Contested Election Very Likely

Remarkably, if the polls are as wrong as they were in 2016, Trump would win with 279 of the 538 electoral votes, while Biden would get 259. Still, the margin of victory would be within 0.5 percentage points in Wisconsin (for Biden) and Georgia (for Trump), which would trigger an automatic recount and delay results. In addition, the margin in Pennsylvania and Florida would be less than 1.0%, likely resulting in a bitter post-election night fight and contested outcomes.  In short, no matter what happens on Nov 3, expect recounts and extensive delays before we have a clear winner. https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/here-result-if-polls-are-wrong-2020-they-were-2016

We know that if Trump apparently wins on election day that Biden will not concede without a recount and same thing for Trump.  So there is probably an 80% of a contested election, similar in some ways to 2000, and we won't know the winner until December 14, when the electoral college votes.

According to this, expect recounts in Wisconsin, Georgia, Pennsylvania and Florida.  And probably Michigan and Arizona as well.  So that is 6 states where the election will be fought in the courtroom and it will almost certainly go up to the Supreme Court. Will Amy Cony Barrett (the notorious ACB) recuse herself?  Don't bet on it. 

Will there be riots?  Absolutely.  The riots this summer were just previews.  I don't know why they would riot in Portland, but the Antifa are idiots.  

I really hope that the winner is declared on election night, but I think there is only 20% chance of that happening.

Oh by the way if there is a contested election, I think Trump will be the winner.  Let's say 60% chance that Trump wins in the courts. The Republicans are smarter when it comes to the courtroom and they have the majority in the Supreme Court.

So my new forecast is a 48% chance of Trump winning.  Biden's best bet is a sweep on election night because if he doesn't win on election night, I think the odds are that he loses in the end.

=================

Update: There is also the possibility of a tie 269-269 if Biden wins Michigan and Trump wins Arizona and Wisconsin.  In which case Trump wins.

The Glenn Greenwald Censored Article

Glenn Greenwald, Fearless Investigative Journalist

 Read it here: https://greenwald.substack.com/p/article-on-joe-and-hunter-biden-censored

Publication by the New York Post two weeks ago of emails from Hunter Biden's laptop, relating to Vice President Joe Biden's work in Ukraine, and subsequent articles from other outlets concerning the Biden family's pursuit of business opportunities in China, provoked extraordinary efforts by a de facto union of media outlets, Silicon Valley giants and the intelligence community to suppress these stories.

One outcome is that the Biden campaign concluded, rationally, that there is no need for the front-running presidential candidate to address even the most basic and relevant questions raised by these materials. Rather than condemn Biden for ignoring these questions -- the natural instinct of a healthy press when it comes to a presidential election -- journalists have instead led the way in concocting excuses to justify his silence.

Arizona will decide the election

 

Some people think Trump will win in Michigan.  If this is accurate, (I went on Nate Silver's projection and only clicked on two states, Florida and Michigan for Trump to win), then Trump has a 95% chance of winning (because Trump would then also win Nevada, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Minnesota).

I think FiveThirtyEight.com is too cocky and overdoes the correlations.  They are overstating Biden's chances now and they are also overstating the correlation effect.

So revised forecast.  Trump has a 50% chance of winning each of Florida, Michigan and Arizona, which gives him a 12.5% chance overall of winning.  Actually FiveThirtyEight says Trump's odds are 10%, so that's pretty close.  Anyways I think this will be the map the day after the election.

The Oceanwide Center Fiasco

 

Oceanwide Center

The Oceanwide Center is a 61-story mixed-use skyscraper complex (made of 2 towers) under development in San Francisco.  The tower pictured, with the triangles on it, is supposed to be 910 ft (280 m) tall, which would make it the second-tallest building in San Francisco, after the Salesforce Tower, which is 1070 ft (326 m).

Cool huh?  Not so fast.  The project broke ground in 2016, and was originally supposed to be completed in 2021, then delayed until 2023.  The second tower, which was supposed to be 605 ft, has been cancelled ("suspended indefinitely").  I can't find a current picture of the site, but apparently some work has been done.  Work on it was delayed for some reason and stopped in late 2019.  The project was behind schedule and over budget, and the owner apparently ran out of money.  With the pandemic, the demand for commercial space has disappeared, and the project is no longer commercially viable.

