Week 9 Polls

Polls

Sander's polls haven't seemed to change much in Iowa as he has 42% of the Democratic caucus-goers' support. While Clinton has been lingering around half of the voters as she is currently standing at 51%.

This is probably due to the 85% of survey takers who believe Clinton has a better chance of winning against a Republican candidate while only 54% believe that Sanders' would do so. Nevertheless, 47% thought that Sanders was a more ideal choice in handling our nation's economy while 42% said that Clinton would. Not only that, but 89% of the participants supporting Sanders thought of him as a trustworthy and honest candidate while 66% of Clinton's supporters thought she was trustworthy and honest. But, most of the people, a staggering 95%, believed Clinton had the best kind of experience needed in order to be president.

According to Peter Brown, an assistant director to the Quinnipiac University Poll, the only way Clinton could loose the nomination would be if she "drops the early Iowa and new Hampshire contests to Sen. Sanders, who then might become the 'momentum' candidate."

Source:

http://www.cnn.com/2015/11/25/politics/hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-iowa/

Newsworthy: Mom Cancel The Trip To Wally World !

Sanders seems to disapprove of anything starting with Wal-...
On this black Friday he was much less concerned with getting a low priced flat screen HD TV and more concerned with the employees selling them.
Sanders who is an advocate for the low wage man angrily tweeted a series of posts a few hours ago that argued " @Walmart shouldn't be allowed to pay workers wages so low that many qualify for Medicaid, food stamps, and government housing." As one of America's biggest corporations Sanders believes that Walmart heirs - who own more wealth than the bottom 42% of Americans - shouldn't be provided welfare from working families.
Is this a random allegation or did Sanders just say what everyone else was thinking but too afraid to voice or too busy pushing people out of the way for the last legoland set?

www.bretbart.com/big-government/2015/11/27/bernie-sanders-attacks-walmart-black-friday/

Newsworthy: M.C Bernie ?

This upcoming Monday will wrap up Sanders' two day ATL visit. Ever since the Paris attacks most of the political conversation has focused on national security and has left Sanders struggling to "find his footing" besides his stance on Wall Street bank separation and income equality.
At 7 p.m rapper 'Killer Mike' (real name: Michael Render)  will open for Sanders at the Fox Theater. Render is a local political activist emphasizing the criminal justice reform and even shortly had a write-in candidacy for state House this past summer. Clinton seems to have Georgia's democratic establishment on lock so hopefully the event will give Sanders substantial quantitative results.
http://politics.blog.ajc.com/2015/11/20/bernie-sanders-sets-rally-in-atlanta-on-monday/

Polls Update: Highest Support To Date !

According to NBC Sanders is now the preferred candidate of 33% of Democratic/Independent leaning democratic voters.
Hillary's still surpassing by 16 points. And even though Sanders has gained 3 points since last month's poll we have to keep in mind that its still within the poll's error estimate of +/- 3.1% points.
O'Malley still struggles to make an improvement in the democratic polls despite two national debate show exposures.




From this graph below we can assume that:
- Sanders maintains a strong lead among young voters
- Clinton stills lead the white vote by 3 points, 6 points among men & 9 points among college graduates.


http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/poll-hillary-clinton-holds-steady-support-among-democrats-n466641

Bernie Sanders... A Hypocrite ?

www.cnn.com/2015/11/politics/bernie-sanders-super-pac-nurses-union/index.html

Bernie Sanders has been supported by a super PAC , but wait, isn't that a little contradicting to his previous stances on the corrupt nature of the campaign finance and fundraising system?
The super PAC: National Nurses United For Patient Protection Spent $ 569,000 backing Sanders in his presidential run since August. How can Sanders stick to a non- super PAC pledge if he himself is supported by the first national union to endorse an presidential election ? Most of Bernie's supporters say they like him because of his anti-super PAC financing stance how will they react ? Bernie's team responded that they were flattered but they do not have a super PAC, don't want a super-PAC and wont in the future either. How can they explain the support then ? Michael Lightly ( the nurses union political director) disagreed and explained that the National Nurses United For Patient Protection is not actually a super PAC. He says " It was set up originally under the pre-citizen United rules, so it is not a super PAC". On the other hand the FEC declares that it is in fact a super PAC it doesn't matter that it happened to be established in 2009 one year before the 2012 U.S Supreme Court decision to proliferate super PACs. In response the Union said that they "exists to protect nurse and patients and, no other candidate has better amplified the critical issues nurses have voiced for many years than Sanders, we are proud to support Sanders and will continue to do so."

