Greg Sargent:
There will be more to say about what this means for the race later. For now, with only a little more than a year left in the Obama presidency, Biden’s exit is another reminder that the Obama era is coming to a close: Biden will, along with the President, soon pass into the realm of Democratic elders, though it’s always possible he could join a Hillary Clinton administration.
Biden probably made the right political move. There was never a clear policy lane for him to convincingly differentiate himself from Hillary Clinton, and polls had showed that Democratic voters trusted her far more than him on many major issues. Nor was there any clear clamor for Biden to enter.
Erik Wemple:
In an “exclusive” story for Politico, longtime Beltway reporter Mike Allen put forth this headline: “Biden eyes weekend decision.”
Only: That story was published Oct. 5, and so it alleged that Biden was eyeing a decision the weekend of Oct. 10-11, “or shortly thereafter.” Another caveat from Allen: “If the decision is a ‘go,’ the announcement could be delayed as advisers begin assembling a campaign.” And the vice president was leaning toward “yes,” Allen reported, based on impressions from “[s]everal people who have visited Biden recently.” At the same time, Allen made clear that associates were unsure which direction Biden would choose.
Allen’s story just suffered quite a blow: Biden did indeed delay his announcement, and it was a no. Standing with President Obama and his wife, Jill, at the White House, Biden said, “I believe we’re out of time, the time necessary to mount a winning campaign,” as he unwound the sort of address that would have come in handy in a presidential campaign.
No need to limit the criticism to Allen.
Via
Taegan Goddard:
A new Monmouth poll finds that 52% of the American public feels that Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email account during her time as Secretary of State was mainly a matter of convenience compared to 33% who say this behavior suggests she has something to hide.
In addition, 59% of the public are tired of hearing about this issue while just 32% say the media should continue to cover it.
Nate Cohn:
For all her struggles with poll numbers and the email investigation this year, Hillary Rodham Clinton has done one thing really well: dissuade mainstream opponents by dominating the invisible primary, the behind-the-scenes competition for elite support that often decides the nomination.
Today, her dominance in the invisible primary yielded another victory. Vice President Joe Biden’s decision to stay out of the presidential race leaves Mrs. Clinton as the only viable mainstream candidate in the race. It gives her an opportunity to unite the coalition of moderate, nonwhite and older voters who traditionally have an edge over the white progressives who now support Bernie Sanders.
...
Mr. Sanders can still claim the support of one of the party’s largest and most influential wings: the party’s predominantly Northern, white progressive base. That will be enough to compete in the key early contests of New Hampshire and Iowa and in some other states, but not in more diverse or conservative states like South Carolina. A recent CNN poll there showed Mrs. Clinton leading by a 70-to-20 margin if Mr. Biden stayed out of the race.
Here's a reminder of another polling question I like: who will win (not "who are you supporting?").
This is from 2012:
In the tight 2004 campaign, the polls that asked Americans which candidate they supported — all the way up to the exit polls — told a confusing story about whether President George W. Bush or Senator John Kerry would win.
But another kind of polling question, which received far less attention, produced a clearer result: Regardless of whom they supported, which candidate did people expect to win? Americans consistently, and correctly, said that they thought Mr. Bush would.
A version of that question has produced similarly telling results throughout much of modern polling history, according to a new academic study. Over the last 60 years, poll questions that asked people which candidate they expected to win have been a better guide to the outcome of the presidential race than questions asking people whom they planned to vote for, the study found.
In the primary, for example, Dems by 65% think Hillary will win (
WaPo, Q 10). Keep an eye on that question, seen here in the general election.
Conservative Ramesh Ponnuru makes the case for a Hillary win:
Finally, Clinton will need some luck to win, as any candidate does. It may materialize. The economy is, if not roaring, as good as it has been since the crisis hit in 2008. Clinton could, of course, be nominated and then lose. But her bet is that the liberal coalition will show up and that swing voters who do not love her will nonetheless decide that they prefer her to a Republican party out of touch with most people’s concerns. It’s not a bad bet.
Kurt Eichenwald:
The historical significance of this moment can hardly be overstated, and it seems many Republicans, Democrats and members of the media don’t fully understand the magnitude of what is taking place. The awesome power of government—one that allows officials to pore through almost anything they demand and compel anyone to talk or suffer the shame of taking the Fifth Amendment—has been unleashed for purely political purposes. It is impossible to review what the Benghazi committee has done as anything other than taxpayer-funded political research of the opposing party’s leading candidate for president. Comparisons from America’s past are rare. Richard Nixon’s attempts to use the IRS to investigate his perceived enemies come to mind. So does Senator Joseph McCarthy’s red-baiting during the 1950s, with reckless accusations of treason leveled at members of the State Department, military generals and even the secretary of the Army. But the modern McCarthys of the Benghazi committee cannot perform this political theater on their own—they depend on reporters to aid in the attempts to use government for the purpose of destroying others with bogus “scoops” ladled out by members of Congress and their staffs. These journalists will almost certainly join the legions of shamed reporters of the McCarthy era as it becomes increasingly clear they are enablers of an obscene attempt to undermine the electoral process.
PPP in NH:
The Presidential numbers bode well for [Maggie] Hassan on that front. Hillary Clinton leads 8 out of 9 Republicans in hypothetical general election contests in the state. The exception is John Kasich- he achieves a tie with Clinton at 44%. Chris Christie comes close to Clinton as well, trailing 45/44. But beyond that Clinton leads the rest of the GOP throng by anywhere from 4 to 16 points. She's up 4 on Jeb Bush (45/41) and Carly Fiorina (46/42), 6 on Ben Carson (48/42), Marco Rubio (48/42 also), and Donald Trump (47/41), 13 on Ted Cruz (50/37), and 16 on Mike Huckabee (51/35).
We also tested Bernie Sanders against the trio of Carson, Rubio, and Trump and he actually fares slightly better than she does against that group of candidates. Where Clinton leads them by an average of 6 points, Sanders' average lead is 7 points. Sanders leads Trump 49/40, Carson 47/39, and Rubio 45/41.
Right now it looks like Democrats are ahead in New Hampshire by about 5 points, similar to Barack Obama's margin of victory in the state in 2012. The Senate race is tight but if those Presidential numbers hold it's hard to imagine a world where a popular Governor like Hassan runs 5 points or more behind the top of the ticket.