amiright?

The primaries? They're scattered over months next year. That's how we do it. Very likely, though, the outcome will be clear on March 2.

you might have a lock on your candidate winning.

For me, either Clinton or Sanders would be fine. I'll be an active supporter of the nominee. I like them both. I think Clinton has a better chance in the GE, which is why I'm supporting her in the primaries.

themselves a progressive or a liberal. No real progressive or liberal would NOT vote for the Democratic nominee in 2016

Since Clinton is NOT a progressive or liberal on far too many issues to count, then a progressive or liberal would be justified in voting for a more progressive candidate, like Jill Stein. I'm sure there are others.

Don't feed me crap and call it caviar. I'm tired of that canard.

in 2016. The three candidates we have against the republican candidates make that statement obvious

I am really tired of that talking point some seem to regurgitate. Some people can rationalize and fool themselves with that bullshit, but the reality is if any one of the republican candidates wins in 2016, the liberal values will be history for decades. The Supreme Court if nothing else will insure that.

Ironically, the only ones that seem to have a problem with that on DU are some supporters of a certain candidate. I have NOT seen the other supporters of other candidates on DU say that. That speaks volumes in and of itself.

cutting ones nose off to spite their face. That went real well when much of labor went for Reagan over Carter.

or progressive with a democrat. Often, they are neither the same nor actually agree on many issues. People vote for their own interests, except some republicans, and not all democrats have the same or similar stripes. So your premise is naive at best and seriously faulty at worst.

It will put the liberal cause decades behind, and thus to not vote for the Democratic nominee in 2016, is NOT a liberal action, and the effect would be at best ignoring reality

Neither party can win without the Independents, and I'm betting more Independents changed to Democrat just so they could vote for Bernie in the primary. I know I did. And the Independents have a lot of Democrats who say "the party left me". Would they vote for Hillary? We know that the Republicans won't. Plus, there are a huge number of people who really, really don't like Hillary and will only vote for down ticket candidates, but not Hillary.


Republicans 28%
Democrats 30%
Independents 39%

Republicans including leaners 42%
Democrats including leaners 44%


http://www.gallup.com/poll/15370/party-affiliation.aspx


Z

any of the republican candidates, and that if any of the republican candidates win, I have no doubt that Roe V Wade would be overturned, Brown VS. the board of education would be completely invalidated, and all the other issues relating to civil rights, gender rights, and other rights that were fought for and won in the sixties.

I honestly don't think Hillary can win. Hell the only reason she won her seat in New York is because she was the only dem candidate with any backing. New York is blue, and they'll elect any dem, which is why we still have Schumer. No one really liked her, and she didn't do much for the state. The only good thing I can say about her is that she kept her promise not to run in her first term as Senator.

I don't think she's much of a fighter, except when she's trying to save her own skin.

Z

As far as I can tell you are just a troll for Clinton reminding us over and over how she is leading in the polls and hoping to convince us there is not much difference. I do not think anyone who actually looks at this and says it would be fine no matter whether Clinton or Bernie wins the nomination. Are you saying that a candidate who wants to remove the oligarchy who are the prime donors for the other candidate is not different? I will never believe another word you say after that oversimplification which I suspect meets Hillary's camp agenda.

Also if you'd like to compare the voting records of Sanders and Clinton, you will find that they voted the same 93% of the time. That is not much difference, especially when you account for the fact that a significant number of those votes were on immigration where Clinton was voting with the majority of the Democratic party and Sanders was voting against the majority of the Democratic party.

Additionally Clinton was ranked the 11th most liberal senator when she was in the Senate. Sanders was ranked the most liberal, but it's far more liberal than most Sanders supporters actually admit.

So yes, looking at facts does show that Sanders and Clinton are not that different. No matter how much Sanders supporters may not like hearing it. So rescind your sad sack accusation that MineralMan is a troll as you have provided exactly nothing to substantiate your falsehood.

By posting a simple and reasonable acknowledgement of political reality, you're obviously a troll. I've suspected it all along.

You ruined my evening. sigH.

And why do the focus group numbers mirror the online poll numbers? Please explain.

The answer is actually self-explanatory, but I'm not going to spend my time explaining what should be obvious to anyone.

By the discrepancies between focus groups/online polls and corporate polling?

I understand how both work. Seeya.

In fact, everything you say amounts to "HILLARY WILL WIN GET OVER IT HIPPIES!"

is not one I want to extend. The differences are simple. Others have already laid those differences out. I'm not feeling like repeating those explanations.

