Speculating on the U.S. Presidential Election
At this start of this year, I posted my expectations for the 2020 U.S. Presidential election. I suggested Joe Biden would likely emerge as the Democratic nominee and the outcome would probably be very close. Any predictions made on January 1 were subject to a number of contingencies, I wrote, including the possibility that “some cataclysmic event occurs that changes everything”. Turns out that these conventional calls were on the mark, at least as of today. And even though I could never have predicted a pandemic, a cataclysmic event has occurred. Its electoral consequences are a matter of total speculation. So, let’s speculate. It's tempting to think the election will be a simple referendum on Trump. Is he to blame or can he offload the blame onto Biden, the Democrats, the Governors, China, the WHO, the media or even Dr. Fauci? The early signs are that Americans are less than satisfied with the job Trump is doing . His overall approval ratings are more or less wh