The owner, Oceanwide Holdings, a Chinese company, reached a deal in January 2020 to sell it to another Chinese company (SPF Capital) for $1 billion, subject to due diligence.  However, the sale still has not been finalized.   Another article says that SPF Capital backed out of the deal and another Chinese buyer, Hony Capital, wants to buy it for $1.2 billion ($700 million in cash and the remaining $500 million dependent on future performance of the project).  Now Hony Capital is postponing the deal until November 30th.

Meanwhile, the project sits abandoned, at least for now.  Chinese projects don't necessarily have to be profitable and they may see a skyscraper as an asset, even if no one wants to lease space there.  So there is hope yet that the project will be completed.  But for now, it's an eyesore in the middle of downtown San Francisco.

There is also a failed Oceanwide project in downtown Los Angeles where no work has been done since January 2019.

Florida is the key state

Whoever wins Florida is likely to become the next president.  Florida has 29 electoral votes and counts its vote quickly, so we are likely to know the winner of Florida by midnight on election day and thus who the next president will be.  By the way, Biden has a 70% chance of winning Florida, so we can state that he has a 70% chance of being the next president.

I am playing around with the  270ToWin map, and also the FiveThirtyEight map, and this is what happens to the winner of Florida.  

========================

1. If Biden wins Florida, then he is the next President.  He will have at least 319 electoral votes and there is no way Trump can win.

=======================

2. If Trump wins Florida, then the pathway isn't as clear but it sets off a chain reaction that results in a Trump victory.  The first chain is that other states that are highly correlated with Florida will also go for Trump. These states are Georgia, Iowa and Ohio.  The next chain is that two states that are leaning Biden will go for Trump because of correlation - Arizona and North Carolina.  Also Maine's 2nd District.  Now stop at this point - it looks like Biden has 279 electoral votes and Trump has 259.

But see what happens when probabilities become certainties. Let's choose the winner of each state in this order:  1. Georgia, 2. Iowa, 3. Ohio, 4. North Carolina, 5. Arizona.

At this point, Trump has an 81% chance of getting Maine's 2nd Congressional District so lets give that to him.  Now Trump has a 69% chance of winning Nebraska's 2nd District so give that to him. At this point Trump has a 75% chance of winning Pennsylvania and a 72% chance of winning Wisconsin, so Trump wins.

======================

3. The Nebraska 2nd District seems to be another tipping point, so see what happens if Trump wins Florida but we don't know the winner in NE2.  Go through the first 6 steps above.  At this point, Trump has a 63% chance of winning Pennsylvania, 60% chance of Wisconsin, and 53% chance in Nevada. 538 predicts Trump's overall odds at this point are 77%.  If Trump wins either Pennsylvania or Wisconsin, he has it.  

=====================

4. What is the most likely scenario if Trump wins Florida, and then Georgia, Iowa and Ohio?  Well, he will probably win North Carolina, Arizona and ME-2, but that isn't enough.  It looks like Biden 279 to Trump 259.  So Trump needs just a little more magic besides Florida.  And that is most likely to happen in Pennsylvania.  Trump's best case scenario involves winning these two states.

So let's recalculate.  Trump has a 30% chance of winning Florida and a 13% chance of winning Pennsylvania, calculated separately.  If Trump wins Florida, his chance of winning Pennsylvania jumps to 35%.  Multiply 30% by 35% and you get about a 10% chance of Trump winning.  So I understand Nate Silver's math a little better.

======================

On the other hand, you could say that Trump has a 30% chance of  Florida, and this would give him a 77% chance of winning under the 3rd scenario.  So this would make Trump's odds 23%.  This makes sense to me, so I will say that as of now, Trump has a 23% chance of winning.

Does the United States own the Moon?

The United States is the only country that has sent men to walk on the Moon, with 12 astronauts on 6 space missions between Apollo 11 (which landed on July 20, 1969) and Apollo 17 (which landed on December 11, 1972).  On each landing the astronauts planted a U.S. flag.  No other country has had men walk on the moon or planted flags there.

