Winning most predicted by 1. endorsements, 2. fund-raising and 3. polling.
Hillary on top in all 3.
Graphs at website.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/us/elections/presidential-candidates-dashboard.html
Who’s Winning the Presidential Campaign?
History suggests that each party’s eventual nominee will emerge from 2015 in one of the top
two or three positions, as measured by endorsements, fund-raising and polling. UPDATED Oct. 24, 2015
Who’s Running Who’s Winning Campaign Money Primary Calendar
Democrats
Candidate rank 1
4
Prediction
Markets National
Endorse. Iowa
Polls N.H.
Polls Money Raised
HillaryClinton #1 #1 #1 #1 #1
BernieSanders 2 2 2 2 2
MartinO’Malley 3 3 3 3 3
LawrenceLessig 3 4 4 4 4.
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The polls get most of the attention, but they’re not the most important part of the early stages of a presidential campaign. The better guide to who’s really winning is known as the “invisible primary,” in which candidates compete for support from their fellow politicians, from party leaders and from donors.
A candidate who wins the invisible primary usually wins the party nomination. At the least, the eventual nominee tends to be a candidate who was a close runner-up. Why? The support of party leaders is both a sign of a candidate’s long-term strength and a source of future strength.
As for the polls, they’re not irrelevant, even at this early stage. But the national polls matter less than the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, the first two states to vote and the states where voters are paying more attention to the candidates.
Here, we offer a scoreboard that totes up the factors that matter most, and we’ll update it every day for the remainder of the year. For all the imperfections in his campaign so far, Jeb Bush still leads the Republican field, albeit by a much smaller margin than Hillary Clinton leads the Democratic field.
Prediction Markets
When a campaign still has months remaining, prediction markets — in which traders bet on event outcomes — have a substantially better record than polls at pointing to the eventual nominee. But the markets do have at least one weakness: They sometimes exaggerate the chances of unusual or long-shot candidates, like Donald Trump, perhaps because a few passionate traders can affect prices.
PredictWise Chance of Winning Democratic Nomination
1 Hillary Clinton 89.0%
2 Bernie Sanders 11.0
3 Martin O’Malley 0.0
Lawrence Lessig 0.0
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PredictWise prediction data are based on odds from the Betfair and PredictIt betting exchanges and markets, and aggregate polling data from HuffPost Pollster.
National Endorsements
“Since 1980, the single best predictor of a party’s nominee is the number of endorsements from party elites — elected officials and prominent past party leaders — in the months before primaries begin,” as the political scientist Lynn Vavreck put it. Why? Political elites have a better sense of which candidates can endure a long campaign, and they can influence voters and donors by praising or criticizing candidates. One distinguishing feature of the 2016 cycle is how few top Republicans have endorsed any candidate so far — Jeb Bush has received endorsements from 6.6 percent of Republican senators, representatives and governors, compared with Hillary Clinton’s 59 percent of Democratic officials.
Endorsements From National Democratic Officials
Governors Members of Congress Share of All
1 Hillary Clinton 9 142 60.2%
2 Bernie Sanders 0 2 0.8
3 Martin O’Malley 0 1 0.4
4 Lawrence Lessig 0 0 0.0
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Sources: Democracy in Action; data gathered by John Sides, George Washington University, and Lynn Vavreck, U.C.L.A., with help from Luis Rishi Puno.
Iowa Polls
National polls are of dubious value at this stage, because most voters aren’t focusing on the race. But likely caucus goers in Iowa are paying more attention, as the candidates descend on their state. Of course, Iowa has voted for the eventual nominee in only two of the last six Republican nomination fights (George W. Bush in 2000 and Bob Dole in 1996) that did not involve an incumbent president. It has done better in Democratic races, choosing four of the past six nominees.
Democratic Support for Candidate in Iowa
1 Hillary Clinton 45.8%
2 Bernie Sanders 34.0
3 Martin O’Malley 3.0
4 Lawrence Lessig 0.0
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Source: HuffPost Pollster, based on the average of the five most recent polls by unique pollsters.
New Hampshire Polls
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Democratic Support for Candidate in New Hampshire
1 Hillary Clinton 36.4%
2 Bernie Sanders 36.2
3 Martin O’Malley 1.2
4 Lawrence Lessig 0.4
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Source: HuffPost Pollster, based on the average of the five most recent polls by unique pollsters.
Money Raised
As with endorsements, money matters for two reasons: It’s a sign of a candidate’s strength, and it then becomes a further source of strength. .......................The calculations here include both the money raised directly by a campaign and the money raised by the super PACs and other outside groups allied with the campaign.
Total Raised (in Millions)
Candidate Outside Groups Total Raised
1 Hillary Clinton $77.5 $20.3 $97.7
2 Bernie Sanders 41.5 0.0 41.5
3 Martin O’Malley 3.3 0.3 3.6
4 Lawrence Lessig 1.0 0.0 1.0
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Candidate totals are through Sept. 30, and outside group totals are through June 30.
Source: Federal Election Commission, campaigns, news reports
= new reply since forum marked as read
Not so much.
