Writing in Nation of Change, C. Robert Gibson has a post “Six Reasons Sanders Actually Won the Debate Despite What Pundits Claim,” featuring statistical evidence from: Online polls of a half-dozen news organizations, including CNN, Time and Fox News; Facebook and twitter mentions; Google searches; a fund-raising uptick; and CNN, Frank Luntz and Fusion focus group picks.
However, respected poll analyst Mark Blumenthal, along with co-authors Ariel Edwards-Levy, Natalie Jackson and Janie Valencia, cite a Clinton win in a new HuffPo/YouGov poll that indicates 55 percent of registered Democratic voters picked Clinton as the winner, with 22 percent for Sanders. However, note the authors, “The difference between candidates disappears if Democratic-leaning independents are included with Democratic voters. Among this larger group, 46 percent say their opinion of each candidate improved.” Further, an “NBC/Survey Monkey poll finds similar result – Allison Kopicki and John Lapinski: “Hillary Clinton’s performance in Tuesday night’s debate resonated strongly among members of her party, with more than half–56%–saying [Clinton] won the debate.” The authors add “Instant online polls are informal and unscientific. The results rely on a self-selecting group of respondents with no regard to political affiliation, age, country, or even whether the person doing the responding actually watched the debate. Respondents, meanwhile, don’t have even the slightest motivation to be objective…Like tracking new Twitter followers or Google searches, the online surveys provide an interesting snapshot of the mood of a particular slice of the Internet, but they’re mostly for entertainment (for the reader) and traffic (for the outlet). No one should mistake them for the scientific surveys done by professional pollsters.”
Daily Kos Elections explains why the U.S. Senate race in PA may be competitive after all.
In Charles Pierce’s Esquire post, “Ted Cruz Has the Look of a Dangerously Unhinged Charlatan,” he writes “Ed Kilgore is absolutely right about what Tailgunner Ted Cruz is up to out there on the stump, where he is sitting inside a powder magazine, playing with a blowtorch and giggling like a child...There’s no third alternative. Simply put, unless every other candidate on the stage in a couple of weeks loudly and forcefully distances themselves from this kind of, then the Republican Party is not worth the sneeze that at this point would blow it to hell.”
I agree.
Whatever else can be said about the Sanders campaign, generating articles like this one enriches America’s political dialogue significantly.
Blog for Our Future’s Terrence Heath makes an excellent point in his post, “Democratic Debate Proves Movements Matter.” To all of those progressive activists laboring in social change movements, your efforts to make a significant difference, and they are well-reflected in the first Democratic presidential debate.
At The Nation Joan Walsh explains why progressives should be very pleased about the quality of the Democratic debate, and she also highlights some of the differences in policies.
Keep it up guys!