Sanders Ahead of Clinton In New Hampshire Poll

thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/dem-primaries/260698-sanders-ahead-of-clinton-in-new-hamphire-poll

According to FOX news, Sanders has 45% support and Hillary has 44% support, but we must keep in mind that the slight difference is still in the 5.5% margin or error.(sample representation)

-Among younger voters(under 45):
Sanders: 59%
Clinton: 30%

(Is this unusual because more young people would more likely want the glass ceiling to be broken for different types of people, since we are the generation of diversity tolerance and acceptance?)

Democratic "Socialism" & Polls Update

http://www.inquisitr.com/2575139/bernie-sanders-polls-sanders-hoping-to-make-up-ground-on-clinton-with-speech-defining-democratic-socialism/

Sanders is losing ground in the polls he is now behind Hillary who has 51% of the democratic vote while he has 33.5% of the democratic vote and slightly ahead of O'Malley still struggling to find his voice better yet supporters. His most recent attempt to make up ground on Clinton is his speech defining his self- defined democratic socialism. He defined it as: "having a government which represents all people, rather than just the wealthiest people, which is most often the case right now in this country". Can America change from a Plutocracy to this democratic socialism?

Issue Position: Second Amendment

Sanders publicly announced that he strongly believes that there needs to be restrictions on gun purchasing including extensive background checks even more so than currently. He finds it absurd and completely unnecessary that the are AK47's and machine guns on America's streets when they are weapons of war and need only to be used for such not available for the masses and their disposal.

Issue Position: Opinion on Wall Street & The Campaign Finance System

Sanders has a very strong opinion about wall street and monopoly banks. He wishes to end corporate loopholes so corporations will actually pay federal taxes instead of turning a blind eye to bankers who hide millions in foreign bank accounts. As for wall street , he believes we as the American people have bailed them out before so now they can bail us out and help make college free. He also believes that his opponent Hilary, who has fundraising support from wall street, is too close and it can lead to policy input and is ultimately the exact reason why campaign fundraising and consequently the political process is so corrupt. He believes similar to Teddy Roosevelt that we must break up the banks and encourage credit unions as the future of America. Bernie has also admitted that although he has many supporters they happen to be lower income/ middle/low class that donate about $30 on average. On the positive side he declares that he therefore is not in debt or will be influenced to any super PAC's that will expect future favors unlike his opponent who can be compromised.He also believes similar to O'Malley that a new updated version of Glass Steagall should be established which could help end crony capitalism. As for wall street advisers, Sanders very strongly declared he would have absolutely none in his cabinet.

Issue Position: Fiscal Policy

Sanders really emphasizes finance reform in areas that need updating and adjustments, first is the military. Sanders wants a more cost effective reform increasing and upgrading: intelligence, fighting international terrorists and manpower. Secondly, Sanders wants to make public college debt free similar to the other democratic candidates. Also, to increase social security benefits and spend a trillion dollars on infrastructure especially in areas of low income and poverty.

Issue Position: Stance on Accepting Syrian Refugees and Other Middle East Affairs.

Sanders is a big supporter of globalism and reminds America that it is our moral responsibility to help those countries in need who cannot do so for themselves. He was also very against the Iraq war and despite the fact that his colleague and competitor Hillary voted for it. He says its a major correlation with the ISIS uprising/ development and is actually "the worst foreign policy blunder in the history of the United States of America".

Issue Position: Biggest threat on national security?

Sanders still holds his belief that climate change is the biggest threat to national security. he believes it leads to the growth of terrorism. To further explain, terrorists groups have a sense of entitlement can go invade other countries when their supply gets low , stealing what they lack such as water for agricultural crops,etc and end up bullying for their resources like a school bully taking a younger child's lunch everyday.

Issue Position: Stance on ISIS

Sanders states that we need to "rid the planet" of the ISIS terrorist group. He believes we cannot do it alone, we need the middle east and Muslim countries to lead. In other words they can no longer continue to host and protect terrorists out of fear and intimidation and expect America to go in blind they must fight with us.

Issue Position: Sander's "Political Revolution"

Sanders has established his political platform which some may say is radical but he is admitting unapologetic. His platform includes:
1. Breaking up the banks, wall street
2. Joining all types of people together and globalism
3. Requiring wealthy people to pay fair shares of taxes
4. Rebuilding infrastructure
5. Raising the minimum wage to a "living wage" ($15/hr)
6. Ending the corrupt campaign finance system
7. Making public college debt free
8. Making healthcare a right not a privilege.

Sanders' Performance More Convincing in Second Debate

While the reaction to the first democratic debate was mixed, with many major commentators believing hillary showed the best perfomance, senator sanders seems to have outshone his competition in the second democratic debate on Saturday. A wall street journal poll reports that 44% of democrats felt that the senator won the debate, while only 32% felt the debate went better for hillary. This wide margin is rather surprising, seeing as some of the margin has to come out of hillary's own followership.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/wsj-survey-44-of-democrats-think-bernie-sanders-won-debate-1447609672

Inching Forward Little By Little

Polls

It seems as though Bernie Sanders is still left in the dust of Clinton's massive takeoff. Though, his polls have increased slowly since he first began in the month of November with an average RCP poll of 27% but has now inched forward 6% to today's poll, where he stands at 33%. Which is 19% less than Clinton's staggering 52%.

