90 Miles From Tyranny

Tuesday, May 28, 2019

It Was So Much Better When Obama Was In Office...

For Terrorists,
For Iran,
For North Korea,
For The Islamic Brotherhood,
For Deep State Traitors.

Expert modelers predict Trump reelection after models all point to one result: ‘Mr. Trump wins in all of them’

Three different forecast modelers are predicting that President Trump is on track to win reelection in 2020, according to a Monday New York Times column by Steven Rattner, an Obama-era administration official.

The models give credence to multiple factors, but key are jobs, economic data, and advantages that an incumbent carries into an election. However, a deciding factor in the election is likely to be the “poor perception” of President Trump by a large segment of the voting population, to include virtually all Democrats.

Rattner’s commentary entitled “Trump’s Formidable 2020 Tailwind,” looks at not only the expectations, but also past performance, which for most has been impressive.

One model, according to Rattner is “one of the first–and perhaps still the best,” by Yale professor Ray Fair. Fair finds “that the growth rates of gross domestic product and inflation have been the two most important economic predictors — but he also found that incumbency was also an important determinant of presidential election outcomes.”

Another of the modelers’ assessments referenced is by Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. Zandi has himself looked at 12 models and “Mr. Trump wins in all of them.”

Donald Luskin of Trend Macrolytics reaches the same conclusion, examining the Electoral College.

Fair’s model accurately foretold Barack Obama’s 2008 popular vote total within six-tenths of a percentage point, predicting 53.1 percent of the vote that actually came in at 53.7 percent. In 2012, the Fair model did even better, estimating a vote share of 51.8 percent that ended up at 52 percent.

As for 2016, Rattner reported that Trump’s 2016 advantage was the incumbency factor, which would suggest that after eight years of a Democrat in the White House, voters would normally elect a Republican. Note that since 1952, the only person elected from the same party after eight years of a presidency was...

Several Confucius Institute have closed their doors amid President Trump's ongoing trade battle with China.
Experts have argued that these Chinese funded centers are used by the Chinese as propaganda arms.

Amid President Donald Trump's ongoing effort against China and Chinese tariffs imposed on imported U.S. goods, several Chinese-funded Confucius Centers on college campuses around the country have ceased their operations.

The University of Oregon, Western Kentucky University, and San Francisco State University have all announced the closures of their Confucius Institutes, which are on-campus language centers funded by the Chinese government. Along with allegations of spying, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) labeled the institutes a threat because of their close ties with the Chinese Communist Party.
“[The Confucius Institutes] present a picture of China that is not in accord with reality" Tweet This

The Department of Defense (DOD) recently denied the schools’ request for waivers to allow the institutes to receive funding. A new federal law signed by Trump last year prevents universities from receiving DOD funding for Chinese language studies if these universities host Confucius Institutes.

Citing this reason in a statement, the University of Oregon chose to keep its Chinese Flagship program, which has received $3.8 million in federal grants since the 2016-2017 academic year.

Over a dozen colleges and universities have shut down their Confucius Institutes over the last year after increased scrutiny from Washington. Last year, the National Association of Scholars estimated that there were approximately 107 Confucius Institutes in the United States.

U.S. Senators Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) have led efforts to close Confucius Institutes across the country. Three Florida universities announced the closure of their institutes after Rubio sent a letter urging them to do so.

Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told Campus Reform that Confucius Institutes deliberately “mislead” college students through propaganda: “China is a totalitarian country. To present them as a normal country would be to misguide and...