If you built a function that predicts a candidate’s chances of victory, you would find that it strongly favors an incumbent.
Furthermore, if you had to build a function that predicts a candidate’s chance of winning a primary when the incumbent isn’t running, you would find that it strongly favors the sitting vice-president.
So if three years ago a political scientist had to predict the person most likely to win in 2024, they should have chosen Biden. Especially if they had to predict, in 2021, the person most likely to win a rematch of the 2020 election.
And if they predicted that Biden would not seek re-election, then they should also predict that Harris would become the nominee.
Now, perhaps there is data in 2024 indicating uncertainty about a Biden victory. But that data would not have been available three years ago. So I’m not sure it does much good to argue that we should have made a different decision then. And frankly, I’m not even sure we got it wrong.
If you built a function that predicts a candidate’s chances of victory, you would find that it strongly favors an incumbent.
Furthermore, if you had to build a function that predicts a candidate’s chance of winning a primary when the incumbent isn’t running, you would find that it strongly favors the sitting vice-president.
So if three years ago a political scientist had to predict the person most likely to win in 2024, they should have chosen Biden. Especially if they had to predict, in 2021, the person most likely to win a rematch of the 2020 election.
And if they predicted that Biden would not seek re-election, then they should also predict that Harris would become the nominee.
Now, perhaps there is data in 2024 indicating uncertainty about a Biden victory. But that data would not have been available three years ago. So I’m not sure it does much good to argue that we should have made a different decision then. And frankly, I’m not even sure we got it wrong.