Source: CNN

This is a live televised report; no story yet.

In Alaska, Sanders is up by 79% to Hillary's 21% with over 38% of the vote in, and CNN has called it for Sanders.

In Washington, Sanders is up by 74% to 26% for Hillary with over 14% of the vote in.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/

while also expanding on his 590 to 515 Outside-the-Bible-Belt delegate lead.

Let's get this out of the way first: Hillary is the undisputed winner of the 13-state Bible Belt, and no one disagrees with that (hey, congratulations!):



In the rest of America, however, Sanders continues to build his lead over Hillary:

State.....Hillary Delegates.....Sanders Delegates

IA.....................23....................21
NH.....................9....................15
NV....................20....................15
CO....................28....................38
MA....................46....................45
MN....................31....................46
OK....................17.....................21
VT......................0.....................16
NE....................10.....................15
KS......................9.....................24
ME......................9.....................16
MI.....................63.....................67
IL......................78.....................78
MO....................36.....................35
OH....................81.....................62
AZ…………………..….44………….....………31
UT……………………....6…………….....…….27
ID……………………..…5…………….....…….18

Total................515...................590 out of 1105

Both PredictWise and BornToRunTheNumbers project Sanders as the likely winner of all three contests this weekend:

Washington (Sanders 54% to Hillary 46% projected with Sanders a 97% favorite)

Alaska (Sanders 61% to Hillary 39% projected with Sanders a 93% favorite)

Hawaii (Sanders 58% to Hillary 42% projected with Sanders a 69% favorite)

How many states does Hillary have to lose outside of the Bible Belt before there is greater concern that Hillary's appeal is mainly as a regional candidate?

Will Sanders' continued dominance of Hillary outside of the Bible Belt win him enough delegates to make up for her regional wins down south? Stay tuned!

Keep fighting! Keep donating! Keep winning!

Trump and Cruz are awful in every way, but - from the perspective of the establishment (both the Democratic establishment and the Republican establishment) - Hillary is a safe bet. She will not kill their golden goose, won't rock the boat, will not even upset their apple cart (or mix their metaphors).

Trump is a bigot and a demagogue, and - more important to the establishment - he is promising change, and the establishment has no reason to doubt that a Trump presidency would definitely kill geese, rock boats, and spill apples.

Cruz is a corrosively ambitious, sneaky conniving, back-stabber, and the establishment knows that Cruz will throw anyone under the bus who gets in his way, and so Cruz cannot be trusted to protect the geese, boats, and apples.

Sanders - why even mention Sanders? - he's a non-starter for the establishment because he has promised to nationalize the boat and serve apple-stuffed cooked goose to the poor.

If you look at the four candidates from the perspective of those Republicans as well as those Democrats who have a vested interest in protecting the status quo of the establishment's rigged economy, Hillary is an easy choice.

status quo (such defensive efforts to conserve the status quo against change is called "conservatism" in political science class).

The Republicans may be evolving into the party that tells those who feel left out of the status quo economy "we are going to radically change this broken system."

If we cannot stop Hillary in the primary, we are looking at the first election in my lifetime where

* the Democrat is the candidate using Citizens United to raise Super PAC funds from millionaires and billionaires while the Republican campaigns against a corrupt pay-to-play campaign finance system

* the Democrat is the candidate encouraging international trade agreements which have the effect of promoting the loss of American union jobs to foreign countries while the Republican campaigns on bringing those union jobs back to America

* the Democrat is the candidate who saber rattles about American boots on the ground in foreign conflicts while the Republican campaigns on the theme that the countries in the region should take the lead role and we should limit our in-forum involvement to bombing rather than American boots on the ground

* the Democrat is the candidate is defending the tax policy status quo while proposing minuscule tweaks at the edges of that policy while the Republican is arguing that the billionaires and the large corporations must pay a greater share of taxes

* the Democrat is the candidate saying "let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater" about Wall Street reforms while the Republican campaigns against corruption in the financial sector

Here's an exercise: Draw a horizontal line, and put the initials "FDR" at the left end of the line and write "George HW Bush" at the right end of the line. Now, write "Hillary" at some point on this line -- closer to FDR if you believe she will govern more like FDR or closer to Bush if you think she will govern more like him.

If that exercise doesn't make you sad, then you don't understand why so many progressives and liberals know Hillary would be a historically weak general election candidate incapable of uniting the party.

link to Cruz, Sanders top picks in Tuesday's Utah caucuses, poll says; excerpt:

SALT LAKE CITY — Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is the top pick of Utahns in Tuesday's GOP presidential preference caucus election and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is their choice in the Democratic caucus vote, according to a new Deseret News/KSL poll.

Cruz also leads GOP frontrunner Donald Trump and Ohio Gov. John Kasich among Republicans who said they're likely to participate in the caucus, as does Sanders over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton among a similar group of Democrats.... All of the candidates except Clinton have made campaign stops in Utah over the past several days and both the candidates and political action committees are blanketing Utah airwaves with well over $1 million in television and radio commercials.... Sanders, who has the support of 52 percent of likely Democratic caucus-goers in the poll to 44 percent for Clinton, appeals to Utah voters because he's seen as "authentic. He is true to himself and we like that," Love said.

