Right now the people thinking they might have that plurality can't even crack 30%.  No one is going to feel obligated to nominate someone with such a small plurality.  At that point, every candidate better be making friends.

After Warren bashed Bloomberg about the non disclosure agreements and he offered up a weasel response (which to me indicated a failure of his prep team for a question he knew he would get) Biden piled on commenting 'let the women choose'.

Hard to dispute Sanders will go into the convention as the delegate leader.  After tonight I am not sure but if forced go choose I would put Biden in second place.  Bloomberg really needs to step up his game or he may well fade to the also rans.

Complete with white eye holes.

Bloomberg is not that much shorter than everyone else.  Maybe he has elevator shoes.  

Warren keeps pounding on the Bloomberg non disclosure issue.  So far I have not seen anything from Bloomberg or Biden.

Again Bloomberg needs a better prep staff to get him ready to get in front of the cameras and take the heat.

People are passionate about him. That is true.
It is also true that he actually stands for something.

That rattles Pete.

When I see our Democratic candidates turning on each other, they seem like petulant children. Infantile. (No disrespect to actual children intended.)

Warren made a big mistake when she, in essence, turned on Sanders and inferred that he was a sexist. Idiotic. She hasn't recovered from that one.

I maintain that Sanders could beat the incumbent.
My personal opinion is that it would not even be close, but Sanders would win handily.

Sanders comes across as real, consistent, and genuinely on the side of the people. His candidacy is not fueled by personal ambition, but, in my opinion, driven by a desire to help citizens in distress. A novelty in politics.

This is a quality that I think will motivate people across the political spectrum to vote for him.

What the bobble heads say.  

Clearly they have spoken.  I was sure Mica and Donnie Doousch were going to need medical attention this morning.  Joe said one thing I agreed with, Bloomberg should taken charge more.

I would just remind us that they, the bobble heads, have been know to be entirely clueless about any part of this primary so far.
I do not agree Bloomberg did so terribly.   He might have done better but afaiac he did way better than Biden in this debate or any of the others and Biden has been "leading" for months.  

I expected Bloomberg to do more or less what he did which was to let them squeal and try to appear calm and above it all.  I think the tried a bit to hard in that respect.

But back the the bobble head pronouncements,
Sanders won.  Really?  I thought Sanders was at his most frightening.  
Warren won, really?  I thought she was a cross between a chihuahua and Sanders.  She made many viewers like Bloomberg more.
I thought Pete was very good all night.  If there was a debate winner it was him.
Amy will probably not be around much longer IMO.
Bloomberg had some very good answers.  Something none of the others did.  And his excessive reserve ended up making him look like the designated driver because the rest other that Pete acted like escaped mental patients.

The bottom line is the debates have not mattered much and I doubt this one will.

Trump.

I though that was stunning and mystifying  

Point is that a lot of comments I see are along the lines of my guy did well and the other guys did not do well.

My impression is the talking heads are defining winning as changing or not changing things.  For Sanders who is the presumed leader according to all the polls nothing changed; he is still the presumed leader.  Everyone paying attention already knew he is a socialists, or as he prefers a democratic socialist.  He has been saying it at his rallies for as long as I can remember.  He is not a member of the dem party and I don't think he has ever been.  I am sure there is plenty of video of Sanders confirming that so him saying it on the debate stage changes nothing.

For Bloomberg the bloom is off the rose.  He got bashed about his non disclosure agreements and the other candidates made it clear we have not seen the last of this issue.  He was also bashed about his tax returns, another topic the candidates made clear we have not seen the last of.  I was watching a Bloomberg flack today on CNN getting grilled about 'stop and frisk'.  The talking head on CNN pointed out that while 'stop and frisk' did reduce crime in NYC the majority of the gains were in the last year of Bloomberg's term; at the start it was not all that effective.  The thing is the Bloomberg flack got blind sided by that and was clearly not prepped.  And the same is true for Bloomberg in the debate; he simply was not prepped.  On the other hand CNN is offering the theory that Bloomberg was prepped to simply avoid conflict and not answer questions; on the theory that Bloomberg is prone to 'blowing up' and it was important for him to not 'blow up'.

