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Wow!!! What a total food fight that was. Did anyone hear what the candidates were saying as they shouted down each other? The dems are never going to coalesce around whoever emerges as the nominee.

My favorite blunder of the night was Biden saying that half of our population was killed by guns since 2007. Second was Klobachar claiming she wrote a bill and Bernie telling her he wrote the bill. Third was Klobachar responding that they had "2 hours" when Bernie asked how many hours do you got when asked to explain how he is going to pay for his proposals.

I'm not a fan of polls especially for this president because the "cancel" culture keeps many voters silent in their support of the President but I keep seeing posts in here about the polls and how Trump has never been over 50%. The fact is though, the day Trump was inaugurated his RCP approval rating was 37.5% and recent polls have him at 52% approval rating. His approval rating has recently just gone higher than his disapproval rating, too. Trump's approval rating is higher than Obama's was at the same point in his first term, too. Multiple polls have Trump's approval in the Black community at over 30% which "IF" they turn out and vote anywhere close to 20% for him, he wins in a landslide.

idhawkman wrote:Wow!!! What a total food fight that was. Did anyone hear what the candidates were saying as they shouted down each other? The dems are never going to coalesce around whoever emerges as the nominee.

My favorite blunder of the night was Biden saying that half of our population was killed by guns since 2007. Second was Klobachar claiming she wrote a bill and Bernie telling her he wrote the bill. Third was Klobachar responding that they had "2 hours" when Bernie asked how many hours do you got when asked to explain how he is going to pay for his proposals.

I'm not a fan of polls especially for this president because the "cancel" culture keeps many voters silent in their support of the President but I keep seeing posts in here about the polls and how Trump has never been over 50%. The fact is though, the day Trump was inaugurated his RCP approval rating was 37.5% and recent polls have him at 52% approval rating. His approval rating has recently just gone higher than his disapproval rating, too. Trump's approval rating is higher than Obama's was at the same point in his first term, too. Multiple polls have Trump's approval in the Black community at over 30% which "IF" they turn out and vote anywhere close to 20% for him, he wins in a landslide.

As my dad was so fond of saying, people that live in glass houses shouldn't throw rocks. Over the past 4 years, Donald Trump has committed so many blunders and gaffes, some so ridiculous and outrageously false that they go beyond laughable, that the effect of a few of them by the Dems puts them on the same scale as trying to raise the level of the ocean by peeing in it. At least none of the Dems gave us a history lesson about airports during the Revolutionary War or showed us a map of the projected landfall of a hurricane altered with a Sharpie.

I didn't watch the debates last night. I've listened to all of the candidates individually and read a lot of their proposals, but that kind of forum, a free for all with a half dozen or so participants, rarely results in any meaningful understanding of positions. Like you said, it's usually just a food fight. I'll wait until after the convention and watch the one-on-one debates.

I'd like to see these "multiple polls" of yours. Since you mentioned RCP, their most recent average shows Trump with a 46.3 approval and 50.6 disapproval. Only one, Rassmussen (surprise surprise), shows him over 50% approval. But I do agree that he's showing some improvement, not completely unexpected during the Democratic primary battle as the Dems are, as you noted, preoccupied with each other rather than being focused on Trump.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epoll ... -6179.html

RiverDog wrote:As my dad was so fond of saying, people that live in glass houses shouldn't throw rocks. There are so many blunders and gaffes that Trump has made over the past 4 years that the effect of a few of them by the Dems puts it on the same scale as trying to raise the level of the ocean by peeing in it.

I didn't watch the debates last night. I've listened to all of the candidates individually and read a lot of their proposals, but that kind of forum, a free for all with a half dozen or so participants, rarely results in any meaningful understanding of positions. Like you said, it's usually just a food fight. I'll wait until after the convention and watch the one-on-one debates.

I'd like to see these "multiple polls" of yours. Since you mentioned RCP, their most recent average shows Trump with a 46.3 approval and 50.6 disapproval. Only one, Rassmussen (surprise surprise), shows him over 50% approval. But I do agree that he's showing some improvement, not completely unexpected during the Democratic primary battle as the Dems are, as you noted, are preoccupied with each other rather than being focused on Trump.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epoll ... -6179.html

According to RCP, who was the closest pollster to the 2016 election? I know you already know the answer to this but just in case you forgot I'll remind you. Yep, it was Rassmussen. https://thehill.com/media/306721-rasmussen-calls-itself-most-accurate-pollster-of-2016

That said, with Sanders alienating the Jewish vote by his comments last night and Trump boosting his standing in the Jewish community by moving the US Embassy and with Jarrod's peace plan for the mid east (that was smothered by the impeachment coverage), combined with his in-roads with Black and hispanic voters, you start to see cracks in the NY and NJ voting blocks. Bernie lost Florida to Trump last night with his support of Castro, too. Hard to see how Bernie can win in the general and stealing the nomination from him will alienate the youth vote and hard left from voting for the ordained nominee that the DNC will put up.

Personally, I hope it is Bernie because he will have no coat tails down ballot as an Independent (socialist) masquerading as a democrat.

