elected have gone as low as 3 to 1 on betfair exchange. Still, I’m not betting the house on it given I still think there is a 40% chance that Biden will win.
As for the polling, one of the most accurate battlefield state pollsters in 2016, Trafalgar Group (TG), who factor in the possibility of “shy Trump voters” in their methodology, have released a very interesting set of polling recently showing that Trump is still competitive in battlefield states. What is most interesting about their polling is that they were virtually the only pollsters who accurately forecast Trump’s shock victory in Michigan (see below and note that excluding TG pushed Clinton’s average lead to around 5%).
Realclearpolitics
Also note that “Cahaly’s polls in 2016 also showed Donald Trump winning Pennsylvania – again, he was nearly alone in projecting Trump’s narrow victory there – and thus taking the White House.”
Virtually all the other polling data was forecasting a comfortable Clinton victory in both states, many with Hilary 5% ahead of Trump. Mr Cahaly, who runs the TG, was one of the few pollsters who came close to the actual result on the night.
Some may say I’m cherry picking polls and maybe so, but his record is good in 2016 so I will take the TG polling seriously. They are currently showing that Trump is tied in Florida, behind Biden in Pennsylvania, Minnesota and Michigan but ahead in Georgia and Wisconsin. That sounds fairly reasonable to me at this stage of the race (e.g. Biden would narrowly win if the election was held now).
Those who are interested in reading more should follow Mr Cahaly at his twitter feed here.
In regard to the markets, I’m expecting a healthy correction soon in the stock markets as the perfect V shaped recovery priced in doesn’t match with economic reality. However, a surge in equity markets later on this year, assuming the Covid outbreak fades in the United States, the economy continues recovering and continued money printing looks likely.
Crypto markets also look bullish, with bitcoin breaking out of a key resistance level at $10.5k along with other quality altcoins being adopted in the real world.
In regard to Brexit, all the signs that a goods-based “skinny” trade deal will be agreed by October 2020, in line with my forecast at the beginning of the year.
So, overall, it will be fascinating to see whether I am right in regard to the US elections or not!
Take care everybody. I will return next month for my next monthly post.
Anybody who wishes to subscribe to my blog can add their email to the bottom of this page.
forecastingintelligence 
Cases will decline in the south, and they will rise in the midwest within those 6 weeks. We won’t be as high but we are still going to have a steady clip of deaths and will be well over 200,000 by the election. No epidemiologist thinks we are 1 inning away from ‘defeating’ the virus. That’s just not remotely realistic. The economy is not going to be markedly recovering, the proof is in such persistent data as rising unemployment and the number of people who can’t even pay their rent (over 20 billion is owed already) There’s no plausible amount of improvement in a mere 3 months that is going to sway enough of the electorate to bring Trump a win. The Trump campaign demoted Parscal and put a stop on all new ad buying (not just in MI) to reconfigure- that tells you their internal polling is flashing red.
As far as the ‘shy voter’ hypothesis
https://www.aapor.org/Education-Resources/Reports/An-Evaluation-of-2016-Election-Polls-in-the-U-S.aspx#CONCLUSIONS
Reasons for under-estimating Trump’s support: Late changes in voter choices.
There are a number of reasons as to why polls under-estimated support for Trump in various polls. There is evidence of real late change in voter preferences in Trump’s favor in the last week or so of the campaign, especially in the states where Trump won narrowly.
Reasons for under-estimating Trump’s support: Pollsters’ failure to weight by education.
Education was strongly correlated with presidential vote in key states: that is, voters with higher education levels were more likely to vote for Clinton. Yet some pollsters – especially state-level pollsters – did not adjust for education in their weighting even though college graduates were over-represented in their surveys. This led to an under-estimation of support for Trump.
Reasons for under-estimating Trump’s support: Little backing for Shy Trump hypothesis.
