Cogito Ergo Non Serviam
There Are No Swing Voters in America
Psephology is a wonderful word, meaning the study of elections. This is different from political science because it relies more on mathematical models that well bear scrutiny and which can be tested against experience. A new model for American psephology that says there are almost no swing voters left in America. Crafted by Dr. Rachel Bitecofer of the of the Wason Center for Public Policy at Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Virgnia, this is positively revolutionary. That her 2018 predictions were so close to perfect suggests that this model deserves much more attention in 2020.
She has posted, "In July of 2018, my innovative forecasting model raised eyebrows by predicting some four months before the midterm election that Democrats would pick up 42 seats in the House of Representatives." The prediction was bold, and the Democrats picked up 40 seats. Any prediction that comes to within 5% of the actual result is considered scientifically valid. Dr. Bitecofer was off by just 4.76%.
Her argument, which one believes holds a great deal of water, is that the nation as become politically polarizes to the point where the numbers of voters who are truly independent are few. While “independent” is a very popular label by which many self-identify, but in truth, they are reliable voters for one or another of the two main parties.
As a result of this change in the electorate, the tribalism of politics in the US is in the ascendant. How else to explain all the Democrats voting to impeach and remove Mr. Trump and almost all the Republicans voting against the idea?
In the Alabama special election last year, she observed, "Republican primary voters selected for their nominee Roy Moore, who had twice been removed from the Alabama Supreme Court by fellow conservatives for conduct unbecoming a justice and more problematically, for whom credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors emerged. Yet on Election Day, 90% of self-identified Republicans still cast ballots for this flawed nominee because he was the Republican. Republican voters interviewed about their support for Moore either expressed concerns about the allegations but justified their support by citing aspects of negative partisanship such as the high policy stakes of the seat going to a Democrat and general acrimony they held towards Democrats, or more common in the Trump Era, simply refused to believe the allegations. This type of behavior in Republican politics presents a sharp departure from the past, when scandal ended political careers."
In other words, election campaigns that try to convince swing voters to back one party or the other are pointless. There are a couple of percentage points to be had at best. It is far more effectve to run a campaign that focuses on turnout of friendly forces. When one realizes that voter turnout in presidential elections has not topped 60% since 1968, there are a lot of voters who can be motivated. Persuading them to change their viewpoint is another matter. In fact the second highest turnout after 1968 was 2008, when black Americans and liberal whites turned up to vote for Mr. Obama, and that turnout rate was 58.2%.
Dr. Bitecofer has the Democrats winning 278 electoral votes with just 270 needed for a win, and those don't count states she considers in-play (Arizona, Florida, Iowa and North Carolina are her only toss-ups). She admits that there are ways for this to change. As she put it, "Barring a shock to the system, Democrats recapture the presidency." A war with Iran, or the Democrats nominating a real disruptor like Bernie Sanders could affect this. But for now, the current panic among the anti-Trump forces is baseless.
© Copyright 2020 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.
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