I know you folks won't watch this but these two African Americans sum up the debate last night pretty well. NOTE: These are not Republican's in fact the first lady was on Bernie's staff in 2016.

https://video.foxnews.com/v/6136091433001/?playlist_id=930909787001

idhawkman wrote:According to RCP, who was the closest pollster to the 2016 election? I know you already know the answer to this but just in case you forgot I'll remind you. Yep, it was Rassmussen. https://thehill.com/media/306721-rasmussen-calls-itself-most-accurate-pollster-of-2016

You must not have read that article very closely, so let me break down some of the details for you:

At least one statement is not accurate. It says "Clinton won the popular vote by 1 percentage point, even though Donald Trump beat her on electoral votes." Clinton won the popular vote, 48.2% to 46.1%, or 2.1%.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Unit ... l_election

Also, it said in the last paragraph.."Most other polls tracked by RealClearPolitics showed Clinton leading by three or four points." and earlier in the article it said "Rasmussen had Hillary Clinton up 2 points on Donald Trump."

That's a difference between polls of one or two points, which is insignificant as it's within the margin of error. Most polls have an error margin of plus or minus 3%, so while it's technically correct to say that Rassmussen was the most accurate, it's misleading to claim that they were better at gauging this or future elections because of it.

Virtually all of the polls correctly called the nation wide popular vote in the 2016 election. Some of the statewide polls in the critical swing states, in particular Wisconsin, were off by quite a bit. What was outrageous was these asinine "chance of victory" percentages that pegged Hillary with a 95% chance or so of winning the election even though the polling data in many of the critical swing states like PA, MI, FL, and NC, all eventually won by Trump, had the race as too close to call, or in other words, inside their margin of error.

Here's an article by Gallop that summarizes the results of the polling during the 2016 election. It also gives a good explanation as to why state wide polls are more problematic:

National Polling Accurately Nails Popular Vote

https://news.gallup.com/opinion/polling ... -vote.aspx

Per your clarification then, Rassmussen had Hillary up by 2% and she won the popular vote by.... 2%? Hmmm....

I want the Dems to get their nomination picked. I'm hoping for Bernie. I want to see Crazy Town fight each other. One thing about Bernie is he'll go at Trump. We'll see two crazy old men going back and forth. Should be a blast.

idhawkman wrote:Per your clarification then, Rassmussen had Hillary up by 2% and she won the popular vote by.... 2%? Hmmm....

You're missing the point. Yes, Rassmussen did correctly predict the 2016 election result better than any of the other polls. But the other polls were also correct, as defined by their margin of error.

If you want to trumpet Rassmussen, then go ahead. But you're going to have to give us a few more examples of their superior accuracy than just the 2016 presidential election. How did they do in other elections, like the sate wide races? How did they do in the 2018 midterms, or the 2014 general election?

If you can't do that, then you're not a very good salesman.

I'm not buying any polls this far out. No one is making firm decisions other than the already decided while a bunch of Dems are fighting each other with an unclear message. Once the candidate is picked, the Dems solidify a message, and the candidates start the campaigning and going head to head, then we'll see how the polls look. A lot can happen between now and the election. And we ain't seen nothing yet. I think this election will have lots of fireworks.

Aseahawkfan wrote:I'm not buying any polls this far out. No one is making firm decisions other than the already decided while a bunch of Dems are fighting each other with an unclear message. Once the candidate is picked, the Dems solidify a message, and the candidates start the campaigning and going head to head, then we'll see how the polls look. A lot can happen between now and the election. And we ain't seen nothing yet. I think this election will have lots of fireworks.

Agreed. The polls do mean something in regard to the Democratic nomination, but not very much in the general election and one of the reasons why I said that I'm not paying much attention to them until after the nomination or at least when the Dems have a presumptive nominee.

The dem debate is indeed a cluster. I saw an analyst explaining that the age of internet fundraising is what has made this such a sh!tshow for the Dems just as it was for the Republicans 4 years ago. Money previously unavailable to lower polling establishment candidates allows them to hang on far too long allowing the loudest voice with the most passionate support to pick off state after state when the overwhelming majority of voters oppose them. In the case of trump party leaders feared catastrophic losses up till election night where the polls were only off in the swing states. So who knows.
As to the last debate I had a quite a bit different take on Mike Bloomberg's performance than most pundits i've seen.

I've heard universal agreement he was better, couldn't have been any worse but that it was still bad. I thought he did quite well hitting back at Warrens attacks and she drew sharp boos when she continually attacked him over NDAs he had already agreed to release. Her unsubstantiated claims he told a pregnant woman to "kill it" and her sappy story about being fired for being a pregnant teacher drew a classic response. "you wouldn't have had that problem living in NY". His exchange with Sanders "can you imagine any moderate republican coming over to vote for this guy?" and the vicious booing of Sanders for suggesting all Bloomberg's friends are billionaires tells a story.

I asked myself, Is this just HT, ol bipolar johnny seeing what he wants to see? Then I saw an interview with James Carville. He said he couldn't believe how well Bloomberg did, didn't believe he could do that well. I feel vindicated.