I've made a prediction about the Democratic primaries. It's an opinion. In the end, I'll either be correct or incorrect. However it turns out, I'll be working hard for the nominee, whoever it is.

I was and remain quite fond of hippies.

I bet it's hard to see much of anything with your head stuck in there, though.

Haven't seen anyone do that but BS supporters themselves. I find that strange.

seriously, it's very apprent why you like Bernie so much, you also subscibe to the "repetition theory".

Sootaloo, I've done nothing to deserve this "persons such as yourself" accusation.

It's the gods' truth that I started out very interested in Bernie, signed up for the Bernie forum, and was driven away by the incredible hostility shown to All Things Not Bernie. When I said "You people have completely lost your way," I got banned with a lot of neener-neener follow-up comments, but at that point I really did not care any more.

I don't call people hippies or trailer trash (some of my best friends, etc etc), but on occasion I have been known to say people are assholes. Present company excepted, of course.

And that you were totally unfairly persecuted and hounded for very mild, thoughtful criticisms.

Fact is though? That's what we get called by Clinton supporters. And since you just told me that you base your candidate support on the other supporters, i can only take away that you fully accept and endorse such rhetoric.

Focus groups, like most online polls, are dependent on whatever volunteers are handy.

And Bernie clearly has some very dedicated supporters.

Sure they are. Every single one.

They are alchemy at best.

So every non corporate poll and focus group on earth is part of a big conspiracy against Hillary. lol

When multiple "corporate" polls are assessed together, as Nate Silver does, the results have been shown to closely predict election results.

Non-random focus groups have never been shown to do that.

They are skewed according to what the entity paying for the polling wants.

that is paid for by TV stations and newspapers, not by political candidates.

They are considered outdated and alchemy at best. The future is mobile and online polling, according to experts.

have predictive value.

Focus groups do not have predictive value and are not representative of a larger group. But they are useful to pollsters in that they can suggest questions to be asked in future statistically-based large-scale random surveys.

The 1 % efforts to silence anything to the left of the centre are reaking of desperation.

I agree on the Dem side.

have no clue who the GOP nominee will be. Could be Mitt Romney for all I know. Could be Ted Cruz, damn his eyes. I just have no idea. In reality, I don't much care. Clinton will beat any of them, in the end.

the one they will try and use to convince people they arent racists.

My money's on it not being Trump, though. Beyond that, I can't predict.

I have no money to bet, frankly.

Republican candidate, they'll go with Cruz.

Both are unqualified to lead this country, though.

He's got a strong strategy going behind the scenes, and he's got a Spanish family name. It's between Rubio and Cruz, but I think most Republican backers don't believe Rubio is old enough. I think they'll go with Cruz. Being Hispanic/Latino is a plus, what with the Hispanic/Latino demographic being the fastest growing constituency in the nation.

The only way they'll float Cruz is if Sanders becomes the Dem nominee.

Note: I have never expressed a preference here for a 2016 Democratic presidential candidate -- the environment here is far too toxic. I am only responding to your hypothetical. And I find it amazing that I should feel that I would have to post this caveat on DU.

The only thing I have expressed about 2016 is that I will support the Democratic nominee.

No need to work on GOTV, or actually go to the polls ourselves. It's a done deal. MM says so! We can just laze around and await the inevitable.

that question? There is a discussion ongoing. I've made my opinion clear on how I think it will go on the Democratic side, but it's just my opinion. Others have different opinions. All opinions can be posted here.

As have been a lot of your questions of late. When you aren't pretending to be a "Lake Wobegon-style" poster.

So I'm giving your "question" all the answer it deserves.

Just another Hillary troll trying to act as if we are still voting for the less of the two evils, when in fact there is an honest authentic candidate who will work for us, not the billionaires. Go Bernie!

I think it's probably a long shot though, since he's a two-time loser.

That may be a bit simplistic, but I think that is what it is.

HOPE she'll lose in the primary are Republicans.

But the vast majority of Americans are excited that it's looking good that she's going to win both the primary and the general election!

None. Zilch. Nada.

It may be anecdotal, but it seems anecdotal all over and that is most people I talk to, text with, see on political boards, etc., see far more Bernie stickers, signs and support in the real world. My own experience is the same. I see a Bernie sticker nearly every day - on different cars or in different yards - and I've only seen three Hillary stickers on anything. I live in a light blue city in a red state where most people tend to vote for the status quo, so, that I'm seeing this shows he has the excitement.

She's a real yawner.

