I’m of two minds about this, or maybe even three minds:
On Friday afternoon, Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s campaign manager, Greg Schultz, convened a conference call with supporters to outline a path forward following two bruising losses in Iowa and New Hampshire.
The campaign, Mr. Schultz made clear on the call, was banking on finishing in at least second place in the upcoming Nevada caucuses, a contest that will offer the first major test of Mr. Biden’s assertion that he can uniquely assemble a diverse coalition.
First, saying this even on a conference call of supporters can be expected to leak, as it did. So, hopefully, they wanted people to know that they’re shooting for at least a second place finish. The upside is that it sets expectations a little low so that a second place finish doesn’t seem like a disappointment to the campaign. The downside is that a failure to finish in the top two will now be magnified and impossible to spin.
Which leads to my second thought, which is that they must be pretty confident that they’re in a good position in Nevada. If they thought there were tanking, they’d be prepping people for that.
But then there’s a final possibility, which is that they really do believe they’re tanking and the call was an effort to rally people so that perhaps they can finish as high as second place. In this scenario, things are so desperate that they were willing to risk a likely leak because it won’t really matter if things keep on the current trajectory. If Biden does poorly in Nevada, maybe they believe any chance of winning in South Carolina will be lost and the campaign will effectively be over.
All of these seem like plausible scenarios to me, which makes it hard to choose between them.
I/m pretty. skeptical about this poll that shows Tom Steyer ahead, although I know he’s been spending big out there.
What I found with the Google:
Not sure I trust polling by “a political advertising agency.”
That poll with Steyer in first is garbage (look at the “n” and the demographics). However, Steyer is in decent shape there because he’s been the only one spending. I suspect it’ll look like Data For Progress poll, just released. DFP has been one of the best pollsters of the cycle (and in 2018). They’ve got it like this:
Sanders – 35
Warren – 16
Buttigieg – 15
Biden – 14
Steyer – 10
Klobuchar – 9
Biden is not going to the nominee. He’s now just another old white man standing in the way, upset that things are not how they were in the 80’s, when he never had to take any sh$t from outside his demographic.
“Out by February” I predicted 6 months ago. Looks like I missed it by a month.
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Been looking at the polling in my state. Bloomberg is just edging out Biden in Arkansas. Given margin of error, there is effectively a four-way tie. Bloomberg, Biden, Sanders, and Buttigeig, in that order. Looking more and more like I’ll be casting a vote for Bloomberg in March. If nothing else, he’s the only Democrat who bothered to have a coherent campaign organization in my state, and when his campaign organizers drove an hour away to visit my city, the crowd to see him was over double what was expected. Too many more people, and the venue would have shooed away folks.
Come November, my state doesn’t matter for EVs, but whoever is at the top of the ticket will influence a lot of down-ballot races that matter a whole lot to me and mine. Also guessing a Sanders nomination is one in which we effectively cede Florida to Trump. Not acceptable. As for Biden, I never thought he was much of a campaigner, even in his prime. The guy is tired. He needs to hang it up and allow someone else to take the relatively liberal wing of the party (what I guess is now pejoratively called centrist).
Biden should never have launched his campaign. That being said, it’s up to us to persuade him to bow out gracefully.
The numbers don’t quite add up for him, and nobody appears enthusiastic about his candidacy. He has a role to play as an elder statesman in the party, not as a candidate.