Does the US claim to own the moon through right of conquest?  There is the Moon Treaty which the US has not ratified and so which is effectively meaningless.  The US did sign the Outer Space Treaty, formally named  "the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies". This treaty provides that no nation can claim sovereignty of outer space or any celestial body.  So it seems that the answer is no.

However, does the Outer Space Treaty prevent the US from licensing companies to mine asteroids and the moon and effectively control it?  The US passed the Space Act of 2015 (formally known as the Commercial Space Competitiveness Act of 2015) which allows US citizens and industries to "engage in the commercial exploration and exploitation of space resources" including water and minerals.  This Act may violate the Outer Space Treaty, but who would decide that?  Could Russia sue the US in the International Court of Justice in The Hague and claim that the Space Act is a violation?  Maybe, but they haven't.  I would argue that the Space Act allows the US to effectively control the moon and asteroids as long as they don't formally claim sovereignty over them.  What is to stop any other country from passing a similar law?  Nothing, but none have except for Luxembourg, which passed an asteroid mining law in 2017. 

Critics of the Space Act claim that: Space exploration is a universal activity and therefore requires international regulation. The act represents a full-frontal attack on settled principles of space law which are based on two basic principles: the right of states to scientific exploration of outer space and its celestial bodies and the prevention of unilateral and unbriddled commercial exploitation of outer-space resources. https://www.iflscience.com/space/who-owns-space-us-asteroid-mining-act-dangerous-and-potentially-illegal/

In 1856, the US passed the Guano Islands Act, which allowed U.S. citizens to take possession, in the name of the United States, of any unclaimed island anywhere on earth, so long as it contained guano.  I think there are certain commonalities between the Guano Islands Act and the Space Act.  We can imagine private space explorers roaming the galaxy looking for gold and minerals and flying the flag of either the United States or Luxembourg.

With this background, read the following article:  "For Sale: The Moon".  This editorial claims that NASA, through its Artemis Accords project, effectively claims ownership of the moon, and is creating private treaties with other countries that recognize this claim and want to share in the bounty.  And thus NASA is creating international space law, effectively violating the Outer Space Treaty and the role of the United Nations.

The Artemis Accords are not merely a code of conduct for foreign space agencies wishing to join NASA's moon program. They represent another prong in what has become a sustained American campaign to legislate international space law unilaterally. That NASA has begun to act as a diplomatic surrogate for the United Nations is a significant — and potentially harmful — milestone in the commercialization of outer space. --https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/521864-for-sale-the-moon

I think NASA would argue that this is a misinterpretation.  The Artemis Accords project is a joint program to land the next man and woman on the moon.  This will be done with the participation of Europe, Japan, Canada, Italy, Australia, UK and the United Arab Emirates.  And the Artemis Accords is their agreement to work together.

I think this is an interesting question - Is the Artemis Accords a "private international space law treaty" or is it just an agreement to go to the moon?  You can read the text of the Artemis Accords here: https://www.nasa.gov/specials/artemis-accords/img/Artemis-Accords-signed-13Oct2020.pdf

See also: https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/10/nasa-builds-support-for-artemis-by-signing-accords-with-seven-countries/

So, to answer the question posed by the title of this post - no, the US doesn't technically own the moon, but it does claims the right to control it, at least for the purpose of exploring it, mining it, and developing it commercially.

The Pollster Who Believes Trump Will Win

 

Robert Cahaly

Robert Cahaly, of Trafalgar Group, believes that Trump will win the election in a couple of weeks.  Here is what he thinks will happen: Trump will win in Iowa, Ohio, North Carolina, Georgia, Florida and Arizona.  He thinks Trump will win Michigan because people don't like the governor.  

And in Pennsylvania, he thinks Trump has a 50% chance of winning. Trump isn’t there yet in Pennsylvania, according to Cahaly. “Right now, we’ve got him down in Pennsylvania,” he says, “I think if it were held today, the undecided would break toward Trump and there’d be some hidden vote. He’d probably win Pennsylvania. But I’m going to give a caveat on only Pennsylvania. I believe Pennsylvania to be the No. 1 state that Trump could win and have stolen due to voter fraud.”

But if Trump wins in Michigan and the other states listed above (and loses Pennsylvania) then he will still win.

