Back in January, DNC insiders such as Barack Obama, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and Tom Perez were frightened by a rather boring looking graph (see below).

Does this graph look scary to you? No? Let me explain what fabulously wealthy "public servants" who control the Democratic Party see in it that most ordinary voters don't.

1. Sanders was SURGING.
   Biden was FALLING, Buttigieg was FLAT. Warren was on the graph too, but she was merely a blip. But above all ... Sanders was SURGING.
2. The scary part for powerful DNC insiders? Sanders was SURGING. Can I say that again? Sanders was SURGING. The fact that Biden was falling, and would potentially not even be viable in Iowa because he had less than 15% of voter support, was important too, in a just plain embarrassing kind of way.
3. The data on this graph comes from two surveys taken by a polling outfit that fivethirtyeight.com describes as “gold standard”, headed by Ann Selzer of the Des Moines Register, “The Best Pollster In Politics”.
4. Politico calls the latter survey “The most consequential poll in politics”. Fun fact: it has correctly predicted the winner of the Democratic caucuses dating back to 1988!
5. Let me repeat that bit too: The final DM Register poll taken immediately before the Iowa caucuses has correctly predicted their winner FOR OVER 30 YEARS!
6. Politico:“The final poll from the Des Moines Register has been a critical, 11th-hour marker ahead of past caucuses. It has measured — and, in some cases, fed — a candidate's late momentum, whether positive or negative. The paper's final poll ahead of the 2008 caucuses led to a prolonged news cycle about Barack Obama's apparent surge on the eve of the vote, including measuring a wave of new caucus-goers poised to break turnout records and propel the then-Illinois senator to victory.”
7. Do you think Barack Obama remembers the importance of the final DM Register poll taken immediately before the Iowa caucuses? Do you think HE remembers the "prolonged news cycle about [his] apparent surge on the eve of the vote" back in 2008? Of course he does, baby. Of course he does.
8. Take another look at the above graph, then answer this question: WHO did the “the most consequential poll in politics” predict would win the Iowa caucuses? The answer: Bernie Sanders. Why? Because Bernie was at the TOP of the graph, silly, he had the MOST support from likely caucus-goers according to Oracle of Iowa, and not only that, Sanders was SURGING. I think I mentioned this before, didn't I? Sanders was SURGING!

.

Considering all of the above, one of the following two statements must be true. Either

1. the “gold standard” DM Register poll had finally broken it's long, long, long, long streak of correctly picking the winner of the Iowa caucuses (because we now know that Buttigieg "officially" won, in the bitter end), or
2. the “gold standard” DM Register poll was actually CORRECT, and Bernie Sanders should have been the winner of the Iowa caucuses. But something went wrong, very wrong, at the Iowa caucuses, thus **stealing a rightful victory from Sanders**, and perhaps more critically, the momentum that should have and would have propelled him to victory in the entire Democratic primary presidential contest.

But which of the above two conclusions is the correct one? How can we decide?

LOOKING AT OTHER POLLS

Having the benefit of hindsight, we now know that the Iowa caucuses were a crap-fest beyond anyone's wildest imagination, that the IDP, DNC, and Pete Buttigieg campaign all participated in the acquisition of “an app” created by a company called “Shadow” (wait, WTF?) in order to COUNT the votes (seriously, are you kidding me?).

"It's not the people who vote that count. It's the people who count the votes." - widely attributed to fascist Joseph Stalin

We also know that none other than Pete Buttigieg declared victory BEFORE THE COUNTING WAS EVEN OVER!, and that IDP chair Troy price resigned in shame as a result of the chaos. More details (and sources) will be provided in the next chapter of this series. But let's put all of that aside, just for a moment. Maybe we could look at other polls and see what support for Sanders and other candidates looked like at the time? How wildly off was this "gold-standard" DM Register poll that had never been wrong for thirty years, anyway? The one that was SUPPRESSED at the behest of, let's never forget, Pete Buttigieg.

The following graph comes from RealClearPolitics; it shows the cumulative polling results for the month of January 2020. To be honest, I'm not 100% sure how the values for the daily data points are calculated. However, the graph does in fact confirm my key point: Sanders was SURGING just before the Iowa caucuses. I am not making this up. Sanders was SURGING.

This next graph was created by yours truly, using raw data as reported by RealClearPolitics for polls taken in January having an MOE better than +/- 5.0. It also includes three additional data-sets:

1. The results from the now infamous 2/1 DM Register/CNN/Mediacom poll, which were not officially published due to “concerns” raised by the Buttigieg campaign. Clare Malone, Senior political writer at FiveThirtyEight.com, confirmed the results of this poll: Sanders 22% Warren 18% Buttigieg 16% Biden 13%. This data is added as a reference point, to show that these results are CONSISTENT WITH ALL OTHER POLLS around that time in that Sanders was SURGING.
2. The 2/2 DFP/Civiqs poll, conducted from Jan 26-29 with an MOE of +/- 4.7.
3. The 2/2 Emerson/7News poll, conducted from Jan 30-Feb 2 with an MOE of +/- 3.3.

Observe that in these last three polls, Bernie Sanders was at the top of EVERY ONE, and Pete Buttigieg was ALWAYS either at or near the bottom.

