2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Forget Sanders and Clinton for a moment. This is a symbolic schism that has been long brewing [View all]Gothmog
(144,919 posts)Predictwise has Biden with a higher percentage than Sanders http://www.predictwise.com/ Silver has a similar prediction. Unless the Clinton campaign implodes or Sanders can appeal to voters other than in the small segment he is currently appealing to, Hillary Clinton will be the nominee. Biden is waiting until after the Howdy Gowdy hearings to decide if he is getting in. Early November is too late to get into the race against a healthy Clinton campaign but is plenty early if Biden's main competition is Sanders.
The GOP have been going after Hillary Clinton because they expect to be the nominee. I listened for Sanders' name in the debate last night I did not hear Sanders mentioned by name once. The GOP is gearing up to run against Clinton because they can read polls and they have learn to trust Nate Silver.
The Clinton campaign and/or perhaps Biden are the only two candidates who might be able to raise the funds to compete against the Kochs and the RNC candidate. I have been to one bundler event already and met Clinton's chief of staff who is very impressive. I hate Citizens United but one has to play by the current rules. Event President Obama used a super pac in 2012. The GOP would love to run against Sanders due to the funding issue and the fact that the GOP could run negative ads on (i) the socialism term and (ii) the WSJ cost of Sanders programs. Even if the premises of such ads are wrong, it takes a great deal of money to counter such negative ads.