Revised election odds - Trump has a 35% chance of winning

 I am using as a starting point The Economist projections at https://projects.economist.com/us-2020-forecast/president.  They think Trump only has an 8% chance of winning.

They see the following swing votes.  Here is the list, their odds and my odds:

• Pennsylvania, D 89%.
• Michigan, D 92%.  The polls have this wrong and this is closer than predicted.  I give Trump a 40% chance of winning Michigan (and Biden 60%).  The Trafalgar poll predicts that Trump will win Michigan 47-46.
• Florida, D 76%.  I think this is virtually a tie with Biden having a slight edge.  I think the odds are D 51% and R 49%.
• Wisconsin, D 91%.  This is much closer than the polls predict.
• Minnesota, D 95%
• North Carolina, D 64%.  I think this is basically a tie.  D 51% and R 49%.
• Arizona, D 67%.  This is fairly close, with the edge to Biden.  I call it D 55%, R 45%.
• Ohio, R 65%
• Georgia, R 55%
• Iowa, R 64%
• Nevada. D 88%
• Texas. R 71%.

To simplify this, I will just assume Trump wins Georgia, Iowa and Ohio (and Texas).  In my previous analysis, I said that Trump had to win, of the remaining states, Arizona, Michigan, Florida, and North Carolina.  So give the rest, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Minnesota (and Nevada) to Biden. Note that if Trump wins Wisconsin, he could swap that for Michigan.

So using my probably flawed methodology, I come up with a 35% chance of Trump winning.  This is also similar to what the gamblers predict.

As usually, the pollsters are way overconfident.

The Fiscal Year 2020 deficit was $3,132 billion

Total revenue for FY2020 was $3,420 billion and total expenditures were $6,552 billion.  See the September 2020 Monthly Treasury Statement. Compare these to FY2019 revenue of $3,462 billion and expenditures of $4,447 billion.  For only the month of September 2020, revenue was $373 billion (compared to $374 billion in Sept 2019) and outlays were $498 billion (compared to $291 billion in Sept 2019).

What was the biggest change from 2019?  The 2020 results were actually pretty similar to 2019, with the exception of April, May, and June.  The expenditures were fairly similar, adjusted for inflation, except for these major areas:

• Dept of Labor: $477 billion in 2020 vs $36 billion in 2019.  This was for unemployment compensation. 
• Dept of Health and Human Services: $1,504 billion in 2020 v $1,204 bn 2019.
• Dept of Education: $204 bn v $104 bn
• Dept of Treasury - Other: $629 bn vs $117 bn.  I think this was for the stimulus payments.
• Small Business Administration: $577 bn vs $456 million.  This was for PPP loans.

So I see 3 major areas of stimulus that show up on the financial statement: 1) Unemployment compensation ($441 bn more than 2019), Treasury ($512 bn more than 2019), and SBA ($577 bn more).  So a total stimulus of $1,530.  So everything else being equal, the 2021 budget would show a deficit of about $1.6 billion, without any stimulus.  Add in a $2 trillion stimulus bill (and it could be a lot more than that) and you are looking at a $3.6 billion deficit in 2021. 

The death of movies

 Movie theaters became popular during the 1920s when ticket prices during a quarter.  During the Great Depression, ticket prices dropped to a dime, but most of the theaters survived.  Today however, the entire industry is dying.  There will be a few specialty theaters that remain open, but almost every mall movie theater and mega cineplex will close forever.  Let's just quickly look at the 3 largest chains: 

AMC is the largest and it will run out of cash by the end of the year and then file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. AMC's revenues are down 85% for the year.  Regal Cinemas, the second largest cinema chain, will close all 536 theaters indefinitely until things return to normal (which may be never).  Cinemark is in denial and claims that things are fine, but the stock market believes that it is facing similar problems to AMC and Cinemark stock dropped 10% on Oct 13.  Marcus Theaters are a very distant 4th, with about 10% of the number of screens as Cinemark and about 72 locations nationwide.  They have more specialty theaters like Movie Tavern, but they have "temporarily" closed 17 locations.

The paradox of fossil fuel shortages

 We (the western world) may run short of oil, coal and other fossil fuels by 2025, and this will cause the economy to decline (or it may be an effect of a shrinking economy that requires less fuel).  This isn't an actual shortage, as there will still be lots of fuel in the ground, instead it is a lack of fuel available for sale because the price is too low to pay for the cost of extraction.