A reasonable person might conclude that the suppressed DM Register poll was in fact not an aberration of any kind, but was in fact an accurate reflection of voter sentiment at that time. The fact that it was suppressed did immeasurable harm to the Sanders campaign. One might even say that the Iowa caucuses were STOLEN from Bernie.

WHY WAS THE “GOLD STANDARD” DM REGISTER POLL CANCELLED, AGAIN?

The official explanation:

Nothing is more important to the Register and its polling partners than the integrity of the Iowa Poll. Today, a respondent raised an issue with the way the survey was administered, which could have compromised the results of the poll. It appears a candidate’s name [Pete Buttigieg] was omitted in at least one interview in which the respondent was asked to name their preferred candidate.

While this appears to be isolated to one surveyor, that could not be confirmed with certainty. Therefore, out of an abundance of caution, the partners made the difficult decision not to move forward with releasing the poll. The poll was the last one scheduled by the polling partners before the first-in-the-nation Iowa presidential caucuses, which are Monday.

J. Ann Selzer, whose company conducts the Iowa Poll, said, “There were concerns about what could be an isolated incident. Because of the stellar reputation of the poll, and the wish to always be thought of that way, the heart-wrenching decision was made not to release the poll. The decision was made with the highest integrity in mind.

The Register has published the Iowa Poll for 76 years, and it is considered the gold standard in political polling. Selzer & Co., which conducts the poll, is recognized for its excellence in polling. It is imperative whenever an Iowa Poll is released that there is full confidence that the data accurately reflects Iowans’ opinions.

Key points:

• ONE respondent raised a POTENTIAL issue that MIGHT have affected the results. Note the use of “could have” and “it appears”.
• That issue could not be confirmed!
• The decision to not release the poll, which clearly hurt Bernie Sanders and benefitted Pete Buttigieg, was made “with the highest integrity in mind.” Ann Selzer and the Des Moines Register conducted themselves with nothing but integrity, I have no doubt. And that pains me greatly, because I believe their integrity was cruelly exploited and used as a weapon against Bernie Sanders and his supporters.

Playing devil's advocate, because why not and also because of the tremendously high stakes involved, let us consider the possibility that a rival campaign simply MADE UP a story about their candidate's name being omitted when an important survey is conducted. A rival campaign has a clear motive for doing so – surely we can all see and acknowledge that motive, right? Here was an opportunity to damage the campaign of the clear leader, who was SURGING. Is there any PROOF that this ALLEGED interviewing mistake actually occurred? Has anyone put their hand on the Bible, and testified under penalty of perjury that what they are claiming is true? No, and apparently NONE WAS EVEN REQUIRED.

“[Pete Buttigieg] looked me in the eye and said, ‘This is a competition, you say whatever you need to say to win,’” Ms. Greene said. “That’s when I saw who the real Mayor Pete was.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/15/us/politics/democrats-2020-tom-perez.html

Perhaps the most remarkable part of this little saga is that no other presidential candidate ever thought of pulling this particular trick before. Talk about a flaw in the democratic process. Who knew that a gold standard poll that was so extremely consequential could be taken out so easily without hard proof? Is it possible that Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Neera Tanden, and Pete Buttigieg knew? Not only do I think the answer is yes, I also think it reasonable to believe that Mayor Pete was actually given an assignment by powerful elites to do so, and that he is being handsomely rewarded for his efforts.

The matter of What To Do About Bernie and the larger imperative of party unity has, for example, hovered over a series of previously undisclosed Democratic dinners in New York and Washington organized by the longtime party financier Bernard Schwartz. The gatherings have included scores from the moderate or center-left wing of the party, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi; Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader; former Gov. Terry McAuliffe of Virginia; Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., himself a presidential candidate; and the president of the Center for American Progress, Neera Tanden.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/16/us/politics/bernie-sanders-democratic-party.html

Biden didn't “win” the Democratic Party presidential nomination, the Iowa Caucuses were STOLEN from Bernie. A major component of that theft was the suppression of the gold standard Des Moines Register poll that showed results comparable to ALL OTHER CREDIBLE POLLS taken at that time. The theft of the nomination from Bernie is devastating; because of it, BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE OF CONGRESS will continue to allow

• health insurance companies to price-gouge life-saving medicines and medical procedures - even during a RAGING PANDEMIC - thus causing the death of AT LEAST 68,000 Americans to die every year
• white law enforcement to openly brutalize and kill persons of color with little to no accountability
• fossil fuel companies to poison our planet to the degree that fires, droughts, and water shortages will be rampant in the next few decades.

@BernieSanders: Tomorrow night the world will be watching Iowa.

Let Iowa be the beginning of a new America.

An America based on the principles of justice. Social justice. Economic justice. Racial justice. Environmental justice.

Let us show the world what America can become.

https://twitter.com/BernieSanders/status/1224066652637188096

Establishment Democrats like Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Neera Tanden, and Pete Buttigieg disagree with Bernie's vision, so they needed to destroy his campaign. We cannot remain silent about this blatant attack on democracy. We cannot! We must push back against those who stole the Democratic presidential nomination away from Bernie. #NotMeUs