Donald Trump is pulling for Peyton Manning, who donated to JEB! Bush

(ftw.usatoday.com) - Count Donald Trump on team Manning for the Super Bowl.

In an interview on CBS’ Face the Nation, the Republican presidential candidate weighed in on the big game. Via CBS News:

"Well, your Carolina team is sort of a hot team. And the quarterback is doing great.

I very much have always liked Peyton Manning. He is a very good guy. I know him. And he is a very, very good guy. So, I have to go with the person I know and I like. I like the other team. I think the other team looks fantastic. Probably, they would be favored by something. But I will stick with Peyton, because he is a very good guy."

Though Manning has not voiced his support for Trump — or even displayed any in his locker — he is a longtime Republican donor, according to finance records. In 2015, according to reports, he and his brother donated to Trump’s rival: Jeb Bush. Read more.

JEB! Bush … Feel The Iowa Enthusiasm (Not)

(fitsnews.com) -

BETTER GET SOME MORE EXCLAMATION POINTS …

Former 2016 “Republican” presidential frontrunner Jeb (exclamation point) Bush is apparently having trouble getting people to rally to his banner in early-voting Iowa – which holds its first-in-the-nation GOP caucus this evening.

Don’t believe us?

Take a look …

Nice …but JEB! supporters in Iowa tell us this flyer is not affiliated with their official campaign.

For those of you keeping score at home, Bush wrapped up his Iowa campaign at 4.1 percent in the polls – according to the final pre-election aggregate averages compiled by Real Clear Politics.  That’s down ten points from his late-April 2015 peak. Read more.

Can the Media and the GOP Party Establishment Actually Help Rubio "Win" Iowa, and Nominate Him Today?

For God, Country, the Republican Party, and Mammon
(Not necessarily in THAT order!)

If you believe what you read in the New York Times, Washington Post, or watch on CNN, Fox or MSNBC, you would believe that Marco Rubio is on a tear in Iowa.  Even some polling seems to bear this out. The most recent Emerson College Iowa poll shows an essential (given the unpredicability of turnout) tie between Trump, Cruz, and Rubio with Trump 27, Cruz 26, and the Golden Boy of Neoconservatism all the way up to 22 percent.  This contrasts with the "gold standard" Des Moines Register/Bloomberg final poll, which showed only a modest rise for Rubio, and pegged him at 15 percent.

It seems unlikely Rubio will win Iowa, all the hype not withstanding, but if Rubio did manage to come in, say a solid second behind Cruz, and Trump underperforms with his self-motivated "fans" and finishes third, the GOP race would be effectively decided, and Rubio would be proclaimed the nominee.  Could it happen? Yes it could.  There's a lot of money riding on it.

JEB! 2016, however, collects just $7 million in hard money as fundraising drops

(Washington Post) - Former Florida governor Jeb Bush brought in just $7.12 million for his presidential bid in the last three months of 2015, a little more than half of what his campaign collected the previous quarter.

His total for the quarter represents a sharp drop-off from earlier in the year: In his first quarter as a candidate, Bush raised $11.42 million. In his second, he pulled in $13.34 million.

The slowdown in contributions comes as the Republican has remained low in the polls in many of the early nominating states, including Iowa, which will hold the first-in-the-nation caucuses on Monday. Read more.

Group Backing JEB! Bush Reports Still Having Vast Resources

(New York Times) - Right to [Rule], the “super PAC” supporting Jeb Bush, reported Sunday evening that it still had nearly $59 million to spend heading into 2016. The report did not include the heavy spending during the final weeks before the Iowa caucuses, when the group unleashed a blizzard of ads.

The group, which released its year end report in a Tweet, said it has raised $118 million to date, including $15.1 million in the second half of 2015.

Most of the $118 million came early on, when Mr. Bush seemed like a more sure bet, able to harness his dynastic family’s connections, as well as a deep Rolodex of donors, to position himself as a presumptive frontrunner. Of the $15.1 million the group raised, $10 million came from a single donation from Hank Greenberg, the former chairman and CEO of American International Group.

Mike Murphy, the group’s chief strategist, has come under fire from some donors and Bush supporters, amid concerns that he was burning through their money with few tangible results. (Mr. Bush still sits at single digits in most polls).

But the group’s impressive cash-on-hand number — $58.6 million — should help the group prop up Mr. Bush’s struggling campaign, despite its recent heavy spending in Iowa and New Hampshire

“We’ve always planned for a long process and the strong support we continue to receive ensures that we’ll be able to support Jeb Bush well after the February early-state contests,” said Paul Lindsay, a spokesman for the group. Read more.

Rubio and Bush prepare for war after Iowa

I don't give a rat's azz about the GOP. It belongs to my
family anyway, and that Judas Goat Rubio is
GOING DOWN!

(CNN) - His focus may now be squarely on Ted Cruz, but Marco Rubio's path to the GOP nomination increasingly runs through someone else: Jeb Bush.

Facing the possibility of a third-place finish in Monday's Iowa caucuses, Rubio will soon head to New Hampshire and battle in a state where polls show a heavily contested fight brewing among establishment-backed Republicans vying to become the alternative to Cruz and Donald Trump.

Of the establishment favorites, Bush is now viewed internally as Rubio's biggest threat after the New Hampshire primary, according to advisers and confidantes to both men.

Despite having run a rocky campaign while struggling in the polls, Bush is the only establishment candidate who has built a national organization that rivals Rubio's. It's Bush's high-spending super PAC, Right to Rise, which has pummeled Rubio across the airwaves with tens of millions of dollars in attacks -- and officials say it will continue to do so long as the former Florida governor stays in the race.

And if Bush continues his campaign beyond the Super Tuesday primary on March 1, as his confidantes promise he will, he could make it harder for Rubio to win what will be one of the biggest prizes in mid-March: Their home state of Florida, which awards all of its delegates to the winner rather than handing them out proportionally. Read more.

Bloomberg’s Joshua Green: There Is No Rubio ‘Surge’ In Iowa

There has been much hype in corporate teevee and print media over the weekend about a huge "surge" for establishment neocon favorite Marco Rubio in Iowa, but one of the internet's most vocal hard right populist blogs isn't buying it.

(Breitbart) - There is little evidence suggesting that there is a late surge for Sen. Marco Rubio, according to the latest Des Moines Register/Bloomberg poll.

Bloomberg News reporter Joshua Green analyzed the latest polling information during an interview on Breitbart News Sunday on the evening before the Iowa caucus.

He dismissed the buzz coming out of Washington D.C. suggesting that the Florida senator was surging right before the Republican primary caucus.

“There is no surge,” he said in an interview with Breitbart News Chairman Stephen K. Bannon on Sirius XM Patriot channel 125. “There is no evidence of anything like that.”

Green pointed out that a “surge” was what happened to former Senator Rick Santorum in 2012, as the poll showed him with a big jump in support in the days before the caucus. Nothing he saw in the current data, suggested that something similar was happening with Rubio.

“There is no evidence of anything like that,” he said. Read more.