US Presidential election 2016

The Des Moines Register is live streaming the poll results. Should see them in about five minutes or so. Seems like they are only talking about Trump and Cruz on the Republican side in the build up.
 
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Trump 28% Cruz 23% Rubio 16% Carson 10%
Clinton 45% and Sanders 42%
4% margin of error
 
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Although Trump will see those results as nothing other than a win for him I wouldn't be so sure. He's going to need every one of those people who've never taken part in a caucus before to ensure victory. It's one thing answering a phone and saying you'll vote for Trump but it's quite another to step out in freezing temperatures and spend your entire evening at a debate.
 
Well if that converts into the vote then I'm afraid you had better start believing.

Hair Force One!

Curious to see if Trump slags the newspaper off now! If he wins Iowa he can win anywhere
 
brendanr said:
Just cashed out on my Rubio bet with a small loss. That margin looks to big to overcome for him.
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Yes, I'd agree. The moral of the story is don't look for chinks in the Donald .... they ain't there!

Selzer was wrong in 2012 though (admittedly the only time she has been) but you can see the polling result here with the DMR poll sitting half way down the snapshot

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...owa_republican_presidential_primary-1588.html

What's quite remarkable is just how accurate she was regarding every candidate other than Santorum

Paul 22 (21.4), Romney 24 (24.5), Gingrich 12 (13.3) Perry 11 (10.3)

It was only Santourm on 15 (same as Rubio) who she completely missed by caucus time (24.6). I don't know what the back story is, but her 2012 poll adds up to 93% suggesting that perhaps there was a 7% undecided element who must all have broken for Santorum. He was also trying to overhaul a lower target than that presented by Trump. She did pick up a late swing to Santorum, so it's not as if he went completely undetected, but wasn't able to quantify it

Rubio is supposed to be experiencing a late swing too, but his much more of a gentle preference rather than anything dramatic. And as I said, he's aiming at a higher target. The most he looks capable of doing is nipping Cruz

Three quarters of the poll was conducted pre debate, but she hasn't really flagged anything from the other quarter to suggest that something significant was happening outside of the normal swings and roundabouts known as error. The only real swing that seems to have taken place in 2012 leaving aside the undecideds, was away from the Tea Party to the God vote, albeit this might be final acceptance of the fact that Bachmann was certifiable

If a similar trend were to even remotely impact here, we might see God gain a little, but Iim struggling to think these will be swingers from Trump. Trump can't be pulling that many Godists in surely, albeit there could be a few persuaded by Palin?

heads are spinin'

There's some poll in Florida now giving him 48%.
 
I'm convinced Trump has it (Iowa) ............. snowstorm or not.
The Donald is a master PR/manipulator, if nothing else. Yesterday's $100,000 charitable donation to "guide dogs for war veterans" won't hurt him -- everyone loves vets and dogs! Neither will today's endorsement from the Faldwell evangelical dynasty -- yesterday's Selzer poll in the Des Moines Register indicated that 40% of G.O.P supporters who will attend the caucus identified themselves as evangelical. And turning the heat up on Cruz by hinting that he might be the subject of a court/constitutional investigation of his presidential legitimacy by virtue of his Canadian birth is a masterstroke.

The Clinton/Sanders fight is getting really exciting. Getting too close to call, imho. If Bernie pulls this off, and then follows up with a win in NH as expected, then, who knows. I'm detecting a growing sense of dislike amongst ordinary Americans -- like everywhere else too -- for establishment figures too closely tied to the elite and to Wall Street. And they don't come much more "Establishment" than Hilary. Then there's Benghazi, theres the hacked email server, there's ..........:)

I still think Bernie is the play.
 
Warbler said:
Yes, I'd agree. The moral of the story is don't look for chinks in the Donald .... they ain't there!

