These are the words of our son during a WhatsApp conversation about the state of politics in the US election, in the wake of President Biden’s poor, some say disastrous, performance in the first Presidential debate. The choice is between two old men, one a convicted felon, serial adulterer, sexual predator, and inveterate liar, while the other is the incumbent about whom there is anxiety if he is physically and mentally fit enough to serve a full term. I know which one I would choose, even if he couldn’t serve a full term. In my opinion, Donald Trump is the greatest threat to American Democracy and world peace at this moment in time.

Interestingly, amid calls from pundits for Biden to step down and Democratic Party politicians panicking after the debate, Alan Lichtman, Distinguished Professor of History at American University, Washington DC, says that is the worst thing they could do. He has written a book called Predicting the Next President: The Keys to the White House. Using thirteen ‘keys,’ or questions asked from the perspective of the incumbent party to answer in binary form, he has correctly predicted Presidential elections since 1984 (the Supreme Court decided the 2000 election, but Gore won the popular vote), and has assessed past elections using the keys going back to 1860, when Lincoln won. Whoever wins the majority of the keys wins the election.

Two of these keys are ‘Is the candidate the incumbent?’ and ‘Has the candidate won a Primary contest?’ For Joe Biden, the answer to both these questions is yes, so he holds these keys. If Joe Biden steps back, the Democrats have lost both these keys, meaning they only need to lose another five to be sure of losing the election. It is too far from 5 November to predict the answers to all the remaining keys, but some are already in Biden’s hands, like the economy. Some are not, such as the ones relating to ‘Incumbent Charisma’ and ‘Challenger Charisma.’ The ‘Third Party Challenger’ key depends on whether RFKJr’s campaign takes off. At the moment, that seems unlikely, in which case it will be in Biden’s hands.

The basis for Lichtman’s assessments is an examination of how elections work, and the pragmatic nature of the electorate. Endless millions are spent on adverts, campaigns across the country, and reading the runes of debates. Lichtman says they are all irrelevant. What matters is how the electorate answers these thirteen questions to themselves, and whoever wins more of the keys wins the election. The binary nature of the questions means that no one key can hold more sway than others. And the questions are not trite. They cover the reality of the present situation in the White House and Congress, the performance of the economy, the military, and the administration, as well as personal questions about the candidates.

While Lichtman is not yet in a position to predict the outcome on 5 November (he will sometime in August), his assessment is that if the Democrats want to win, they must stick with Biden. If they don’t, they are almost certain to lose.

Observant readers will have noticed that I haven’t tried to answer Ian’s question. It is an important one, especially when asked by a young, thinking adult. They do not want to be governed by old men like Biden or Trump. If this is the choice, the system is broken, but no one seems able or willing to fix it.