The Campaign Trail 2016: A Bumpy Road

For the Republicans, not much has happened since the events of the weekend of Super Saturday. No candidates have dropped out nor have any indicated that they plan to. Everything seems to be the same as it has as they march into the primaries on March 8^th in Hawaii, Idaho, Michigan, and Mississippi. This is almost the last chance for the Republican candidates before some states start becoming winner take all states and where delegate counts start moving up fast and the Republican nominee becomes sorted out.

Retired General and Former Secretary of State Colin Powell spoke to Michel Martin on All Things Considered on National Public Radio about the state of the Republican campaign trail. In a far more appropriate speech, given what has been witnessed from the Republican Party during the 2016 Campaign Trail, than former Governor and 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney did, Powell spoke out about the actions of the presidential candidates belittling the country and office of president. Whether this will have any effect on the 2016 campaign, which has even at this point managed to include a debate over Billionaire Donald Trump's penis size on national television is unknown, but hopefully Powell's words will sink in.

For the Democrats not much has changed either. Sunday night while the Maine Democratic caucuses were being concluded Senator Bernie Sanders and former Senator Hillary Clinton were debating in Flint Michigan on CNN. Despite both candidates claiming victory at the debate, most accounts show that neither candidate won and did much to change the opinion of the voters. The two will face off on March 8^th in Michigan and Mississippi. March 8^th will also conclude the voting period for Democrats Abroad.

One subject regarding the Democratic 2016 campaign trail that needs to be brought up are the delegate counts. It won't take someone long to go out on the internet and find griping about the delegate count of the two candidates and even claims that some networks can't even be trusted because of the delegate counts they are showing. It may even be confusing when one sees a delegate count where Clinton is already over 1,000 delegates and Sanders is below 500. These delegate counts are including superdelegates, which are unbound until the 2016 Democratic National Convention being held in Philadelphia from July 25^th through July 28^th. However the networks showing these totals aren't lying to the readers or viewers as these superdelegates have currently been pledged to the candidates they are showing for. So they aren't lying to the reader or viewer.

More importantly, and what is being completely glazed over in all these discussions and claims are what the delegate counts are showing, which is what is most important especially since the Democratic primary processes does not include winner take all states like the Republican one does. The Democratic primary process is proportional depending on how well each candidate does. Before South Carolina, Sanders and Clinton were tied on delegates they had won through voting in the various states. Before the voting on March 8^th, Sanders is now in a deficit of almost 200 delegates. After each series of voting, the deficit has been growing more and more. Every time that deficit grows it makes it harder for Sanders to win as he has a bigger hill to climb just to even back out. This is what the discussion should be over.

And now on to the voting on March 8^th. For the next coverage of The Campaign Trail 2016 return after the results of March 8^th are finalized. The results from Democrats Abroad probably won't be discussed here until March 11^th.