New Hampshire polls: The last week of January

The Dems: The story on this side is simple. It's a two-person race and Sanders appears to be pulling away. His median lead in all January polls is 11 points and that increases to 16 points when looking at the five polls in the last week. I'm sure the press will play down a victory in New Hampshire for Bernie, but it looks like it will be a comfortable win a week out.

The GOP: As I said last week, the drama in New Hampshire is not for first place, but for finishing over 10%, the threshold for delegates. I Apologize for how difficult it is to read the log jam for second place, but right now its Kasich at 11.9% and Cruz and Rubio tied at 11.6%.

Numbers I think are more relevant is how many times in January these five candidates polled above 10%, which tells a slightly different story. Each of the five candidates will be list with two numbers, the percent of the polls in January where their numbers were over 10%, and the same question, but only taking into account the polls in the past week.

Ted 'The Snake' Cruz: 79% for the month, 80% past week
Marco Rubio: 71% for the month, 40% past week
John Kasich: 64% for the month, 60% past week
Jeb:(: 29% for the month, 40% past week
Chris Christie: 29% for the month, 0% past week

These numbers would suggest Ted 'The Snake' Cruz is most likely to stay over the 10% threshold and Chris Christie is in serious trouble. We have one more week of polls before votes are cast on the 9th, so I will have another update next week.

Tomorrow: post-mortem in Iowa!

The Iowa polls:Final post before tomorrow's caucuses

 The Dems: Bernie Sanders has made a race of Iowa, according to the opinion polls, but both the monthly average numbers and the median polls says it's still advantage Clinton. The average lead is higher than the median lead, largely due to one crazy outlier that gave Hillary a 29 point lead, but the median lead has been steadily consistent:

Entire month's median lead: 2 points for Clinton
Last two weeks' median lead: 2 points for Clinton
Last week's median lead: 2.5 points for Clinton

Of course, tomorrow is the proof of the pudding.

The GOP: The point the media has been drumming home this month is Nobody Likes Ted Cruz. By Washington standards, he is just as much of an outsider as Trump, Carson or Fiorina. That said, he did a great job in Iowa making it a two-man race once the numbers of The Completely Sane and Honest Ben Carson tanked back in November. But the average poll in January gives Trump about a 3 point edge.

The median lead for the Republicans has not been as consistent.

Entire month's median lead: 2 points for Trump
Last two weeks' median lead: 5 points for Trump
Last week's median lead: 3 points for Trump

Both races are proportional, so all four candidates should get delegates. The big question is about organization, especially Trump's. News stories agreed in December he had no organization to speak of, but in January, he clearly paid for some boots on the ground, though stories disagree on how good that organization is.

Tomorrow, it's a report on the New Hampshire numbers, Tuesday a re-cap of Iowa and Wednesday, the national polls.

I've been keep tabs for quite a while. Now the shit gets real.

The National Polls:Third week of January

The GOP: The national polls aren't showing much drama right now. Trump's lead is yuuge, Cruz and Rubio aren't moving much, Carson is taking forever to disappear and Jeb:( is the only candidate not listed who has even 5%.

The next time I post these numbers, Iowa will be in the books. Conventional wisdom is that outside of Iowa and New Hampshire, only political junkies like me (and since you are reading this, you) are paying attention, though I do not know how anyone who watches the news can avoid hearing about Trump. Maybe when more people take an interest, all those good and sensible conservatives George Will and David Brooks love so much will put their support behind one of the "mainstream" Republicans, but that is a big maybe. When I started this blog, I didn't think Trump would still be leading in late January, and certainly didn't think his lead would be so commanding. I thought he was going to be one of a series of flashes in the pan before a party favorite like Rubio or Jeb:( finally got enough delegates. I'm slowly getting used to the idea that the fever that grips the right wing voters is not going to break soon.

The Dems: Did I write there's not much drama on the Republican side. There is none with the Democrats this week. Both Hillary's and Bernie's numbers stayed completely flat compared to the week before and the only sign the polling companies didn't just phone it in is a tiny uptick in the None of the Above numbers at the expense of Martin O'Malley. I do expect the national numbers to change once Iowa and New Hampshire are in the books.

Next update: the last numbers from Iowa will be posted on Sunday.  See you then.

New Hampshire polls:Third week of January

The Dems: Sanders still has a comfortable lead in New Hampshire. The average for January is a 10.2 point lead, the median poll says 9 points. The Confidence of Victory method would give Bernie a 98% chance to come in first, but historically New Hampshire splits the delegates proportionally in both the Democratic and Republican contests; for the Democrats, the threshold to get delegates is 15%. For the Republicans, it is 10%. On the Democratic side, this means Martin O'Malley is shit out of luck. 15% for him would be a miracle.