The New York Times and CBS News released a series of polls demonstrating democrat's opinion on both Hilary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. According to their polls 62% of the democratic primary voters believe that Clinton would make a real change in Washington while 51% say that Sanders would do so. They also have another poll stating that 24% of these democratic voters believe that Hilary Clinton would be more likely to get her policies enacted as president, 57% say she is somewhat likely, while 17% say that she is not very likely to get such policies enacted. Whereas, 8% think that Sanders would be more likely to get his policies going, 63% say that he is somewhat likely, and 24% say he is not likely to do so. As mentioned in an earlier post, many people are unhappy with the way that the government is working, and they want to see changes. Which, according to the statistics, more people feel as though it is possible with Hilary Clinton. Even though Sanders has a higher percentage of people who believe he could probably get his policies enacted, Clinton has the upper hand when it comes to confident followers. In fact, she has the upper hand in most of the polls released by CBS News and The New York Times. Thus, explaining why she leading Sanders.

Nevertheless, The New York Times states that Bernie Sanders may have more room to grow as long as he could find a way to win over the 50% of democratic voters who feel as though it is too early to tell who to fully support in this election.

New Positions

As of today Sanders does not seem to have any significant new positions.

Challenges

According to The New York Times' article Bernie Sanders needs to find way to make his left wing approach into one with a broad appeal that is more acceptable for the democratic majority. He will have to find a way to do this during the upcoming debate on Saturday night.

Sources

RCP Average: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/2016_democratic_presidential_nomination-3824.html

CBS News/The New York Times Poll: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-hillary-clinton-bests-sanders-as-the-democrats-change-candidate/

Challenge/polls: http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/11/12/poll-shows-hillary-clinton-maintaining-lead-over-sanders/

As Momentum in the Polls Stalls, Sanders Campaign Goes on the Offensive

In the wake of the first democratic primary debate, and with Joe Biden confirming his non-candidacy and Caffee and Webb dropping out, the last couple weeks should have been tumultuous for all candidates from a polling perspective. Instead, we watched Clinton maintain or gradually increase share of the vote, relative to Senator Sanders. Sanders' Iowa prospects have all but evaporated, and what was once a commanding lead in New Hampshire has narrowed to a single percentage point. In national polling clinton has maintained around a 20 point lead on the Senator.

Times of increased uncertainty, in any competition, are always the most nerve wracking for those who are in the lead. The Clinton campaign, with the candidate to beat, has emerged from the latest round of unknowns not profoundly stronger than before, but not profoundly weaker either.

With a stagnating campaign, well behind in most polls, the burden is on Sanders to renew the uncertainty. This appears to be exactly what his campaign is doing.

A series of moves by the Sanders campaign have unfolded in the last week. A 2 million dollar ad buy took place, and adds began airing tuesday in Iowa and New Hampshire. Additionally, while early in the campaign Senator Sanders expresses a disinterest in directly attacking Hillary Clinton, recent statements have walked a thin line between compare and contrast exercises and outright negativity. Lastly, and significantly, the senator, who is often admired for having championed the same issues for his entire political career, has taken a relatively new position in the last week. On Wednesday, Bernie Sanders filed a bill to decriminalize marijuana at the federal level. While almost all experts agree that US drug law, particularly around marijuana, is due for reform, the timing of this aggressive stance form the senator seems to suggest that the move is largely an appeal to young liberal voters, who, more than any other demographic, support legalization. This same demographic happens to be a large part of the Senator's political base.

It is yet to be seen how Sander's new intensity will affect polls. He is certainly fulfilling his tactical burden in this moment though: to keep things interesting, and insodoing keep his campaign alive. given time and effort, or alternately or much of anything unforeseen, momentum may well swing back towards the presidential longshot, who is very much still in the race, and seems to plan on sticking around.

-Newsworthy Moment and Challenges-

Over the week, voters and news agencies have begun to question as to whether or not Bernie Sanders is sexist. In a recent event, Clinton had quoted a moment in which Bernie made a comment about her "shouting" about gun violence, in which case she replied by saying, "It's just, when women talk, some people think we are shouting." It is still up in the air as to whether he really is sexist or not, but the controversy being caused by this may end up becoming a challenge for Sanders to face in the weeks to come. 

Source: http://www.npr.org/2015/11/01/453663625/is-it-fair-to-accuse-bernie-sanders-of-sexism