Presidential Election 2020: Where things stand with one week to go
Pre-election quantitative analysis of the 2020 presidential race: polling averages, battleground state forecasts, and electoral college projections with one week to go.
Current Affairs
Trump’s Base Strategy is Unlikely to Work in 2020. He was Warned
Statistical analysis showing why Trump’s base mobilization strategy was unlikely to succeed in 2020, using demographic data and historical vote share trends.
An Alternative Explanation of the US-Iran Escalation: A War for Public Approval?
A public approval theory of the 2020 US-Iran military escalation: did domestic politics drive Trump’s decision to kill Soleimani?
US-ROK Burden Sharing: You Want Us to Pay What Now?
Analysis of the US-ROK burden sharing dispute: what does South Korea actually owe, and why are the numbers so politically charged?
The whistleblower story is going to get a lot worse
⚠️ This post was written in September 2019 and reflects the political situation at that time. Some details may be outdated. A copy of the whistleblower’s report to the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community was released this morning. I don’t have a lot to add beyond the analyses that are circulating around various media … Read more
Democratic Presidential Candidates and Iran
Much of the Democratic Presidential debates have not focused on foreign policy, but the United States’ policy towards Iran has pivotal implications for Iran, the Middle East generally, European foreign policy, as well as the choices Russia and China make in the region. As such, knowing the candidates’ positions towards Iran allows us to understand their goals, likely choices in a similar crisis, and the shape of their overall foreign policy agenda. To better understand that, I have collected a summary of the top ten Democratic candidates’ stated positions towards Iran.
Natural (base) selection: The potential costs of a U.S. military base in the Galapagos
Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Charmaine Willis, Andrew Stravers, and Carla Martinez Machain. Environmental activists were shocked to learn over the summer that the U.S. military will soon be deploying counternarcotics forces to an airfield on the island of San Cristóbal, in the Galápagos Islands of Ecuador. The Galápagos, known for inspiring Darwin’s … Read more
Politics and Peer Review in AMLO’s Mexico
Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Alissandra Stoyan and Carla Martinez Machain. They are, respectively, an assistant and an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at Kansas State University. On February 21st, Mexico’s Fondo de Cultura Económica (a not-for-profit publisher partially funded by the Mexican Government that is often referred to as … Read more
On H.R. McMaster’s Tenure as National Security Adviser
Last week President Trump tweeted that his National Security Adviser, Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster, would be leaving the administration and would be replaced by John Bolton. McMaster is Trump’s second National Security Adviser since taking office, replacing former Lieutenant General Michael Flynn after the latter’s departure. As I noted in a previous post on Rex … Read more
On Rex Tillerson’s Tenure as Secretary of State
On Tuesday, President Trump issued a tweet announcing that Rex Tillerson would be replaced as Secretary of State by current CIA Director Mike Pompeo. That Tillerson would be replaced as Secretary was not exactly news—reports of the tense relationship between Tillerson and the President date back several months at this point. What was surprising was the … Read more