Now if the price is too low, you would assume that raising the price would take care of the shortages.  But this is the paradox - that oil prices remain too low despite shortages.  Why is this?  Because the economy has become bifurcated between industrial workers, who work at energy-intensive jobs, and the elite, who don't require as much electricity.  

That is my explanation of Gail Tverberg's theory:

As the economy approaches limits, prices tend to fall too low for producers, rather than rise too high for consumers. Energy prices tend to fall too low because, as the economy gets more complex, wage and wealth disparity tend to grow, reflecting differences in training and responsibility. The problem occurs because low-paid workers cannot afford to buy very large quantities of goods and services produced by the economy. For example, many cannot afford a car or a home of their own. The spending of high-paid workers does not offset the loss of demand by low-paid workers because high-paid workers tend to spend their wages more on services, such as advanced education, which require proportionately less energy consumption. Ultimately, the lack of demand by low-paid workers tends to pull down the prices of oil and other commodities below the level required by producers.

https://ourfiniteworld.com/2020/09/23/reaching-the-end-of-early-stimulus-whats-ahead/

Henry Ford paid his auto workers more than the going wage rate so that they could afford their own cars, in a virtuous cycle.  This is that cycle in reverse - low paid workers cannot afford to buy what the economy produces, leading to a shrinking in the real economy.

Economic Collapse in Orlando

The aging motels along Florida’s Highway 192 have long been barometers of a fragile economy. In tough times, the motels degenerated into shelters of last resort in a city where low-income housing shortages were among the most severe in the nation and the social safety net was collapsing. Now they were fast becoming places where it was possible to glimpse what a complete social and economic collapse might look like in America.

The pandemic had heaped crisis on top of crisis. The 2008 housing collapse and recession had caused the tourist market to tank at the exact moment the foreclosure crisis was forcing thousands of homeowners and overburdened renters from their homes. Struggling motel owners began renting rooms to the only customers they could find, those who had no place else to go.

But almost nothing was done to address the reality that many service workers had emerged from the recession saddled with stagnant wages, bad credit or eviction records that made it nearly impossible for them to rent an apartment and return to a normal life. Many spent much of the past decade stuck in motels with restful names — the Paradise, the Palm, the Shining Light, the Star, the Magic Castle — that belied an increasingly grim reality for both the owners and tenants who found themselves trapped together.

 https://www.adn.com/nation-world/2020/09/10/a-pandemic-a-motel-without-power-and-a-potentially-terrifying-glimpse-of-orlandos-future/

Orthodoxy in Ukraine

I am interested in this topic because it is so confusing.   Some 87% of Ukrainians are culturally Christian, and most of those are Orthodox Christian, of one of 4 branches.

First there was the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate (UOC-KP),  which was organized in 1992 after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.  Until 2018, it was headed by Patriarch Filaret (Denysenko) and it had about 25% of Ukrainians as members.

Next is the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC) which was organized in 1990 and had Metropolitan Makariy as its head until 2018. It had about 3 million members, which is about 8% of the population of Ukraine.  

Now let's talk about the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) (UOC-MP) which is lead by Metropolitan Onuphrius, subject to oversight by the Patriarch Kirill of Moscow.  It was granted status as a self-ruling (but not autocephalous) church within the Moscow Patriarchate.  It has about 15-20% of Ukrainians as members.  It claims to be the sole canonical Orthodox body in the country and considers the other two bodies to be schismatic.

The first two bodies were merged together in 2018 to form the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), headed by Metropolitan Epiphanius Dumenko.  It was almost simultaneously recognized by the Patriarch of Constantinople Bartholomew on December 15 2018 and then granted authocephaly on January 5 2019.  This act by Constantinople lead to a schism between Moscow and Constantinople.

There is also the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) headed by Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, and is subject to Pope Francis.  This church has about 4 million members, about 10% of the population of Ukraine.  Their services are practically identical to the other churches, following the Byzantine Rite, except they commemorate the Pope instead of the Patriarch of Constantinople or Moscow.