This Utah polling corresponds to the projection at PredictWise, which has Sanders as the favorite in the following upcoming races:

Utah - 83% chance of Sanders win
Idaho - 85% chance of Sanders win
Alaska - 84% chance of Sanders win
Hawaii - 53% chance of Sanderswin
Washington - 87% chance of Sanders win

Source: Deseret News

SALT LAKE CITY — Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is the top pick of Utahns in Tuesday's GOP presidential preference caucus election and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is their choice in the Democratic caucus vote, according to a new Deseret News/KSL poll.

Cruz also leads GOP frontrunner Donald Trump and Ohio Gov. John Kasich among Republicans who said they're likely to participate in the caucus, as does Sanders over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton among a similar group of Democrats.... All of the candidates except Clinton have made campaign stops in Utah over the past several days and both the candidates and political action committees are blanketing Utah airwaves with well over $1 million in television and radio commercials.... Sanders, who has the support of 52 percent of likely Democratic caucus-goers in the poll to 44 percent for Clinton, appeals to Utah voters because he's seen as "authentic. He is true to himself and we like that," Love said.

Read more: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865650529/Cruz-Sanders-top-picks-in-Tuesdays-Utah-caucuses-poll-says.html

---

This polling corresponds to the projection at PredictWise, which has Sanders as the favorite in the following upcoming races:

Utah - 83% chance of Sanders win
Idaho - 85% chance of Sanders win
Alaska - 84% chance of Sanders win
Hawaii - 53% chance of Sanderswin
Washington - 87% chance of Sanders win

My rank is:

1. Clinton
2. Trump
3. Cruz
4. Sanders

link to How To Explain Hillary Clinton’s Fundraiser With Failed Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes - Scenes from the wreckage of the Democratic party; excerpt:

So, that happened. ... Last October, the Wall Street Journal reported that Theranos wasn’t delivering anything close to what it promised. In the months since, the company has become synonymous with corporate excess — serial violators of lab standards and federal regulations that posed “immediate jeopardy to patient health and safety.”

So, why is Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton having a fundraiser with Holmes next week? The choice seems inexplicable — unless you’ve read Thomas Frank’s new book, Listen Liberal: or Whatever Happened To The Party of the People. Frank joined the “So That Happened” podcast to discuss his new tome. ... you need to be aware of how the Democratic party has evolved over the past few decades — an evolution that Frank rather eloquently documents in his book. “At some point,” Frank tells the Huffington Post, “{the Democrats} decided that they weren’t all that interested in the concerns of working people anymore.” Rather, Frank says, they became fixated on “the concerns of the professional class, people with advanced degrees, people at the very top of our economic society.”... Frank says that Clinton is “a perfect example of the kind of liberal I talk about,” steeped in the “belief in meritocracy that’s going to solve all things” and the regular “palling around with billionaires.”... Throughout the campaign, Clinton has described her candidacy as one that would “break down barriers.” This is the essential aspect of her response to income inequality: rather than repair a rigged system or make the capital-to-labor ratio more equitable through policy, she wants to bring a greater amount of diversity to the meritocratic class, with benefits sure to trickle down.

Source: HuffingtonPost

WASHINGTON — Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) said Friday that his party needs to “just man up and cast a vote” on President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee — a break from GOP leaders’ position that there will be no votes or even hearings until there’s a new president....He went on to say, in essence, what Senate Democrats have been saying all along about voting on Merrick Garland: It’s our job.

“The tough thing about these Senatorial jobs is you get yes or no votes,” he said. “Your whole job is to either say yes or no, and explain why.”

The Illinois Republican is in a tight race with Rep. Tammy Duckworth (D), who is trying to unseat him in November. He’s been trying to cast himself as above politics, and in recent days has been distancing himself from his party leaders’ firm stance on denying Garland hearings.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mark-kirk-supreme-court-nominee_us_56ec29e8e4b084c672201134

link to Florida voters "fed up" with Trump and Clinton speak out; excerpt:

Voters in the key swing state of Florida are sharing their frustration about their options in the 2016 presidential race. A focus group comprised of Republican and Democratic voters who oppose both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump offered a revealing look at the anger toward the front-runners in both parties.

Clinton and Trump share the distinction of being among the least-liked candidates.

"I would rather not vote than vote for either one of these candidates," one woman told CBS News contributor and Republican strategist Frank Luntz, who led the group at the Orlando Public Library. "And it pains me to say that, because I feel it's my right as a member of this democratic society to be able to vote. But given those two candidates, I can't vote for either one of them."... "I just think that none of the-- either party doesn't deserve my vote. They're not giving me what I feel we need as a country," another woman explained. "So why give the support to someone who's not gonna do what I need them to do for me and my family?"

"I don't believe Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton really care about the American people. I don't trust either of them. I don't think they are presidential," one man said. ... "The thing about Hillary Clinton is that all of her flaws are verifiable and provable. ... "There is a great opportunity for someone. And that person had better come forward fast, because if the Republicans put Donald Trump up, and if the Democrats put Hillary Clinton, it will be the worst turnout election ever," a woman said.

Probably half of the Sanders supporters I know are actively interested in Plan B if Sanders cannot overcome the delegates Hillary won in the Bible Belt (of course, he's winning the delegate court outside of the Bible Belt). I personally do not think Plan B is a viable option because Sanders is not interested and because Jill Stein's math is wrong (she is counting the super delegates now but they don't vote until this summer and few will defy the people's choice so Sanders' goal is to win a majority of pledged delegates without regard to the super delegates).