Post New Hampshire analysis...

So after New Hampshire, we can say without doubt that everything is now as clear as mud. Bernie Sanders is likely the frontrunner, Pete Buttigieg could be the frontrunner, Amy Klobuchar is a good Nevada result away from being the frontrunner, and Michael Bloomberg is waiting in the wings as a potential frontrunner!

Did these two really win the New Hampshire primary?

The only thing we know for sure is that Andrew Yang and Michael Bennett will not be the nominees and that neither Joe Biden or Liz Warren are considered frontrunners anymore.

So I would offer that Bernie Sanders should both be a little bit disappointed and breathing a sigh of relief. He won (which was good) but he didn't win by much (which was troublesome). But a loss could have been disastrous, so he bypassed that one.  One has to wonder where Bernie is really going to "break out" with a big win if not in an Northeastern State. He also might be alarmed at the reality that this "progressive" lane (which was so dominate in early polling) has dwindled down to two and half candidates (Sanders, Warren, and Patr) after Yang dropped out... and together they didn't come very close to hitting 50% of the popular vote.

Moreover, it appears that Warren's demise wasn't necessarily Sander's to enjoy. Much of the Warren exodus went to Amy Klobuchar, which makes sense if you consider that there a great deal of voters in the Democratic Party who might just want a woman. Klobuchar certainly had her breakout moment, and possibly moved herself from running for Vice President to actually thinking she has a chance to be the nominee. Nobody could have expected that after her so-so showing in her neighbor state of Iowa. The question is whether her appeal is broad enough to overcome early fundraising and organizations disadvantages. And let's face it, she's kind of boring.

Pete Buttigieg is likely happy with his result. After all, he might not have won, but he still beat expectations and won an equal share of the delegates. Interestingly, Buttigieg lost the popular vote in the first two states to Sanders, but still holds a delegate lead over him. Sander's fans are none to pleased with that! But at this point, beating expectations is often better than winning a state you were supposed to win. His only disappointment would be that the Klobuchar result might mean that she is taking control of the "establishment" lane, now that Slow Joe Biden is crumbling before our eyes. The speculation is that Klobuchar's rise prevented Buttigieg from winning. I am not as convinced as others that they are really running in the same lane. She's establishment, and he's an upstart.

Lastly, the more convoluted and muddy this all is, the better it is for two billionaires waiting in the wings. Bloomberg's dream is for nobody to walk into Super Tuesday with a real "frontrunner" status. The longer this remains "up in the air" the better it is for him. I am still not convinced that a psuedo-liberal billionaire who holds a significantly higher disapproval rate than the others in the Demoratic Party can win by any reason other than default, but the longer nobody else takes control, the better chance he has of becoming that "default". 

The other Billionaire, of course, is Trump. Trump would love nothing else than a long and drawn out fight, that in a perfect world ends up with a brokered convention with no candidate with a majority of the vote. Something where Bernie Sanders has the plurality lead, but finds himself pushed out of the nomination again by Super-delegates would be picture perfect!