So at this point it is basically a 3-way split, all of them claiming to be the true church for Ukrainians.  What a mess.

Meet the Collapsologists

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/11/humans-werent-always-here-we-could-disappear-meet-the-collapsologists

In 2015, two Frenchmen, Pablo Servigne and Raphaël Stevens, who describe themselves as independent researchers, co-wrote an essay entitled How Everything Can Collapse, in which they introduced the term “collapsology”. 

The movement also cuts across political boundaries, embracing everyone from the far right to the far left. One of the most outspoken collapsologists is Yves Cochet, a politician with Europe Ecology – France’s green party – and a former environment minister in Lionel Jospin’s leftwing government of the early 00s. He has retreated to a farmhouse in Britanny and reputedly has not seen the inside of a plane since 2009. But there are also French “survivalists” who – at least until about a decade ago – shared the drawbridge mentality of the Americans stocking up on peanut butter and ammo.

Unlike Cochet, who claims that things will fall apart in 2030 – in a series of mainly climatic catastrophes that will eliminate half the world’s population – Servigne does not predict when the collapse will happen. Indeed, he thinks we may already have entered the endgame.

Yves Cochet has some writings in English here: https://www.institutmomentum.org/language/en/author/cochet-yves/

Trump could still win

 Read: https://www.zerohedge.com/political/poll-which-correctly-called-2016-election-sees-another-shocking-outcome-november

Here is how:  1. Assume Trump wins Florida, Georgia, Iowa and North Carolina and Biden wins all the votes in Maine.  In Nebraska, Biden gets 1 and Trump gets 4.

2.  Look at the following 5 swing states:  Arizona, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.  Whoever wins 3 of those will win. (The article only mentions Michigan and Pennsylvania).  Here are some possible combinations, but I can't go through all of them:

• Trump wins Ohio, Biden takes the other 4 => Biden 291, Trump 247
• Trump wins Arizona and Ohio, Biden takes the other 3 => Biden 280, Trump 258
• Trump wins Arizona, Ohio and Pennsylvania => Trump 278, Biden 260
• Trump wins Arizona, Ohio and Michigan => Trump 274, Biden 264
• Trump wins Arizona, Ohio and Wisconsin => Biden 270, Trump 268.  This is the exception - it isn't a winning combination.  However, if Trump could get one more vote in Nebraska or Maine, then it would be a tie and Trump would win because he would win in the House. 

So what do the polls say in these 5 states?

• Arizona.  RealClearPolitics average shows Biden +2.7, which is within the margin of error.  Trafalgar shows Trump ahead by 4.0 (47.8% to 43.8%).
• Michigan. RCP shows Biden +6.7, but Trafalgar shows Trump ahead by 0.7 (46.7 to 46.0).
• Ohio. RCP shows Biden +0.6, but Trafalgar shows Trump ahead by 3.7 (47.6 to 43.9).
• Pennsylvania. RCP shows Biden +7.1.  However, it is still possible that Trump could win depending on the turnout.
• Wisconsin.  RCP shows Biden +5.5.  Trafalgar sees Biden ahead by 2.8 (47.7 to 44.9).  An editorial by CNN thinks it is possible that Trump could win, depending on the votes in 3 counties surrounding Milwaukee.

I've never heard of Trafalgar before today and I have no idea if they are on to something, but if I were a Biden campaign strategist I would do some research.

So based on this new information, what are the odds that Trump will win?  It is highly likely that Biden will win in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.  So let's simply this:  Trump must win all 3 of the remaining states.  I think he may win in Arizona and Ohio.  So it all comes down to Michigan, where Biden is slightly ahead.

So my feeling is that there is a 45% chance Trump could win.  This race is way closer than the polls indicate.  It could come down to a few thousand people in Michigan.

See also my prior forecast: Sleepy Joe is going to win.

========================

See also:  Why Trump could win Michigan again

=========================

Update (Oct 14):

The latest polls show that Biden is favored to win Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, while Trump may be able to win Ohio.  As noted above, he must win 2 of the 4 that the pundits have said leans for Biden.  The most likely outcome at the moment is Biden 290 to Trump 248 (assuming Trump wins Florida, Georgia, Iowa, North Carolina, Ohio and the weird 2nd district of Maine).  Trump may be able to win Arizona, but that wouldn't be sufficient, he would still need one more state.

