Disgusting and widely loathed Republican billionaire Michael Bloomberg-- currently pretending to be a Democrat in his Trump-like quest to buy the White House-- is running for president for several reasons. Aside from his own self gratification though, stopping Bernie and Elizabeth, is way on the top of his list. But to take on one of the progressives, mano a mano, he first has to get beyond the 3-5% range in which he's polling and then he has to become the front-runner in the conservative or neoliberal lane-- currently dominated by Status Quo Joe and Mayo Pete. (As Elizabeth Warren noted Thursday night, "Billionaires in wine caves should not pick the next president of the United States." Neither, though, should billionaires not in wine caves.)The newest CNN poll, released yeterday, shows favorable and unfavorable opinions among registered voters for all the viable candidates. These numbers are among all voters, not just Democrats:
• Bernie- 43% favorable, 44% unfavorable• Status Quo Joe- 39% favorable, 47% unfavorable• Elizabeth- 34% favorable, 43% unfavorable• Mayo- 27% favorable, 27% unfavorable (29% who?????)
And, removing Republicans and just polling Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents-- Bernie still leads the pack, something you would never even imagine if you get your electoral information from the rabidly anti-Bernie Comcast-TV:So where's Bloomberg? Not getting enough mentions to even be included-- just like the rest of the candidates in the 0-5% favorability range. But when the pollsters pushed Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents to pick a candidate, and named them all (including Bloomberg) these were the results:
• Biden- 26% (down 2 points since Nov.)• Bernie- 20% (up 3 points)• Elizabeth- 16% (up 2 points)• Mayo- 8% (down 3 points)• Bloomberg- 5% (up 2 points)• Cory Booker- 3% (up 1 point)• Amy Klobuchar- 3% (up 1 point)• Andrew Yang- 3% (flat)• Julian Castro- 2% (up 1 point)• Tom Steyer- 1% (down 2 points)
When pressed on individual points that go into voters' calculations about who to support, Bloomberg did extraordinarily badly among Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents. Bloomberg:
• Best chance to beat Trump's- 6% (Biden- 40%)• Agrees with you on most important issues- 5% (Bernie- 28%)• Best understands the problems facing people like you- 3% (Bernie- 26%)• Most honest and trustworthy- 2% (Bernie 27%)
In other words, most Dems view Bloomberg as relatively untrustworthy, dishonest, unable to deal with their hopes and aspirations, bad on issues and unable to beat Trump. He's counting on flooding everyone's screens with enough ads to change voters' perceptions of him. So far, all those ads are just pissing people off, who are sick of them already. Bloomberg and his cadre of looser consultants aren't fooling anyone. Voters know what a disaster Bloomberg would be as a nominee and, god forbid, as a president:Not a very good look. So, Little Michael, as Trump calls him, decided to go on the offensive-- and he was... very offensive. He sat down for an interview on Wednesday with MSNBC's Stephanie Ruhle. He attacked all the other candidates, but especially Status Quo Joe, who he sees as his main rival. "I don't think any of them have the experience... [Biden has] never been the manager of an organization, he's never run a school system. The presidency shouldn't be a training job. You need somebody who comes in and knows how to run an organization."