Selzer was wrong in 2012 though (admittedly the only time she has been) but you can see the polling result here with the DMR poll sitting half way down the snapshot

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...owa_republican_presidential_primary-1588.html

What's quite remarkable is just how accurate she was regarding every candidate other than Santorum

Paul 22 (21.4), Romney 24 (24.5), Gingrich 12 (13.3) Perry 11 (10.3)

It was only Santourm on 15 (same as Rubio) who she completely missed by caucus time (24.6). I don't know what the back story is, but her 2012 poll adds up to 93% suggesting that perhaps there was a 7% undecided element who must all have broken for Santorum. He was also trying to overhaul a lower target than that presented by Trump. She did pick up a late swing to Santorum, so it's not as if he went completely undetected, but wasn't able to quantify it

Rubio is supposed to be experiencing a late swing too, but his much more of a gentle preference rather than anything dramatic. And as I said, he's aiming at a higher target. The most he looks capable of doing is nipping Cruz

Three quarters of the poll was conducted pre debate, but she hasn't really flagged anything from the other quarter to suggest that something significant was happening outside of the normal swings and roundabouts known as error. The only real swing that seems to have taken place in 2012 leaving aside the undecideds, was away from the Tea Party to the God vote, albeit this might be final acceptance of the fact that Bachmann was certifiable

If a similar trend were to even remotely impact here, we might see God gain a little, but Iim struggling to think these will be swingers from Trump. Trump can't be pulling that many Godists in surely, albeit there could be a few persuaded by Palin?

heads are spinin'

There's some poll in Florida now giving him 48%.
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If Trump manages to win Iowa, and then does the expected in New Hampshire, creating more notions of "Momentum", it may be time to pull the trigger on the general election soon, since the price point may be as good as it is going to get. There have been a few links shared here showing Trump's vulnerabilities with Independents and Democrats, and what may actually be a major negative, instead of the "crossover appeal" that is being projected by the Punditry, and the latest from Gallup (http://www.gallup.com/opinion/polling-matters/188936/trump-negative-image.aspx) provides an interesting read in that regard.

At the same time in which polls among potential Republican voters are moving Trump to a high point, his favorability rating is the lowest of any candidate since Gallup began doing this particular tracking in 1992 - currently 60% unfavorable, vs. only 33% favorable. Turning that around is a high mountain to climb, especially with one key issue noted by Gallup Editor-in-Chief Frank Newport - "The bottom line is that Trump now has a higher unfavorable rating than any candidate at any time during all of these previous election cycles, and that conclusion takes into account the fact that unfavorable ratings tend to rise in the heat of a general election campaign as the barbs, negative ads and heightened partisanship are taken to their highest levels."

I will be watching the prices carefully post-Iowa and post-New Hampshire, the best opportunity to take a position against Trump may be at hand; for all that he has been able to do among the Republican candidates so far, there is compelling evidence that he faces severe limitations should he be the candidate in the General Election.
 
Warbler said:
If Trump calculates he needs both states to win (and if he is strategic tactician, then this is an unavoidable conclusion) then John Kasitch (born PA and Governor of OH) looks very attractive at 8/1 to be the running mate (provided Trump can persuade him onto the ticket).
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3/1 fav now

I half said it joking previously, and it still remains a couple of quid bet only for a laugh, but in what is becoming a mad, mad, race, there is a bit of me wondering if Bloomberg is a viable running mate for Hillary against Trump. I reckon you might be able to get a three figure price, but think it through, remembering that candidates changing sides isn't anything like as fatal in America as it is in the UK. 'The ticket' is a pretty important concept

He'd be a candidate that would rattle Trump. He isn't going to be able to completely command the successful business from outside narrative. If there is an abandonment of the moderate Republican of the GOP, Bloomberg could swing some of those voters over, especially if she's losing some of her poorly educated, middle aged, male voters to Trumps Populism. Politically there's not a great deal between them. In fact they're remarkably similar. Bloombergs a better fit for the Democrats than he is Trumps Republican campaign. OK Hillary and Bloomberg both carry New York baggage, but then so does Trump. This need not be as fatal as it can be. If he wants it (and there's no suggestion he does) then all he needs to do is threaten to run an independent campaign and he's got her over a barrell. I think she'd have to give it him? Also, the Democrat establishment would have to accept him if the price of not doing is President Trump
 
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icebreaker said:
The Clinton/Sanders fight is getting really exciting. Getting too close to call, imho. If Bernie pulls this off, and then follows up with a win in NH as expected, then, who knows. I'm detecting a growing sense of dislike amongst ordinary Americans -- like everywhere else too -- for establishment figures too closely tied to the elite and to Wall Street. And they don't come much more "Establishment" than Hilary. Then there's Benghazi, theres the hacked email server, there's ..........:)

I still think Bernie is the play.
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I'm seeing the opposite at the moment with Hillary slightly extending if anything.