During both the primaries and the general election, some postulated that Trump supporters might be unwilling to tell a live interviewer their intentions, on the theory that backing Trump was not a socially acceptable view. A number of Trump voters who participated in pre-election polls did not reveal themselves as Trump voters until callback studies conducted after the election (and they outnumbered late-revealing Clinton voters), which could be attributable to either late deciding or misreporting (Shy Trump) in the pre-election poll. A number of other tests for the Shy Trump hypothesis yielded no evidence to support it, including differences between polls with live interviewers and those with no live interviewers.
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The Shy Trump issue is an interesting one and remains open to debate.
As a life-long Tory I have quite a few times “hid” my Tory support in various social situations so can imagine the social disapproval would be far worse if you are a white-collar Trump supporter (given the hatred he arouses in some voters). So for me it strikes me as plausible.
Many of the polls showing Hilary 5% ahead just before the election also showed around 6% supporting a third party candidate. The actual result on election night showed half of that 3rd party support shift to Trump. Where those voters who claimed they were backing a 3rd party candidate really planning to vote that way or were they “hiding” in the polls because they didn’t want to admit to anybody they planned to vote for Trump.
We will never know for certain but I think it is likely that it was probably the case.
As for Covid, we will see. If the general trend is lower deaths over the next few months the debate will likely shift from Covid to getting the economy back.
And on that front Trump is leading among swing voters (https://twitter.com/GoodwinMJ/status/1288917685347262470) – “If you ask American voters in swing states ‘who would more likely lead a strong recovery for the US economy out of the covid crisis?’ Trump leads everywhere except Michigan”.
All you need to do is look at the poll on polls of Hilary versus Trump in 2016 to see that Hilary was consistently ahead for the bulk of the race. Indeed in August, she opened up a double digit lead… I remember that month vividly because even I had a massive wobble (https://forecastingintelligence.org/2016/08/06/the-donald-trump-enigma-and-the-future-of-trumpism/).
In the end he recovered and won. I don’t have a crystal ball but anybody who says he can’t win at this point is plain wrong. Trump is 6% behind Biden in battlefield state polling (not good but recoverable – https://twitter.com/GoodwinMJ/status/1287473204181831683).
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Trump supporters are not at all ‘shy’ or hesitant about expressing themselves loudly in all sorts of venues and circumstances, at least where I live (and it’s a blue state). Some may be lying to pollsters, although there’s no data regarding whether it’s statistically significant or not.
The virus isn’t significantly fading in the next 3 months. Deaths are at a steady tick, and the high positivity rates in testing despite the decrease in the number of tests are signs this isn’t going to be changing in a big way (particularly when coupled with school openings). Projections by the CDC and outside experts are indicating this.
‘Trump is 6% behind Biden in battlefield state polling (not good but recoverable)’
Ok, but that is actually pretty bad for Trump. Battleground states are just those which are too close to call. Georgia, Texas, and Ohio -which should be easy wins for Trump- are considered battleground states (and the Trump running to OH the other day shows his campaign realizes this). Biden’s going to win MI WI and PA and it’s over. He is likely to win other states he doesn’t need. The only way Biden doesn’t win is some sort of health crisis for him, or some large events interfering with the actual vote (you can read up on how the Trump administration is purposely slowing down our mail system).
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“Where those voters who claimed they were backing a 3rd party candidate really planning to vote that way, or were they “hiding” in the polls, because they didn’t want to admit to anybody they planned to vote for Trump.”
Insofar as this was so 4 years ago, I’ll bet it to be *hugely* more so now, esp. in light of the recent greater fame of Cancel Culture, and of the willingness of antiFa/ BLM to deploy (deadly) force.
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Ha! I have been reading you and Greer recently and I think you are spot on. Where do you place your bets? I am sure that Trump will win the election, and I truly hate everything he stands for, but it’s too certain for me not to go long.
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Thanks Y.
I placed my bets on betfair exchange (see https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/en/politics-betting-2378961), with 50% going on a Trump reeelection bet and the other 50% going on Trump winning the popular vote.