So what I am saying is, that Trump must win both Arizona and Michigan.  I would guess his odds of winning Arizona are 46%, (which is the middle of the 7 polls taken - compared to Biden 48%), and his odds of winning Michigan are 42% (compared to Biden with 50%).  So I am sure this is not statistically correct, but I give Trump a 39% chance of winning (0.46/0.5 * 0.42/0.5 * .5).  The race is down to a few thousand people in Michigan and a few thousand people in Arizona.

According to this scenario, Trump must win in [Florida, Georgia, Iowa, and North Carolina] and at least 3 of the set of [Arizona, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin].

However, it should be noted that Biden is ahead (at least slightly) in an average of the polls in each of the states of  Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Iowa, and Ohio.

=================================

FiveThirtyEight.com puts the odds of Trump winning at only 13%.  It says that the must-win states for Trump, from those listed above are: [Florida, Georgia, Iowa, North Carolina, Ohio and Arizona].  The possible-win states for Trump are: Pennsylvania, Colorado, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Nevada.  Possible combinations are: Pennsylvania OR Michigan OR Minnesota OR Wisconsin OR Colorado + another state OR Nevada + another state.

To restate, to make it comparable to the above, Trump must win in [Florida, Georgia, Iowa, North Carolina, Ohio and Arizona], and at least one of [Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Colorado+Nevada].  This is really almost saying the same thing as above, but it adds Minnesota to the list of possible swing states, which however, I consider unlikely.

Or to state if differently, if Biden wins Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and either Colorado or Nevada, he gets 269 votes, and the rest of the states don't matter.  Of those states, Trump's best bet is Michigan.  If Trump wins Michigan and lots of other things go his way, he wins.  But, Biden can block this with the trifecta of Arizona, Colorado and Nevada.

To go back to my analysis above, if Trump wins both Arizona and Michigan, (and lets add Florida and Ohio to that as well, and I guess Georgia, North Carolina, and Iowa to make it complete), then he has it.  Let's call these the 4 must-win states for Trump.  If Trump's odds are 46% in Arizona, 42% in Michigan, 46% in Florida, 47% in Ohio, 49% in Georgia, 46% in North Carolina, and 49% Iowa, then using the same probably-flawed formula as above, his odds are 30%.  

So that's my revised analysis of the race.  Trump's odds of winning are 30%.  To do so, Trump must win in Arizona, Florida, Michigan, and Ohio, (as well as Georgia, North Carolina and Iowa).  That's a lot better than 13%.

The September 2020 deficit was $124 billion

The federal budget deficit was $3.1 trillion [actually $3.131 trillion] in fiscal year 2020, the Congressional Budget Office estimates.  The federal government incurred a deficit of $124 billion in September 2020—compared with an $83 billion surplus in September 2019.  https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/2020-10/56661-MBR.pdf

This is really bad.  The government almost always has a surplus in September because it receives large amounts of taxes.  This year, the revenue in September was similar to September 2019, but the spending was much greater: $496 billion of outlays compared to $291 bn in Sept 2019.

Question:  has the government ever run a deficit in September before and if so, what year was the last time that happened?  Well let's see:

Sept 2019 $83bn surplus

Sept 2018 $119bn surplus.

Sept 2017 $7bn surplus

Sept 2016 $33bn surplus

Sept 2015 $90bn surplus

Sept 2014 $105bn surplus

Sept 2013 $75bn surplus

Sept 2012 $75bn surplus

Sept 2011 $62bn deficit.  In 2011 the government ran a deficit in every month and had a deficit for the year of $1.296tn.

When was the last monthly surplus before that? That would be Sept 2008 which had a surplus of $45 billion even though the financial crisis began that month.

So we may be looking at 3 years of deficits every single month.

John Mauldin says the National Debt will be $50 trillion by 2030

 Here is his forecast:

Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnmauldin/2020/09/30/to-50-trillion-debt-and-beyond/

My last forecast, following the CBO numbers, was for $33 trillion in debt held by the public by 2030.  If you add $6 trillion in intragovernmental debt you get $39 trillion.  John Mauldin thinks it will be much worse than that.  The main difference is that he thinks revenue (that is, taxes collected) will be much lower than the CBO projects.  (He also thinks spending will be slightly higher). Why would revenue be lower?