So far as I can work out, Bernie is strong in certain areas (urban) where he'll wipe the floor with her, but she has a better geographic spread across the state and will pick up the delegates/ precincts

Also the Selzer poll said that there'd been no perceptible increase in new Democrat registrations and in her opinion the caucus was heading for a normal year rather than anything close to the Obama type of turnouts when young people made the difference. In fact the greater increase has been on the Republican side which does make me wonder if a few Democrats have migrated to caucus for Trump?

Bernie was a fair punt at 5/2, but right now you'd have to think the price was right. If Bernie can't win in Iowa then he's pretty well out the race really.
 
SlimChance said:
If Trump manages to win Iowa, and then does the expected in New Hampshire, creating more notions of "Momentum", it may be time to pull the trigger on the general election soon, since the price point may be as good as it is going to get. There have been a few links shared here showing Trump's vulnerabilities with Independents and Democrats, and what may actually be a major negative, instead of the "crossover appeal" that is being projected by the Punditry, and the latest from Gallup (http://www.gallup.com/opinion/polling-matters/188936/trump-negative-image.aspx) provides an interesting read in that regard.

At the same time in which polls among potential Republican voters are moving Trump to a high point, his favorability rating is the lowest of any candidate since Gallup began doing this particular tracking in 1992 - currently 60% unfavorable, vs. only 33% favorable. Turning that around is a high mountain to climb, especially with one key issue noted by Gallup Editor-in-Chief Frank Newport - "The bottom line is that Trump now has a higher unfavorable rating than any candidate at any time during all of these previous election cycles, and that conclusion takes into account the fact that unfavorable ratings tend to rise in the heat of a general election campaign as the barbs, negative ads and heightened partisanship are taken to their highest levels."

I will be watching the prices carefully post-Iowa and post-New Hampshire, the best opportunity to take a position against Trump may be at hand; for all that he has been able to do among the Republican candidates so far, there is compelling evidence that he faces severe limitations should he be the candidate in the General Election.
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You might find this interesting

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/donald-trumps-support-in-iowa-is-narrow-but-deep/

I should point out that Nate Silver has been predicting the imminent collapse of Trump ever since he first began his run, and he's becoming a point of professional embarrassment for him.

This 'unfavourable' rating is what the anti Trump pundits are increasingly going all in on (it isn't new). I was initially persuaded by it, but have grown cautious of it in recent months. What Silver has done here though is perform a regression analysis and generated a determinant coefficient of 21% to explain the correlation between the vote (revealed preference - which strictly speaking of course is still to be proven) and the expressed preference (the favourability)

Now 21% is considered weak if I recall correctly. Is it going to be enough? I might have an unfavourable view of Alex Ferguson, but would sure as hell have voted for him if we could appoint managers that way

It's almost as if he's trying to fit the narrative towards what he wants to find, so he's included the next category of favourability to push the coefficient out to 68%. That's quite a strong correlation, but 'Mostly unfavourable' is actually quite different to 'very unfavourable' and the impact of it dilutes towards neutrality. It would also be interersting to know if the favourability findings are based on substantive issues or superficial ones?

My instinct is that 21% won't be to turn this round on the scale he thinks. Nate Silver's going to need more. Put another way, there are 79% of other factors impacting the decision as to whether or not to support Trump, and that's before you try and factor in other candidates who will also have their own poorish figures. What he's turnign a blind eye to is that the three right wing candidates hold about 60%. If this becomes a battle for the spirit of the party, the right wing is still in the ascendancy and analysts are assuming that Cruz supporters will suddenly convert to Rubio? You've also got a couple of Goddists and a libertarian in there too whose support needn't fall back into the moderate camp either.

If I were going to lay Trump somehow, I'd be inclined to wait a bit too, but how exactly are you going to 'get him'

Hillary is going to be odds on to beat him for the general election for some time yet (until there is a terrorist attrocity from a 'recently arrived' muslim). You're going to have to bank on a moderate to emerge from within the GOP.

