REPUBLICANS
We’ll start with the GOP, because quite frankly, that’s where the biggest drama lives.
Ben Carson is still heading south, Donald Trump still on the upswing, but the most interesting line on that chart is Marco Rubio. As the current establishment pick, he needs to show continued strength to have any hope of consolidating the non-tea party wing of his party. But … nope. He’s flatlining even as Jeb Bush continues his slow death march. The biggest non-Trump gainer at the moment is Ted Cruz, but at just over 12 percent, he doesn’t have much to brag about.
|
TRUMP |
CARSON |
RUBIO |
CRUZ |
IPSOS/REUTERS |
12/5-9 |
37 |
13 |
12 |
11 |
11/28-12/2 |
36 |
17 |
7 |
10 |
CBS/NYT |
12/4-8 |
35 |
13 |
9 |
16 |
10/21-25 |
22 |
26 |
8 |
4 |
Morning Consult |
12/3-7 |
41 |
12 |
10 |
7 |
11/13-16 |
38 |
19 |
7 |
7 |
Suffolk/USA Today |
12/2-6 |
27 |
10 |
16 |
17 |
9/24-28 |
23 |
13 |
9 |
6 |
For the GOP, Iowa ended up being a tale of two wildly contradictory polls:
|
TRUMP |
CRUZ |
RUBIO |
CARSON |
Monmouth |
12/3-6 |
19 |
24 |
17 |
13 |
10/29-31 |
20 |
15 |
10 |
28 |
CNN |
11/28-12/6 |
33 |
20 |
11 |
16 |
10/29-11/4 |
20 |
15 |
13 |
28 |
Guess which one Trump likes, and which one was glommed onto by the media and GOP establishment? These polls are so wildly divergent that it’s impossible to try and make sense of them. In short, Trump is either static or way up, and Cruz is either up or way up. The only thing we can conclusively state from these polls is that Carson is buh bye.
In New Hampshire:
|
TRUMP |
CRUZ |
RUBIO |
CARSON |
CNN/UNH |
12/5-9 |
32 |
14 |
6 |
5 |
9/17-23 |
26 |
9 |
5 |
8 |
PPP |
11/30-12/2 |
27 |
13 |
11 |
9 |
10/16-18 |
28 |
8 |
12 |
11 |
Some GOP consulting firm also released some numbers, but they have no track record and I’ve never heard of them, so I won’t include them.
Expect Cruz to be maxed out, as Christian Coalition-style Republicans don’t do as well here as they do in Iowa. Crazy racist xenophobes, on the other hand, have a great shot! Just ask Pat Buchanan, who got 38 percent in 1992 in a strong second place finish, and won in 1996. My guess? Trump will match that 38 percent. (edited, originally wrote Buchanan won in 1992.)
DEMOCRATS
For the last couple of months, both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders were gaining week over week. But now? The race has gotten even more boring, with both candidates slipping.
A week ago, Clinton was at 56.6 percent (-2.9), while Sanders was at 31.7 percent (-1). So while the front-runner is inching back closer to the 50 percent mark, Sanders is still stuck at his 30 percent demographic ceiling. Let’s look at the latest polling:
|
CLINTON |
SANDERS |
IPSOS/REUTERS |
12/5-9 |
56 |
30 |
11/28-12/2 |
51 |
36 |
CBS/NYT |
12/4-8 |
52 |
32 |
11/6-10 |
52 |
33 |
MORNING CONSULT |
12/3-7 |
52 |
23 |
11/13-16 |
57 |
26 |
Suffolk/USA Today |
12/2-6 |
56 |
29 |
9/24-28 |
41 |
23 |
Honestly, all of this is just float during a low-attention time of the year. Donald Trump may be able to bust through the holiday-season noise, but neither of our two candidates can. Nor should we aspire for them to do so. I don’t want anything even remotely resembling the GOP primary on our side of the aisle.
As a bonus, let’s see where the race stood at this point in the 2008 cycle:
|
CLINTON |
OBAMA |
EDWARDS |
IPSOS |
12/3-5 |
45 |
23 |
12 |
NBC/WSJ |
12/14-17 |
45 |
23 |
13 |
GALLUP |
11/30-12/2 |
39 |
24 |
15 |
CBS |
12/5-7 |
44 |
27 |
11 |
ABC |
12/6-9 |
53 |
23 |
10 |
CNN |
12/6-9 |
40 |
30 |
14 |
Barack Obama’s deficits ranged from -10 to -30 in that outlier-looking ABC poll. The average among this lot was Clinton 44, Obama 25, or a 19-point deficit.
Of course, things were different then—Obama was splitting the white liberal educated vote with John Edwards, and he had a demographic opportunity in African Americans that didn’t flock to him until after he won Iowa. And there was a natural “anybody but Clinton” vote just waiting to be consolidated. Add up Obama and Edwards’ numbers, and you had a pretty tight race. And that’s what happened—the not-Clinton vote consolidated around Obama and he rode that to victory.
Right now, the anybody-but-Clinton vote is already consolidated around Sanders. Thus, he has to eat into Clinton’s support to gain traction, something he has yet to do. But yes, if you are a Sanders supporter, you can take solace from those historical numbers—things can always change quickly in politics, underdogs can turn things around.
Let’s now look at the latest Iowa numbers:
|
CLINTON |
SANDERS |
MONMOUTH |
12/3-6 |
55 |
33 |
10/29-31 |
46 |
32 |
CNN |
11/28-12/6 |
54 |
36 |
10/29-11/4 |
55 |
37 |
Unlike the GOP field, where both these polls were diametrically opposed, we have a real consensus here, and that’s that there isn’t much of a contest here.
I dug into the internals of that CNN poll, and Sanders has made inroads among Democrats on the economy, where he trails Clinton by only 47-42 on the question of who would do best. Same with “values,” where Clinton leads just 46-44. However, Clinton wins handily on health care (63-31), race relations (52-36), and trounces Sanders on foreign policy (72-21) and ISIS (67-19).
That’s the obvious danger of running a one-note campaign: You may eventually win the argument you want to have, but then you surrender the arguments you’re trying to avoid. And no presidential campaign exists in a one-issue vacuum.
By the way, you guys want 2008 Iowa comparisons?
|
OBAMA |
CLINTON |
EDWARDS |
SELZER |
11-25-28 |
28 |
25 |
23 |
CNN |
12/14-18 |
28 |
30 |
26 |
Mason-Dixon |
12/3-6 |
25 |
27 |
21 |
ABC |
12/13-17 |
33 |
29 |
20 |
Hotline |
12/7-12 |
27 |
27 |
22 |
Newsweek |
12/5-6 |
35 |
29 |
18 |
Despite his national deficits, Obama was already making his move in Iowa, in a race he would end up winning by eight points over both John Edwards and Clinton (who ended up just behind Edwards in third).
Let’s go to the latest New Hampshire polling:
|
CLINTON |
SANDERS |
CNN/UNH |
12/5-9 |
40 |
50 |
9/17-23 |
30 |
46 |
PPP |
11/30-12/2 |
44 |
42 |
10/16-18 |
41 |
33 |
UNH has Sanders losing ground while PPP has him gaining ground. More fun in contradictory polling! Either way, New Hampshire remains Bernie Sanders’ best chance at primary victory among the early states. And if he really hopes to play deep into the calendar, it’s a definite must-win.
As a political junky, this gives us plenty of drama:
See you next week!