We reset revenue to change by the same annual percentages it did in 2008 and the following recession and post-recession years. 

Ok, makes sense.  So we will never see spending less than $5 trillion per year or a deficit below $2 trillion per year again.

But why does it matter if it hits $50 trillion? (There is no limit to the Magical Money Tree).  Mauldin himself isn't worried about it.  He thinks that somehow we will survive as a nation and species.

We have no good choices left. It is as if we are on a trip through a desert and know for certain we don’t have enough water to go back. We have to go forward, not knowing where the desert ends. We are going to learn how much the US can borrow before it all collapses around our ears. I have no idea where that point is. It’s probably a lot more than any of us currently believe. While all of this is happening, we will continue to see accelerating technological transformation.  So yes, I fully understand that $50 trillion or even $60 trillion of US debt is a problem, but I’m not going to ignore the opportunities in front of me. I fully believe that the 100,000+ entrepreneurs who have lost their businesses are not simply going to sit on their derrieres and do nothing. It is in their DNA to launch new ideas. They will keep creating opportunities and jobs. I think of myself as a realistic, rational optimist. I can admit the problems that we have with our government, debt, and political partisanship and still want to be long humanity and believe in a powerful future. You should, too.  https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnmauldin/2020/10/01/5-consequences-of-us-debt-at-50-trillion/

So focus on what happens after the dollar collapses and think about transformation.

M5 for September 30

M5 is a measure of money that includes M2, plus debt held by the public, less Treasuries owned by the Fed.  Here is the current measure:

As of 9/30/2020:
M2 (as of 9/21/20) = 18,720.3
Pub Debt (as of 9/30/20) = 21,015.3
Fed held (as of 9/30/20) = -4,438.8
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Total: 35,296.8

On 8/31/20, this was at 34,821.5, so it is up 475.3 or 1.36%.

In an ideal world, you would want this to expand a tiny bit so interest can be paid on debts.  You wouldn't want it to contract.  But you don't want it to expand too fast either, because inflation is a problem.  I would say that the maximum it should expand is 0.58% per month, which would lead to a doubling every 10 years.  (1.0058^120 = 2.0017)

If the rate of 1.36% continues, then this would lead to a doubling in 52 months, which is just over 4 years.

The current trend is UNSUSTAINABLE and will lead to inflation.  1.0135^12 = 1.176, so  this is a rate of 17.6% per year.  And this is without any stimulus.

Debt could reach 245% of GDP by 2050

 Today, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its 2020 Long-Term Budget Outlook, which shows the federal budget is on an unsustainable long-term trajectory. Overall, the situation is much worse than the agency’s 2019 pre-pandemic projections. CBO’s report shows: 

• Debt Will Nearly Double the Size of the Economy By 2050. Under current law, CBO projects federal debt held by the public will rise from 79 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at the end of Fiscal Year (FY) 2019 to 195 percent by 2050. Under a more realistic scenario, we estimate debt could reach 245 percent of GDP by 2050.

http://www.crfb.org/papers/analysis-cbos-2020-long-term-budget-outlook

I don't think debt will be that high by 2050.  My last projection was 153% of GDP by 2050.  It is obvious that the long-term trajectory is unsustainable.

$21 Trillion in Debt Held By the Public

 As of 9/30/20, the Debt Held By the Public was at $21,018,952,080,385.63 (Source).  It exceeded $20 trillion on 6/3/20, about 4 months ago.  The public debt was at $16.2 trillion on 7/31/19, only 14 months ago, so it has increased $4.8 trillion since then.  It should hit $22 trillion about 5/1/2021, unless there is another stimulus package, which there probably will be.

When was the public debt at $10.5 trillion, half of the current amount?  That was on 1/30/2012.  So it took 8 years and 8 months to double.  Let's just call it 9 years.  So on 9/30/2029, the public debt will be $42 trillion, if current trends continue. 

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The total national debt hit $27 trillion on 10/1/2020.  It was at $13.5 trillion on 9/30/2010, 10 years ago.  So, if current trends continue, it will be at $54 trillion on 10/1/2030.