Here's the deal. Biden will likely win SC but he has no money. He is currently not on the air in any super tuesday state. Sanders has been campaigning ahead for months and has huge organization. Everyone else is stealing votes from 3 people, Biden, Bloomberg and in the case of Warren Sanders. Sanders, Buttigieg are the only 2 not named Bloomberg with any significant money other than Steyer who has gone all in on SC. However MB plans on spending 100s of millions before Super tuesday when he is on every ballot, already is with extremely slick ads showing him speaking about his ideas without childish attacks and interruptions.

Its going to be him and Sanders after super tuesday IMO. And I like Mike.

Good take, Hawktalk.

Your description of the debates explains exactly why I don't like watching them. Doing it in front of a live audience gives it a professional wrestling feel with all the boos and cheers. I don't need all that static interference.

We'll see what happens after Super Tuesday. I suspect that we'll be down to 'just' 4 or 5 candidates. I've already cast my vote for Bloomberg, but I don't expect him to do well in this state, not with the People's Republic of Seattle dominating the landscape.

Oh, and by the way, if anyone is bipolar, it's James Carville. That guy is a moon bat if I've ever seen one. But on this occasion, I agree with him.

If Sanders or Bloomberg win the nomination, I might watch the debates this year. Trump vs either of them is going to be fun I think.

I like the debates with just the two candidates, a couple of moderators, and no live audience.

We'll see how it goes this year. I still prefer getting my information via reading about it or watching television interviews of candidates vs. a debate. If Sanders, Warren, or Biden win the nomination I'll be put in a position where there's not a lot of discovery about the two candidates and I won't be able to gain a lot from watching them in a debate. But if Buttigieg, Klobuchar, or even Bloomberg wins, then it might be helpful to see them handling questions on their feet.

idhawkman wrote:According to RCP, who was the closest pollster to the 2016 election? I know you already know the answer to this but just in case you forgot I'll remind you. Yep, it was Rassmussen. https://thehill.com/media/306721-rasmussen-calls-itself-most-accurate-pollster-of-2016

Wow, the latest Rassumssen Trump job approval poll shows Trump with a higher than average disapproval rating. Hmmmm.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epoll ... -6179.html

RiverDog wrote:
You're missing the point. Yes, Rassmussen did correctly predict the 2016 election result better than any of the other polls. But the other polls were also correct, as defined by their margin of error.

If you want to trumpet Rassmussen, then go ahead. But you're going to have to give us a few more examples of their superior accuracy than just the 2016 presidential election. How did they do in other elections, like the sate wide races? How did they do in the 2018 midterms, or the 2014 general election?

If you can't do that, then you're not a very good salesman.

After the super tuesday schiff show from the pollsters I'm back to not believing in any of them. Bernie by double digits in Texas my arse.... Bernie competing and maybe winning in NC my arse.... Warren winning or coming in close second in Mass. my arse.... They blew it big time...

RiverDog wrote:
You're missing the point. Yes, Rassmussen did correctly predict the 2016 election result better than any of the other polls. But the other polls were also correct, as defined by their margin of error.

If you want to trumpet Rassmussen, then go ahead. But you're going to have to give us a few more examples of their superior accuracy than just the 2016 presidential election. How did they do in other elections, like the sate wide races? How did they do in the 2018 midterms, or the 2014 general election?

If you can't do that, then you're not a very good salesman.

idhawkman wrote:After the super tuesday schiff show from the pollsters I'm back to not believing in any of them. Bernie by double digits in Texas my arse.... Bernie competing and maybe winning in NC my arse.... Warren winning or coming in close second in Mass. my arse.... They blew it big time...

Super Tuesday was a pollster's nightmare. Not only are state polls more difficult to forecast than nation wide polls, the South Carolina primary results and the subsequent withdrawals/endorsements from Buttigieg and Klobuchar had a huge impact in a lot of states. They didn't "blow it", they simply could not adjust fast enough to events.

But you ducked the original point I was making, and that was your claim as to the superiority of Rasmussen as a polling organization.

I ducked it on purpose because I think they are and you think they aren't and neither of us can change the others mind on that. So I moved on to something more constructive.

idhawkman wrote:I ducked it on purpose because I think they are and you think they aren't and neither of us can change the others mind on that. So I moved on to something more constructive.

Baloney! You ducked it because you didn't want to do your homework and/or you were afraid as to what you might find.

I didn't say that Rasmussen wasn't the best. All I said was that there's not enough of a difference between their performance and that of many other polls to claim that they're that much better as many polls correctly called the 2016 presidential election to within their margin of error, some just a tenth or two off from what Rasmussen did. What I asked you to do was prove that Rasmussen is what you are suggesting they are, that their performance in the 2016 presidential election wasn't just an anomaly. Here's the same question again:

How did they (Rasmussen) do in other elections, like the sate wide races? How did they do in the 2018 midterms, or the 2012 general election?

If they are as good as you claim, surely you can find at least one other poll that mirrors what they were able to do in the 2016 presidential election.