I think Bush will be badly beaten after Iowa (should go better in NH). I don't believe Jeb can win, but I think he could become a backable price to arb provided you're satisfied he'll stay in the race. It depends what price he's allowed to go to. There's only Rubio left, and the bookies have kept him onside. You're going to have to go in heavily at a relatively short price with a lot of risk attached

I'm also consumed by the spectre of a major incident that allows him to say "this wouldn't have happened under Donald J Trump. I'd have banned all new arrivals until we got on top of it" - it's almost as if he knows there will be one, or has placed an order for a terrorist incident!!! If something like this happened, I wouldn't worry about finding an angle, the value will be in trying to work out what Trump's majority will be. I'd be interested in seeing a price on Trump to win the WH by a majority of 50+. Sure I'd want a price for that margin, nut I reckon there could be a rick here when someone gets round to pricing it

I reckon the likelihood of him doing so with a big majority is probably better than him limping over the line by a small majority. If I had to say Trump by 50, I'd be more inclined to say that's possible, than say Trump by 10 is, yet I would expect the price on a large majority to be quite a bit bigger, certainly more so than the probability of it occurring
 
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Last two polls in (the first ones to have been conducted exclusively after Trumps chicken run). Now admittedly both Emerson (C+) and Opinion Savvy (unrated) are not regarded as reliable by 538 but these are their findings (off what look like poor sampling again)

Trump = 27
Cruz = 26
Rubio = 22

Trump = 20
Cruz = 19
Rubio = 19

And politicalcompass.org have just updated their appraisal of where the far out right wing of America is now

http://www.politicalcompass.org/uselection2016
 
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Doors opened 30 minutes ago.
First reports from CNN reps on the ground are indicating a high turn-out -- and a high percentage of first-time caucus-goers. (The expected snowstorm has not yet arrived).
This must be beneficial for Trump, no?
 
Conventional wisdom would suggest so, and it shouldn't do Bernie any harm either, yet Rubio is the man for money today (down to 7/1 with Paddy, and 10/1 with Sky). I reckon this is just a belated reaction to these two polls that were put out about 6 hours ago though

Trumps drifting, but lets keep it in context, he's still a pretty firm odds on shot

If he can win on a constituency of 40% Godists, snub their debate, and suggest they're stupid, you do have to start to wonder?

It's all very well saying that all the moderates together could beat him, but this doesn't account for what happens to Cruz and Carson voters. There's about 30% of reasonably extreme (particularly in Cruz's case) vote up for grabs

Logic says Trump can't do this, instinct is saying he can. I've seen and heard too many well reasoned and logical arguments go up in smoke so far.
 
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Warbler said:
and it shouldn't do Bernie any harm either,
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However, the talking heads in the studio are saying that, unfortunately for him, Bernie's first-time caucus-goers ( university students) are concentrated in university precincts rather than spread throughout the state. Unbalanced.
 
LOL, the earliest CNN caucus Entrance Polls show Trump on 27% against Cruz' 22%.
The Donald pulls it off !
 
I noted that Hillary had a better geographic spread in #210, and so far as I can gather the state skews rural

Bernie could win the vote, and lose the delegate count.
 
icebreaker said:
LOL, the earliest CNN caucus Entrance Polls show Trump on 27% against Cruz' 22%.
The Donald pulls it off !
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That's pretty well what the Selzer poll said. It all depends if the Godists start putting curses on everyone and can win them round in debate
 
icebreaker said:
Where do you think the Martin O'Malley support will go/divide if he doesn't reach 15% ?
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The O'Malley supporters I've heard are tending to say Bernie, but there is a bit of you that thinks they ought to drift towards the party line and accept that if Hillary is to be the candidate then give her a mandate
 
Yeh, not looking good for Bernie. (Although there is still money looking to back him on Betfair in-running at 5.0)
 
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Cruz IS a percentage point ahead on the early votes, tho'.

Haven;t looked at BBC at all; am following it exclusively on CNN.

This is great fcking stuff -- exciting and great fun. Can't get to bed because of it ! :D
 
Betfair traders are washing their hands of Trump !
Gone way out to 2.4 from 1.35, and Cruz now touching 2's on.
 
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