Post #13:Week of Oct. 17 to 23

 Dems: This a week of apologies and surprises. I start with the Democrats because more actually relevant things are happening in this race, though as anyone can see it's not much of a race.

Surprise #1 and apology #1. How often do I get to write "The pundits were right and I was wrong"?

Looking back on posts from several blogs going back ten years... this is the first time.

Yes, you guys beat me. I'd quote Han Solo and say "Don't get cocky", but there is no chance in the seven hells the pundits won't be cocky 24/7 about something.

And here is my defeat. All the polls this week are after the debate and the numbers say Hillary won.

I thought Sanders did. In my weak defense, I will not say Sanders lost.  His numbers stayed steady.

Surprises #2 and #3. I didn't think Lincoln Chafee and Jim Webb would throw in their respective towels so quickly. As I tweeted this week, there are five GOP candidates just as dead in the water as these guys, but Jindal, Graham, Pataki, Santorum and Gilmore don't have enough money or sense between them to buy a clue.

Complete non-surprise #1: Biden said no.  He stalled entirely too long, but I never though he would run. The thing is, with three of the also-rans gone, next week will be interesting in a horse race way. My bet would be that None of the Above gets the immediate boost, but it will slide down to where it is now (or lower) by about Thanksgiving.

 GOP: A good week for Trump, slips backward for Carson, Rubio and Jeb... (my new nickname for him; the ellipsis makes you feel as though there must be something else, right?) Cruz is still the King of the Invisibles. 

Free market capitalism in action, sort of: Jeb... got rid of staff and cut the salaries of many who remain, because as free market capitalism tells us, that ALWAYS leads to victory.

I kid... I'm a kidder.

I write that Jeb... did it, but I get the strong feeling that the people who give candidates a LOT of money are now sensibly putting conditions on it. If Jeb... quits, there will be serious cash left over and I'd bet anything it's already decided who gets the rebates and in what percentages.

Apology #2: Let me admit I started this blog too early. I started a similar weekly check of the horse race back in December of 2011. In 2012, meaningful races were held in January. In 2016, both the Iowa Caucus and the New Hampshire primary will be held in February.
 

 Non-Politicians vs. Politicians: The Fiorina disappearing act continues and Carson slipped a little, but Trump's gains are enough to keep the non-politicians above 60% of the vote of people who aren't undecided.

 The Baskin-Robbins of batshit crazy, part 1: There was a time the conservative media was rightfully called The Echo Chamber, and certain phrases would show up on Fox News and in the columns of conservative writers both in print and online, not to mention talk radio. But now, the vicious fractures in the GOP and the right wing are out in the open for everyone to see.

It's not yet Halloween, but Donald Trump is still scaring the holy shit out of the Republican establishment.  There are so many events that were supposed to be his downfall, and so far... not so much. Trump is no deep thinker and with very few exceptions, he doesn't back down on the crap he says. Using objective reality, he says a whole lot of batshit crazy stuff. He's a birther, an anti-vaxxer, he thinks Mexico will pay for the Great Wall of Trump, which he thinks will work, and he thinks he's an innate, untested military genius.

And here is a snapshot of just how bat-shit crazy the Republicans are. Republican voters trust Trump on foreign policy by more than 2-1 over his closest rival.

In fact, the next three rivals combined equal his total.

And just to add to the batshit crazy, the GOP voters put Hillary in fifth, ahead of Jeb...

This is a party gone mad.
 

The Baskin-Robbins of batshit crazy, part 2: But if we are going to talk "party gone mad", let's look at Ben Carson's positives. A lot of people are noticing how much he loves comparing stuff to Hitler and/or slavery, but that's what his supporters like about him.

All this is before his chat with Chuck Todd today when he said he wants to get rid of Medicare, abortion is equal to slavery and there can be no exceptions and what our country really needs is a way for students to turn in their professors to the authorities, just to make sure the students' First Amendment rights aren't being violated.

I just saw Bridge of Spies, a very good Spielberg film, where Tom Hanks' character, a well-respected lawyer, says that it's the belief in the Constitution that makes us all Americans.

No disrespect to Hanks or the writers Joel and Ethan Coen, but Americans have never agreed on the Constitution really, and in the 21st Century the splits are worse than ever.

As someone who is very keen on objective reality, I have no problem saying the right wing has gone batshit crazy, and it is by no means a march in lock step towards the same batshit crazy.

More data next week.