They clearly can't all be right.

Whether this one poll is an aberration or indicative of a trend remains to be seen. I wouldn't put much faith in it, even though Q is a solid pollster, until there's some corroboration.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/us/2020_democratic_presidential_nomination-6730.html#polls

My educated guess is that it goes down some more, then bounces back up following South Carolina.

A 9 point drop seems like way too much after a horribly mismanaged caucus. I know there's been a drop in general for him, but I have a hard time believing it's anywhere near that steep in such a short amount of time. Individual polls aren't particularly worth worrying about, especially at this stage.

....are two completely different things.

Bernie still got a loooooooong way to go though to get all the support even if Biden drops out tommorrow.

Before I'd switch to Bernie, I'd like to see Amy and then Warren take the lead since they have the best statistical chance to crush Trump.

Finally its a toss up between Pete / Bernie, but odds are not strong once we reach there, sorry ... nothing personal but thats the way I see it.

absolutely eviscerated by the right if he is the candidate. .. they will start with Jane and not stop till they do the same thing to him that they are doing to Joe and his family..




If you really care about his philosophy you are going to have to grow alligator skin.. But I just do not think Bernie is up for this. Biden is, he was with Obama when they did everything they could to destroy him.. I just don't think Bernie has that in him, no one should have to but these are the animals on the right we are dealing with.

my ability to understand. It's beyond me.

Maybe Blomberg will eventually overtake Bernie.

The waiting to figure this out is excruciating.

This is the problem, I respect what Bernie is working towards but in 2020 he might end up with a pyrrhic victory, seems he can take the nomination but can he win the main event? He doesn't really display the cool and calm demeanour that Joe / Amy have and thats what it takes when your on the debate stage 1:1 with Trump.

I listened to a NH woman on the car radio this afternoon and she said she'll probably be making her decision inside the polling booth. Her attitude, she suspected, was not atypical because people she knows are really dismayed about who has the staying power to throttle Trump. Lots of anxiety out there and the clear choice simply is not that clear.

Beating Trump is the driver, however. It's going to be an overly angst-ripe night.

As for Sanders? He would be Mondale 2.0. What a tragedy that would be. For everyone.

He's basically untouchable. They can attack him for his beliefs, but none of them should be surprising to anyone. So the shock factor is gone.

Sander's surge in the polls shows that he's a truly viable candidate. I worry that many moderate Dems are dismissing him without actually thinking about it.

Bernie has been ignored most of his career. When he announced his run for the presidency in 2015, hardly anyone had any clue who he was. He hasn't been vetted in any meaningful manner, certainly not to the extent that the GOP hammered on John Kerry or Hillary Clinton or Al Gore. That's what is in store should he win the nomination.

The GOP is mostly hands-off at the moment because they think (right or wrong) that he would be the easiest to defeat in November. They certainly haven't been "smearing him for decades". They've barely laid a finger on him.

I guess we remember the 2016 election differently.

No one can withstand this for long and not affect polling or performance
Personally I can't imagine the amount of strain, his name everyday being drugged through the mud.

I'm no analyst, but it looks to me like there's an urgency to beat Trump that is superseding all other concerns.

I support Biden but if he can't go the distance the simple fact is that Warren / Amy deserves to be next.

Yes, deserve. They are Democrat women who have proved their viability and DESERVE to be next.

Also, apart from that imagine the fury of enraged Bernie Bro's if a Republican Billlionairre gets nominated. For all their many faults the Bernie Bro's are 95% Democrats and would fall right in line between either Amy / Warren just to get the nutjob out of the Whitehouse.

But Bloomberg?

By lots and lots of commercials from a guy who doesn't mention to Democratic voters his recent stances on issues like Social Security and his recent and copious funding of repub candidates.

The ceiling for Bernie is at about 30% while about 70% will want anybody but Bernie because he bernt too many bridges over the past few years. We will have a much better assessment of the situation after Super Tuesday. I think Biden will be ahead by about 100-150 delegates at that point.

advocacy after four years of Trump.

Not messages, not hope, but accomplishments in decades of service.

I will start with Warren. She already took on the big banks with CFPB. Her baby long before she was elected as our Senior Senator of MA.

the total bills as accomplishments, because most bills introduced don't get to the floor.

Many have become presidents after being governors, so there are no legislative accomplishments, like Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton.

Bernie has mastered the art of the bully pulpit which is a big part of being president. You know that he will be even stronger than Trump in that way and we are going to NEED that terribly after Trump.

Namaste.

Decades of pushing the "conversation" forward. Hmmm.

Me, conversations are great however, I prefer Doers not talkers. This is why I support Senator Elizabeth Warren for President.

That’s all I keep hearing on the DU

FDR the visionary:

That vision included one truly insistent message: He was not a socialist.