But, you're right about some excitement. If she's the nominee, the Republicans will crawl naked over broken glass for the chance to vote against her. She'll lose Ohio, North Carolina, Florida and Colorado. Over.

circle--perhaps get out of you bubble. Just a friendly suggestion.

I hear from a lot of different people given what I do for a living. I also have to travel some. I've seen it - or lack of it.

Trust me.

glass to vote against her. They won't do that against Bernie.

Obama won because he got out every black vote available in VA. The lines at my polling place had black neighbors in it that I had NEVER seen voting before, and sadly, I haven't seen them since. People will come out for historic votes that mean something to them, but when that reason goes away . . .

And Clinton, even though she would also be a historic President, probably won't bring out women in the way that Obama brought out black people -- mainly because a larger percentage of women than blacks are Republican. I have no idea why, but there you have it. IMHO, women who vote for pubs are voting for their own slavery, but whatevs.

DC area folks know how dangerous a Republican in the WH can be.

can really seesaw back and forth.

Hillary has a large and growing support network already. I believe your sample may well be too small, generally. DU and similar sites are not indicative of national political leanings. Not even close.

everyone I've spoken to who supports Hillary Clinton isn't jumping up and down in the streets simply because they've already and solidly made up their minds and will be voting and supporting her. There's a degree of peace and confidence in knowing that, and it makes dancing in the streets unnecessary.

We already know Hillary Clinton, and we trust her to be our president. We remember the good economic years of President Bill Clinton (specifically the Black community), and even though we're not supposed to link her husband's presidency accomplishments to her, when looking for bright spots, that's the natural human thing to do.

Peace and prosperity; Justices Bader-Ginsberg and Breyer; a booming economy; and the 1995 Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) changes that stopped discrimination against minorities in "less affluent" districts and what helped minorities borrow in order to become homeowners are all things we remember and want more of.

We also know she'll expand on President Obama's domestic policies - like immigration reform and the PPACA - improving upon them.

So pardon us if we're not running around dancing in the street, but don't take that quiet for not being excited. We are. Very. Don't let yourself be fooled there's no excitement for Hillary Clinton because you'll otherwise be in for a huge surprise come the end of January 2016.

A fair number are excited about having a woman president.

Well done.

I appreciate that.

I do not believe she can possibly win the general election. I think she's going to secure the nomination and then because she can't actually abandon all those stolen moderate-Republican principles that she actually believes, she's going to cost us the GE.

I just want her gone from this race. At any cost, before she can do actual harm by putting a Republican in the Presidency.

It's data-driven analysis.

A) polling only includes likely Democratic voters, and some believe that there will be a surge of non-voters this year who have not been accounted for, or who previously voted Republican, despite the fact that the voting behavior of both groups has been predictable for over a generation.

B) online polls, despite being notorious toward skewing toward self-selected sampling, have more validity: confirmation bias.

C) HRC is paying for more frequent polling than usual to give an impression of winning, despite the fact that most national polling outfits do weekly polling and probably have going back several elections.

D) Something something oligarchy. Verb noun Hillary Clinton.

I don't believe any of what I posted, it's a compilation.

I think Hillary will win the primaries in the end.even if Sanders wins Iowa or NH the schedule becomes harder for him. I just don't see him winning this.

But this is just mho.

eom

I use them as a tool to gauge voter preferences at some point in time, and watch trends in them. I'm not close enough to anyone to cudgel them, in any case. My words here are no more meaningful than anyone else's. I post my opinions because I have them and I'm active on this website.

Everyone who identifies as a Democrat or progressive is welcome to post their opinions here, as far as I know. You can freely post your opinions, too.

eom

person being polled. I measure the accuracy of pollsters by their histories. Some are better than others at getting actual voting numbers right. If you're looking for conspiratorial things, you'll always be able to find them, of course.

eom

someone they really don't want, like Trump. I know the PTB are incensed that Jeb has been acting like he was dragged into the race against his will; he WAS dragged in, but he was supposed to buck up and take one for the GOP team, not act like a whiny toddler. But who else do they have? The rest of them are complete nutjobs like Trump, although Trump doesn't seem to have the religious baggage. Will they draft a GOP governor or Senator? Will they beat up Jeb in a back room somewhere until he agrees to act like he wants to be President? Damn, they have a problem.

Two years ago I predicted that 2016 would be Clinton vs. Bush. I think that is still very, very possible. After all, who is the RW going to vote for -- Hillary? Don't think so. Many voters on both sides will just stay home, for very good reasons.

Personally, I'd like to see Trump run third party to siphon off GOP votes.