CNN also pointed that Bloomberg was invited to their Town Hall show and declined.  In 2016 Trump was on every channel all the time.  Clinton probably spent over three times what Trump did; but Trump got more air time by simply showing up every time he was given the chance.  No matter how much Bloomberg spends on ads it won't come close to matching the total air time Trump will likely get.

Maybe the biggest take away I got from debating in high school was when the coach told me the person who wins is the person who makes the judge like them.  I was impressed by Klobuchar a couple of times.  Before the debate she said she was the only candidate who had a legit claim of being 5'4" tall; something both true and funny.  During the debate she was accused of having a plan you could put on a Post It note and replied she took that personally since Post It notes were invented in her home state; again effective use of humor and a clear sign she was able to think on her feet.

Bloomberg seemed to have some canned points but again I am not sure they were all that effective.  Whatever one thinks about Trump no one accuses him of using canned talking points; in fact most folks think Trump's problem is he does not used canned points and instead goes off script; and sometimes goes off the deep end of the script.

Bottom line for me is not a lot changed as a result of the debate.  The biggest take away is something I have posted before.  Bloomberg has not really been vetted to the extent of the other candidates and there are some blemishes on his record yet to be disclosed; something the other candidates, talking heads, and the pubs made clear they will talk about every chance they get.  Next take away was how poorly prepared Bloomberg seemed.  Maybe his prep was simply 'don't blow up' but if that is really a weakness for him it may be disqualifying in and of itself.

More left wing sites than I can count dis Bloomberg.

Maybe even worse is Bloomberg's ham handed attempt to grossly edit an ad to show him in a good light gets called out.

When Warren bashed him about the non disclosure agreements his answers were just silly and his minions on TV are now taking the position that issue has been addressed.  Same thing with "stop and frisk"; he and his minions have taken the position that this issue is resolved.

Last night both Biden and Warren were on the CNN Town Hall shows; at least getting their mugs on TV.  CNN made it clear Bloomberg was invited to do one and refused.  I have made this point before but it bears repeating; seeing both Warren and Biden each spend an hour bashing Bloomberg and explaining their positions while Bloomberg airs a few expensive ads during the show is advantage Warren and Sanders.  The time advantage is huge and there is no way Bloomberg can spend enough money to over come it.  All the other candidates except Bloomberg will get their mugs on TV and roll up the same time advantage.  

Maybe more importantly Bloomberg's closing statement in the debate was very different than closing statements from the other candidates.  With the exception of Bloomberg the closing statements were a vision of what they wanted to achieve.  Bloomberg said I am a manager; not really selling an idea but selling himself.

The examples that spring to mind for me are two:

The first is the remarkable phenomenon of people looking for masks to protect themselves from the virus - and finding that the price has been quadrupled.

Another is more personal: A dear friend in need of medication for which the price is prohibitively expensive. She has found a way to get it - but for others it is a choice of just accepting death because some entrepreneur has raised the price into the stratosphere.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) was briefed by U.S. intelligence officials this week that Russia is interfering in the 2020 elections to help his presidential campaign, The Washington Post reported on Friday.

Buttigieg tells Bloomberg to drop out.

Sanders tells Bloomberg to drop out.

Bloomberg tells everyone to drop out.

And it's been interesting.  It started with Carville ranting that the big news is Sanders is officially leading in this race.  And we are dead if he wins.  
THEN there has been a parade of others, some liberal firebrands like a Joy Reid, agreeing.

Talking about the effect of Sanders on down ticket races about he has had no real vetting by the media or opponents and on and on.  

I watch a lot of this stuff and I have not seen this before.  It looks like there may be a change in the coverage.

Cuba has an extraordinary resource -- a system of education which values every boy and every girl.

If Sanders is attacked for his supposed easy on gun control position he can easily counter with his grades from the NRA; the best he ever got was a D, but the huge majority were Fs.

Bloomberg is currently at Disney World prepping for the debate after bailing out of a Town Hall.  He is betting a lot on no live fire experience.

Thing is he supposedly had a similar prepping for the last debate and fell flat on his face.