The GOP: There is no drama for the first place finish like there is in Iowa, but the second through sixth contest has drama because of the 10% threshold. If the polling data is a fair indication, Rubio, Kasich and Cruz will have enough with Jeb:( and Christie will coming up short. But there is the idea of the confidence interval (or as it is known colloquially, the margin of error) and every one of the five guys in this pack has a measurable chance to succeed or fail.

I will admit that I always thought Trump would have faded by now, but he plays the media like a violin and his voters have not been turned off by anything he has said or done so far. Chuck Grassley introduced him to a crowd in Iowa, and though Grassley didn't endorse him, if the old school Republicans will be seen on the same stage with him, it's a sign the establishment is moving forward in its stages of grief. Bob Dole made a statement condemning Ted 'The Snake' Cruz - it looks like the 'nobody likes him' meme isn't an overstatement - and said Trump would be better than Cruz.

Here's a tiny piece of math the establishment could cling to. In this polling data, the two main outsiders add up to 41.9% and the four establishment Republicans add up to 41.8%. (I'm not counting Fiorina and Carson anymore, as their campaigns show no signs of life.) The thing is no one has really mounted an Anyone But Trump campaign effectively, so even when people drop out - and I expect several people to drop out after Iowa and New Hampshire - even voters whose first choice was someone traditional might switch over to Trump or Cruz, the least palatable candidates in the eyes of the establishment.

To quote Nassim Taleb, a writer I intensely dislike, this does look like a Black Swan event.

The Iowa polls:Third week of January

 The GOP: Donald Trump has a lead over Ted 'The Snake' Cruz in the average of polls in January. His lead is 1.3 points in the average and of the ten polls taken in January, Trump has the lead in six. His lead in the median polls is 1.5 points. I consider it a good sign when average and median are close to agreeing.

A lot of GOP races are winner take all, but Iowa is proportional. Unless there is a huge upset, both Trump and Cruz together should get the lion's share of the delegates and the difference in number between them will be minimal.

The Dems: Clinton is drawing away from Sanders in recent polling. Her lead in the average is 4.6 points, but only 3 in the median. This is due in large part to one big outlier that says she's ahead 59 to 30. The best poll for her other than this one gives her a nine point lead. It's very rare that an outlier like this is accurate.

The Democratic party process in Iowa is more convoluted than the Republican, the Feb. 1 caucus being just the first of a three step process.

Tomorrow, a report on the New Hampshire numbers.

The National Polls:Second week of January

The GOP: Any poll aggregator will say that the national primary results are not good predictors of anything in most elections, but it is interesting to watch the rise and fall of candidates. If we just paid attention to this, it would say Trump is unstoppable, but as we know, the story looks to be different in Iowa at least. The other thing I find interesting about the national polls is that The Completely Sane and Honest Ben Carson hasn't sunk completely into oblivion. As in Iowa, he's still the fourth choice and no one else has risen above the None of the Above threshold, though Jeb:( is solidly in fifth with around 5%.

Iowa is less than two weeks away, and I expect nothing dramatic in the national polls until then, barring some major scandal.

 The Dems: Looking at the national polls, you would think Hillary hasn't a worry in the world. Her numbers are still above 50%, Bernie can't crack 40%, it's all beer and skittles. But in the two states where people have to make their decision soon, she's got serious competition, where the most likely result right now is she will win Iowa and Sanders will win New Hampshire. Again, I think the thing most likely to move the needle nationally is the Iowa result in early February.

Back next Sunday with more, starting with Iowa.

The New Hampshire polls:Second week of January

The Dems: It was a good week for Bernie Sanders, two new polls both showing him with a lead in New Hampshire. So far there have been five polls of the Democratic race in the Granite State in January and four of them say Sanders is leading. Because it is a two person race, my Confidence of Victory method can be used on the median poll to say Bernie would have an 80% chance of winning if the election were held on the day the poll was taken. Of course, these numbers can change as we get closer to election day.

The GOP: On the Republican side, all the interesting horse race stuff is the battle for second through sixth.  The worst poll numbers for Trump this month give him 25% support, the best numbers for anybody else are two polls that give Rubio 15%. Those two polls give the Florida senator a strong hold on second, but the most recent polls are showing a surge for John Kasich, now in third passing Ted 'The Snake' Cruz. The other notable movement is a slump for Jeb:(, who can't get anything right this campaign. Unless there is a miracle turnaround in the next few weeks, and Jeb:( is just not a miracle kind of guy, I would expect the people who gave serious cash to Jeb:( will want a partial refund by the time the New Hampshire results are tallied.

Tomorrow: the national polls.