But that won't do her any good in the general election since most Americans have a negative opinion of her honesty and integrity. A lot of things will come out in the GE campaign that a compliant press can keep under wraps in the primaries.

If nominated she would lose the election to any republican, including Trump.

In fact, I think it is just the opposite, which is why I'm supporting Clinton. I think you're going to be surprised. That's what I think.

Due to the Republican winner-take-all system, all he needs is a plurality of the vote in most states, and he's running nearly at 40% of Republicans. Unless some major candidates decide to drop out, and purposefully endorse rivals in their same "lane", there will not be any coalescing around more traditional candidates.

Please understand who is #2 and #3 in the race: Cruz and Carson.

Republicans have officially gone completely off their rockers.

- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community

// Hillary is such a lock, it's not even funny.

And they've been quiet as hell!

If they don't like what's on offer, they'll make their own selection.

...in all national polls and every single state poll--in the 2008 primary.

It's not like we've never seen this before. We have.

The Dem primary dynamics are different than the Republican dynamics.

We've got Hillary--a candidate who has run for President before and who has been viewed as the "frontrunner" since the day she lost the 2008 Democratic primary to Obama. It's been nearly eight years of the media touting Hillary as "inevitable" and as the most serious Democratic candidate running for the nomination.

So, it makes sense that her poll numbers are, in large part, fueled by the media reporting that she'll, of course, run again in 2016.

Her 2008 poll numbers (again winning in every national and state poll) were largely augmented by Americans being told repeatedly that she was inevitable.

Support for Hillary is very tepid. Inevitability only gets you so far. Obama was inexperienced but he was able to secure the nomination. It doesn't take much to beat Hillary. Just someone else running for the Democratic nomination.

I see 2016 as more harrowing for Hillary Clinton. A good portion of voting Democrats were toddlers when Bill Clinton was President. They see the Clintons as a part of the past. They see Bernie as the future. Since 2008, there have been drastic shifts in media habits. Most people ignore the media and get their news from social media. That whole "inevitable" meme is less powerful than it was in 2008. In fact, it's viewed as ridiculous. People wanted change in 2008 and they voted for Obama. I think the hunger for change is even more ravenous now. And Clinton is NOT viewed as a change candidate; Bernie is.

As far as all of these polls--How can you put so much stock in them, when they meant absolutely nothing in 2008? If we learned anything from 2008, it's that Hillary's command of the polls was meaningless.

message of Hope and Change --his personality, his humor and his backing of many major Democratic Leaders (which Sanders is have lots of problems with--they simply are not there expect for a few).

Clinton is ABOVE 50% (unlike in 2008) and her numbers ate RISING (unlike in 2008); the ONLY way Sanders can win is 1) if he peels away votes from Clinton or 2) these secret voters, unknown to polling (and apparently to Sanders) mysteriously show up at the last minute.

To try to head off the people with low reading comprehension, let me make clear: I am not saying that all of Clinton's supporters are unenthusiastic. I know she has some passionate supporters. What I'm saying is in the other direction -- that just about all of the people who are unenthusiastic, and/or who are supporting a candidate because they haven't thought much about the race yet, are currently supporting Clinton.

Many Democrats have figured since sometime in the late spring of 2008 that she would be our nominee in 2016. She's been around forever and has high name recognition. Sanders has been only on the periphery of the national scene, and O'Malley is even less well known. I believe that some of Clinton's current supporters can be peeled off by one of the other candidates. By contrast, just about no one who's now supporting Sanders or O'Malley can learn anything new about Clinton that will induce them to switch to her side.

This is by way of answering your question of how people can think, when not one single vote has been cast, that the current poll leader might not win. My personal opinion is that some of Clinton's supporters can be peeled off but probably not enough. She still has the advantages of name recognition and familiarity; her dark-money PAC gives her a big financial edge; and it's just about unheard-of for a candidate with such overwhelming support from the party establishment to fall short of the nomination. Her challengers must rely on mobilizing the rank and file, and, historically, that's hard to do. It's especially hard given that Clinton was to some extent ambushed in 2008 and appears to have learned valuable lessons from that defeat.

Nevertheless, I do think the she's-inevitable-or-nearly-so meme is overstated. She's probable. That's it.