Unlike John Greer (who seems very confident that Trump will win) I’m more cautious and have always thought Biden was the most likely of the prospective Democratic candidates to defeat him. So for me I’ve only placed a modest sum this time round on election betting.
Still, I think Trump will most likely win it, primarily on jobs/economic basis.
“Some really interesting tidbits in here. If you ask American voters in swing states ‘who would more likely lead a strong recovery for the US economy out of the covid crisis?’ Trump leads everywhere except Michigan.”
The swing voters will be key in this election and whilst many dislike Trump I still think that economic logic will win through in the end.
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Hi Forecasting, I’m here owing to your comment on JMG’s site, about this blog.
On the election, my guess is that Trump will win, provided that the huge Deplorables turnout I expect isn’t sabotaged by illegal intervention, e.g. Ballot Harvesting, or antiFa, BLM etc. *physically* stopping this turnout, (e.g. by blocking polling place doors in key pcts.
“Deplorables” will *try* to turnout bigly, moved by the unprecedented combo of the lockdowns and riots, which rubbed in their noses the (Trotsky) view that, while you may not much care about history, history may sometimes care very much about you.
Anything (along those sabotage lines) is far likelier than before, seeing as both sides see this one as a Fight to the Death, made all the more so by the prospect, that the continuation of Barr’s probes into SpyGate hinge on who picks the next AG.
It’s quite obvious, that both sides see no choice, but to pull out **all** stops.
Now that Clinesmith has pled, the odds are high that the next few weeks or so will see more pleas/ indictments.
For an ex-FBI guy’s view of this, see Mark Wauck, e.g. at
https://MeaningInHistory.blogspot.com/2020/08/digenova-BRENNAN-witness-against-COMEY.html .
If Durham gets even one of the big fish (e.g. Mueller, Weissmann, Brennan, Comey, McCabe, Clapper, Lynch), this could easily quite transform the race into a GOP rout.
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Here’s the corrected link:
https://meaninginhistory.blogspot.com/2020/08/digenova-brennan-witness-against-comey.html .
I’d forgotten that links are case-sensitive, and used caps to make link easier to read.
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However, it may get complex, even if DJT has the EVs, see
https://www.breitbart.com/2020-election/2020/08/02/democrats-War-Game-for-election-includes-West-coast-Secession-possible-Civil-War-john-podesta/ .
If CA, OR, & WA would seek secession, I could see Trump letting them go, esp. if trying to block them would be a bloodbath.
The main downside of doing that would be the risk, that the new country would invite other powers (e.g. the ChiComs) in.
The main upside would be, that the rump US would be much more governable, with the Dems’ lack of the 74 EVs (of those 3 states) guaranteeing the GOP holding the W.H., unless the Dems moved far right from their recent drift.
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Hi
Thanks for the responses.
I don’t think the deplorables, who tend to be heavily armed, need to worry to much from the BLM/Antifa thugs. Those who want to see Trump reelected will go out and vote in November.
In terms of secession, it’s a risk but it will take time to develop and on balance I don’t its going to happen over the next 4 years. Medium-longer term, its a big risk (or opportunity) for the United States.
The shy Trump issue is definitely an interesting one. I do think it exists and it is around again this year.
I suspect its a similar amount to 2016 (roughly 3% in the state polling) and that the Trafalgar polls are more accurate than most when polling the battlefield states.
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My guess is, that the shy Trumpsters of 2020 will dwarf those of 4 years before, now that antiFa & BLM are seen to take, and keep, gloves off, far more than in 2016.
Thanx to the explosion of (often fraudulent) robo-calls in recent years, I’ll bet that pollsters get far fewer folks to answer the phone, than was so 4 years ago.
Why should *anyone* tell a stranger that they’ll vote for Trump, and risk her telling the DNC etc. of the voter’s Un-Awokeness, thereby ending up on the list of (as Pelosi recently put it) Enemies of the State?
Likely more later, on other parts of your reply.
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