Though he never used the term socialism in his speech, Roosevelt’s anger at those who accused him of ideological motivations, of applying an economic theory that was anathema to the United States, exploded from the lectern. In line after line, the fiery president defended his actions as pragmatic responses to the real, glaring needs of a changing society. The rich who criticized him, who cloaked their greed in an affinity for capitalism, were dangerously missing his point. He knew the ideological threats of communism and of fascism were real, and were overtaking democracy in European countries. An etched-in-stone commitment to the status quo would be an invitation to extremists everywhere. By fulfilling the government’s obligation to assist its people, he was instilling confidence in the American system. He was vindicating the Founding Fathers.

Now, in a time of far less suffering and little sense of economic crisis, some Democrats are embracing the very title that Roosevelt shunned. It is, in their eyes, truth in packaging. Their proposals sound much like Roosevelt’s: using the power of the federal government to create a fairer society, in which essential services are subsidized by higher taxes on the wealthy. But unlike FDR, they say that, yes, these programs amount to socialism. The Republicans who inveigh against them aren’t misstating their intentions, as Roosevelt claimed. The GOP may be dead wrong to demonize them—to turn a benignly descriptive word like socialism into a scare word—but, yeah, they’re socialists in pursuit of a socialist platform.
The president’s message was clear: His efforts to protect the ordinary American businessman and worker were solidly grounded in the core principles of “the American system of initiative and profit.” No revolutionary was he. But technology had changed, and the massive scaling of industries had empowered a small group of elites, while disempowering the very masses who had won their freedom in the Revolution. “Against economic tyranny such as this, the American citizen could appeal only to the organized power of government,” Roosevelt continued.
“We seek daily to profit from experience, to learn to do better as our task proceeds,” he said. “Governments can err, presidents do make mistakes, but the immortal Dante tells us that divine justice weighs the sins of the cold-blooded and the sins of the warm-hearted on different scales. Better the occasional faults of a government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a government frozen in the ice of indifference.”

“There is a mysterious cycle in human events,” he declared. “To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny.

“In this world of ours in other lands, there are some people who, in times past, have lived and fought for freedom, and seem to have grown too weary to carry on the fight. They have sold their heritage of freedom for the illusion of a living. They have yielded their democracy.

“I believe in my heart that only our success can stir their ancient hope. They begin to know that here in America we are waging a great and successful war. It is not alone a war against want and destitution and economic demoralization. It is more than that; it is a war for the survival of democracy. We are fighting to save a great and precious form of government for ourselves and for the world.”

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/08/16/democrats-socialism-fdr-roosevelt-227622

He’s had a great and honorable career. He just looks worn out to me, and I’d like to see him go home and enjoy his retirement.

Time to ride that pony off into the sunset.

All of the candidates have a certain amount of baggage that worries me. Baggage is the wrong word BTW, but can't think of another term. What worries me about Bernie is the GOP will have a field day with the "socialist" term. The fact that Trump was elected in the first place shows how easy it is to use fear against a candidate. Buttigieg doesn't have the charisma Obama did to overcome the "lack of experience" label. Warren is smart and down to earth, but she isn't doing well in the polls. Same for Amy Klobuchar. I love Joe Biden, I truly do, but I feel his time has passed.

As I was stewing about this I thought "What sort of VP might help a Presidential candidate win?" and Michelle Obama popped into my head. Imagine Michelle Obama as VP? She has the star power, she brings back fond memories of Obama, she is extremely good on her feet when it comes to Q and A. The list goes on and on. I know there is no way she'd run as VP, but oh how I wish she would.

There is no more of a guaranteed Trump re-election than nominating Sanders, IMO.

At least, I wouldn't be surprised since most of Sanders' own senior staff voted for Stein in 2016.

time around. The 18 to 29 year old voters are four years older this time, and some are 8 years older. Those young adults were more likely to identify as liberals but were less likely to identify as Democrats. They are up for grabs so someone's got to get them.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2016/11/21/how-millennials-voted/

Sanders is beating Trump more than Biden is. Actually the only candidate beating Trump more is Bloomberg.

Amy, Pete, Warren also all beating Trump

Sanders will go down at least as hard as Mondale did.

Probably worse.

Possibly Trump would become the second US president to take the Electoral College unanimously.

That's my opinion. GE polls mean nothing at this point. You'll never convince me he won't lose badly.

I’m not going to lie but to be honest I think Biden has a harder time beating Trump. There is no energy with Biden.

May change my mind once Mike gets in it.

All I've been reading for months is how Joe has to be the one because he was ahead in the GE polls. Now the polls are not so important all of a sudden for some reason.

Point to a single post where I have had anything to say about a poll that was not a general "Meh" because GE polls at this point mean absolutely nothing.

Funny, huh?

The Bloomberg and Obama commercial has been playing for awhile and I just saw a Warren and Obama commercial today

And he needs big drum to beat when he says I will beat him like a drum

This is not a sprint, it is a marathon

Thanks for the thread Autumn.