Trump, in his support, is just about the reverse of Clinton. Until practically the day he announced, no one expected him to run, let alone become the front-runner, let alone remain the front-runner for months. Very few of his supporters are people who just drifted into supporting him. He's repeatedly shown that they're enthusiastic enough that they stick with him after events that would sink any other candidate (dissing Mexicans, dissing John McCain, and on and on and on). If the field continues totally fragmented, he will at a minimum pick up a good bloc of delegates. As ConservativeDemocrat pointed out in #72, the Republican winner-take-all primaries later in the season will be a factor. Trump's weakness is that he has little prospect of expanding his support (not being a common second choice when other candidates drop out), but his current support might well be sufficient to get him all the delegates in states like Florida, especially if Bush and Rubio are still splitting the hometown vote. In other states, those two and Cruz will split the votes of those who want a more or less conventional politician, i.e., someone who's held statewide elective office already.

I think the odds are against Trump being nominated. Still, I can see a path to the nomination for him.

We in New Jersey don't vote until June. If the Democratic race is effectively over by then but the Republicans are still battling, I might well take a Republican ballot and vote for Trump. IMO he or Carson would have much less chance of winning in November (against any Democrat) than would one of the conventional politicians. So, count mischief-making Democrats as an additional source of Trump support.

Is a really dangerous strategy. Unexpected events can throw the general into chaos and produce unpredictable results. Say you end up with Clinton-Trump in the general and something terrible happens like Clinton is taken ill just before voting day. It'd be bad enough to end up with a Republican in the White House but even in the GOP clown car there are degrees of unpleasantness.

If I had to pick the President from the current Republican field, I'd lean toward Pataki -- but I don't expect the Pataki juggernaut to become a real threat to win the nomination.

Cruz is a total RWNJ and, in my estimation, a True Believer in those views. I would definitely rather see Trump as President than Cruz.

Bush and Rubio are less sincere than Cruz. Their principal concern in the Oval Office, from Day One, would be re-election, not pushing a right-wing agenda. The trouble is that their most obvious path to re-election would be to do as the party told them, which would mean usually pushing a right-wing agenda.

Trump is more mercurial and more independent. My guess is that he'd be less doctrinaire than any of those three.

Of course, it's an appalling choice to contemplate, even in a hypothetical. The way I'm leaning now, though, in contemplating the degrees of unpleasantness in the clown car, is that Trump would be horrible, Bush or Rubio would be even worse, and Cruz would be the worst of all.

The best outcome for us would be for Trump to run third party. Alas, I think the chances of that are very, very small.

I'd take Trump over Cruz in a heartbeat for those same reasons.

And odds are, you're right about Hillary. But I'll be pushing for Bernie until it's over.

Clinton will not lose the primaries. Bernie's supporters know this.

Trump does not have the support to be the nominee, but some people hope he will be the nominee. They are Democrats, who see him as easy to beat, or they are bigots, who want that type of hateful person for President.

I know, and you do too, that a week can be an eternity in politics. Weird, unpredictable things happen all the time. Frontrunners can be toppled for freakish reasons. But the polls, and common sense are telling you the right things, MM.

Lots of first time people in the process. Second, Sanders is catering to LIV's. It's the political discourse you are going to get from them. Things like how Sanders will win all fifty states. Sanders is so great for POC that they must be suffering from Stockholm if they don't vote for him. Sanders has accomplished so little simply because he is so great. My favorite, in a discussion about corporate influence where a Sanders supporter flat out lied, they said "I relied on Google."

My big fear is the general. I don't think she generates enough excitement to get Democratic voters to the polls. I think it will be like a midterm election and Republicans will take everything because turnout is low.

and re Trump, raw percentage of vote means nothing in elections that lack runoffs (most American elections, and all presidential contests at any level, primary or GE). He's far ahead of his nearest rivals. He's as steady as Romney was in 2012, and everyone is oscilliating around him.

If the numbers aren't there, I look at where they are. Things never move as quickly as I'd like. Otherwise we'd have most of the things we're fighting for already. Numbers tell the story of what the public is ready for, when they're ready for those things. Right now, the numbers say that Democrats are ready for Hillary Clinton to be President. They say that pretty clearly. Is she the ideal? No. Is she the most likely to win against Republicans? I think so. The numbers seem to show that. So she gets my support in this primary cycle.

Who knows how many more presidential elections I'll live to see? As always, I want the Democrats to win this one.

Nate Silver does not think that Trump will be the nominee and has some fun comments http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/dear-media-stop-freaking-out-about-donald-trumps-polls/

An early AM dose of the MM.
Good Morning.

EVERYONE says Hillary will be the nominee. Bernie Sanders is just this cute old man that has no chance in the mainstream media. Otoh most people think Trump will blow it and one of the traditional politicians will pull it out.