Things That Make Other Things Make Sense…

Last week radio talk show host Mark Levin had to reluctantly admit he has a ‘soon-to-be’ step-son working for Senator Ted Cruz. – HERE –  Now, this week comes an even more startling revelation:

Bill Sammon is a Fox News Vice President and in charge of the Fox News debates and questioning.  His daughter, Brooke Sammon, is Marco Rubio’s Press Secretary.

So how influential is Bill Sammon in the debate formatting?  From a Media Buzz interview with Chris Stirewalt about the debate construction: (more…)

Good sample size, good methodology, strong poll.  The latest poll from PPP (full pdf below) provides evidence of a commonly expressed sentiment: ‘The more Iowans see/hear of Senator Ted Cruz, the less they like him’, which makes Trump’s decision to put the Cruz smarm center of an Iowa stage even more brilliant.

The interesting internals in this poll reflect a possibility (a difficult to measure – but solid possibility) that Marco Rubio could actually upend Cruz from second place.

(Via PPP) – PPP’s new Iowa poll, conducted in partnership with Progress Iowa, continues to find Donald Trump leading in the state. He’s at 31% to 23% for Ted Cruz, 14% for Marco Rubio, 9% for Ben Carson, 4% each for Jeb Bush, Mike Huckabee, and Rand Paul, 3% for Carly Fiorina, 2% each for Chris Christie and John Kasich, and 1% each for Jim Gilmore and Rick Santorum.

Since we last polled Iowa two and a half weeks ago Trump and Cruz are the only candidates to see their support move by more than a couple points- Trump’s seen a 3 point gain in his support from 28% to 31%, while Cruz has seen a corresponding 3 point decline in his support from 26% to 23%. (more…)

UPDATE:  Due to the severity of bias within the Fox agenda, candidate Donald Trump has stated his attendance is still undetermined:

This was the earlier snarky statement by Fox which led to Donald Trump reconsidering:

FOX NEWS:  “We learned from a secret back channel that the Ayatollah and Putin both intend to treat Donald Trump unfairly when they meet with him if he becomes president,” Fox News said in the statement, adding this gem: “A nefarious source tells us that Trump has his own secret plan to replace the Cabinet with his Twitter followers to see if he should even go to those meetings.”

Fox News has announced the candidate debate lineup and again there are two tiers.  Eight candidates in the 9:00pm “Top Tier” debate, and four candidates in the 7:00pm “Lower Tier” (kiddie table) debate:

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For those who were not reading in October when we shared: “Candidate Marco Rubio Gains an Additional Master“, you might want to refresh; because much of what was covered in that Halloween 2015 review is now coming to pass.

Vetting a candidate is a process of deep research into the history, activity, associations, affiliations and prior background of a political candidate.  Marco Rubio is the least publicly vetted candidate in the race, and there’s a very good reason for that.

Whenever the media are not deep into a GOP candidate’s background, it’s generally because the information therein holds more value for their ideological use at a later date.

The days of reporters actually doing the legwork of research are in the rear view mirror.  Modern political vetting is done by private entities, private investigative teams, generally outside the official campaign administration of opponents.  That type of research is called opposition research, or “Oppo-research”.    (more…)

Candidate Donald Trump takes a commanding lead (34%) in the latest Fox News Iowa poll (full pdf below).  Ted Cruz comes in second at 23% and Marco Rubio 12%.  No other candidate comes close.

However, additionally worth noting is the under representation of several electorate flags (ex. cell phone users) which would add confidence the impression that even with these results, the size of Donald Trump’s support is understated.

This baseline polling probability is enhanced when you review the Margin-of-Error for the sub-groups.  Obviously, all of this is exceptional news for Donald Trump with a week left before Iowa caucuses… (more…)

Posted without comment:

And then, well, you’re probably going to want to….

….READ THIS !!

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The latest Zogby poll of national GOP voters shows Donald J Trump with a commanding lead of 45% a full 32 points higher than second place Ted Cruz.  Additionally an Arizona poll shows Donald Trump at 38% 22 points ahead – LINK –

(Via Zogby Analytics) […]  Mr. Trump polls over 40% among men (49%) and women (41%), as well as Republicans (47%) and independents (49%), conservatives (46%) and moderates (45%). Mr. Cruz scores double digits among men (10%), women (16%), Republicans (15%), independents (10%), and conservative (15%).

We tested a series of three-way races and found Mr. Trump trouncing all of his rivals — 53% to 20% for Mr. Cruz, and 11% for Mr. Rubio; 57% to 23% for Mr. Cruz, and 8% for Mr. Christie; 57% to 23% for Mr. Cruz and 7% for Mr. Kasich; 55% to 25% for Mr. Cruz, and 10% for Mr. Bush.

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CNN/WMUR have conducted another poll of New Hampshire voters (full pdf below).  Candidate Donald Trump extends his lead and is now positioned (34%) solidly 20 points higher than second place Ted Cruz.  Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio are tied for third place with 10% each.

Notice how Kasich is no-where close to the continual ARG polls (20%)?

Candidate Donald Trump is also winning significantly on the key issues. (more…)

Several people had been mentioning “the lack of polling”…  It appears today/tomorrow will more than make up for it…  (((snicker)))

Via PPP Polling (with full pdf below) – North Carolina was the first place polling ever found Donald Trump leading the Republican Presidential race, and he just keeps getting stronger. PPP’s newest poll finds him at 38% to 16% for Ted Cruz, 11% for Marco Rubio, 8% for Ben Carson, 6% each for Mike Huckabee and Jeb Bush, 4% for Chris Christie, 3% each for Carly Fiorina and Rand Paul, 2% for John Kasich, and 1% for Rick Santorum.

Trump’s support is up 5 points from a month ago when he was at 33%. The only other candidate who’s seen a real gain in their support is Huckabee, who’s climbed from 2% to 6%. The main hopeful dropping is Ben Carson, who’s fallen from 14% to 8%. Besides Carson the only person to see their support decline by more than a point is Marco Rubio, who’s dropped 3 points from 14% to 11%. (more…)

A new Florida FAU poll (full pdf below) shows candidate Donald Trump extending his lead and nearing the 50% threshold.   At 48% Trump has increased his lead by 11 points since the same poll was conducted a month ago.

Ted Cruz comes in a distant second at 16%, with home-state Senator Marco Rubio at 11% and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush 10% – the rest of the field is irrelevant in Florida.

The polling also includes the general Florida electorate enabling head-to-head match ups between the Republican candidates and Democrat candidates.  (more…)