Biden Ekes Out Second Place Finish In Nevada To Stay In The Hunt | Talking Points Memo

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Nevada kept former Vice President Joe Biden’s hopes alive.

While only a small percentage of precincts have actually reported full vote tallies to the Nevada Democratic Party, multiple news outlets called the Nevada caucuses for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) early Saturday evening. With 88 percent of precincts reporting, Sanders was the projected winner by a landslide with 47 percent of delegates.

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1292755
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Biden still has a very plausible shot, IMHO. But a great deal rides on his showing in South Carolina. A relatively big win there – which, grading on a curve, I’d define as at least a 5 point lead over Bernie – could propel Biden into being perceived as the clear leader among non-Bernie candidate on Super Tuesday, and possibly bring supporters defecting from other candidates to his side.

One interesting wrinkle is it’s only 3 days from South Carolina to Super Tuesday. I’m not sure if this is an impediment for a Biden Comeback, or an advantage for him.

On the one hand, it doesn’t leave him as much time to raise money and recruit volunteers and in general gives him less time to make good use of the positive media narrative of a potential South Carolina bump.

On the other hand, that also means less time for the narrative to change again for some reason, which means more chance that a “Biden Comeback” narrative would still be a dominant narrative on Super Tuesday.

So I’m not sure how that factor shakes out, maybe helpful to Biden, maybe not. But I do think a big Biden victory in South Carolina gives him a real shot at the nomination, and since there seems like a decent chance he actually achieves that in South Carolina, he is, as the headline above accurately sums it up, “still in the hunt.”

Conversely, a weak win for Biden with a very close Bernie second-place finish in South Carolina – with the accompanying narrative “Biden narrowly wins, but underperforms, is that enough to keep him alive?” – would reduce the chances of a Biden Comeback substantially. And of course a Bernie win in South Carolina could be the death knell for Biden’s campaign,

So I don’t think it’s overly dramatic to say South Carolina probably determines Biden’s fate in this race. A lot riding on the outcome there, to say the least!

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Sorry, but he is Joe Bydone now. Elizabeth Warren just vaulted into second in the first national poll post Nevada debate still 10 points behind Sanders but ahead of Biden. What it confirms to me is that the country is becoming comfortable with the Progressive agenda and the centrism, which is really “republican lite” is fading. Joe may hang on in SC (which will never vote for a D in the general) especially if Clyburn endorses him in a triage effort. But unless Biden takes some kind of debate steroid on Wednesday, it’s not going to blunt Sanders and a reinvigorated Warren from returning the Democratic Party to the Democrats.

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Bernie self-immolating on 60 Minutes. Can’t come soon enough. Praise for Fidel Castro. Continues to be coy and dismissive about how much single payer will cost. Gets even more cranky and dismissive about questions about other pie in the sky programs.

Nominating Bernie Sanders is political Hari kari. Don’t do it.

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It wasn’t pretty, but Biden got a lot done in NV. He basically eliminated the Klobuchar and Steyer campaigns. He mortally wounded Buttigieg and Pete will get wiped out in SC. That goes a long way to clearing the field in the South. He has to win SC by as big a margin as he can and then he has to figure out how to convince voters not to vote for Bloomberg and consolidate behind his candidacy.

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So a 5 point win after blowing a 30 point lead is “relatively big”? Wish I had professors grading on y our curve back in the day?

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The fact that he’s now “eking out second place” is a loss already. So much for the"I’m a great candidate" assertion. Lmao.

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Look, I’m a Bernie supporter. I’m not arguing that the way election results are interpreted in the media is fair or necessarily makes a whole lot of sense. In the above comment, I’m just predicting that’s roughly how I expect the media narrative to work. Personally in most cases I’d consider 5 points a “solid” win, but not a “big” win per se. Be that as it may, my prediction is that if Biden wins South Carolina by at least a 5 point margin, that will be interpreted as a big enough win to make a “Biden Comeback” narrative gain some legs.

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More Cranky Bernie on 60 Minutes.

Vote for the Fidel Castro rehabilitation program…why not?

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It would be a fascinating race if lets say Bloomberg could be convinced Joe Biden was a viable candidate or was able to talk to the Klobachar and Buttigieg campaigns about dropping out so that the moderate wings could consolidate to deny a first round nomination to Bernie. The polls that matter are not the generic national polls but the state polls in the battleground states of Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Florida which show Bernie losing badly to Trump which should alarm most Democrats.

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I’m not a Biden supporter but I think the headline is a little misleading. If he got 21% and Buttigieg got 13.7% that’s not “eking” out second place but a solid second place.

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Good Lord, that ought to concentrate Dem. voters’ minds!

("“Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” ― Samuel Johnson, The Life of Samuel Johnson LL.D. Vol 3)

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And whose fault it is? No one to blame but himself. Also Bloomberg is doing better than Biden in MI and FL in some polls. I’d rather have him instead.

While it’s a reasonable strategy, I hate to see the party clear the field for Biden. First purging POC candidates, now this.

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I guess to be a strong second, one also has to be not far behind the winner. e.g. Pete in NH.

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No they don’t. At least not in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania in the recent polls I’ve seen…such as this one:

Sanders fares best against Trump in a hypothetical match-up [in PA], leading 47% to 45% — within the poll’s 3% to 4% margin of error. Biden leads Trump 46% to 45%, and every other Democrat is even with Trump in the Keystone State.

Every Democrat leads Trump by 1 or 2 percentage points in Wisconsin , this poll found (a stark contrast from Quinnipiac’s result). But that’s a statistically insignificant lead.

Democrats fare better in Michigan. Sanders leads Trump 48% to 41%, Buttigieg has a 6 percentage point edge on the president, and the rest of the Democrats lead by 3 to 4 percentage points.

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Ok, I’ll buy that as a possible outcome. But remember that it’s almost a week until the SC primary and until then the story will be about SAnders surge and Warren’s reinvigorated campaign. The Wednesday debate has the chance to change the narrative, but so you really expect Biden to do anything significant (unless he screws up again) and Warren (my preferred candidate, Bernie is second) is unlikely to go that hard on Sanders since they agree so much on policy.
Of course Sanders may have trouble overcoming the twitter insults of noted political analyst Jason Haddix /s @khyber900

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Ordinarily I’d agree but was thinking this is slightly different.
I guess I was thinking that since the main focus of attention has been on the pack behind Sanders in terms of who is dropping by the wayside that it was more relevant how close he and Buttigieg are.

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Except that’s NOT what the recent polls are showing in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and especially Michigan…see my comment just upthread.

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Gotcha. It’s good to be an underdog. Lowering the expectation helps. While NV is Sanders’ to lose, Biden getting just above 20% is terrible. He just might lose Hispanic votes to ttump.

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I think the real story of course that seems to be somewhat down-played is although I can’t remember the figures for sure I don’t recall anyone thinking Sanders was going to have as high a percentage as he’s getting.
But like I say, I’m having trouble remembering what the predictions were. It seems many moons ago now.

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