For the Record's week in review: Math class
Happy Saturday, For the Record friends! Attentive readers know that last week's roundup was the swan song for our esteemed colleague, Jessica Estepa. So enjoy this week's group effort from USA TODAY's politics crew — we're lucky that the past week (even with NO PRIMARIES!) provided plenty of material.
Wait, we're journalists — we have to do MATH?
With all eyes on Tuesday’s New York primary and a series of East Coat primaries the week after, and endless talk of a contested convention on the GOP side, it's All About the Delegates right now. Since we have nothing better to do than obsess over this, we answered 16 questions about the GOP delegate fight to make you sound a little smarter around the dinner table.
Catch up on more GOP delegate news from the past week:
• Trump's new delegate hunter has quite the résumé for the job
• Kasich's convention guru thinks his guy's got a chance, but it's gonna be messy
• Meanwhile, has Cruz had it figured out all along?
• And tropical paradise is not immune from the delegate insanity
Trump is winning something unexplainable on Facebook
With all the emphasis on social media and Big Data in politics, we've been experimenting with a bunch of social media metrics for the various candidates. This week we came across an interesting one: Facebook intensity. The deal is, we know how many people are talking about each of the candidates on Facebook, and we know how many likes/post/shares/comments people have made about each candidate. So we mashed them up and got a measurement of "interactions per user" for each of the candidates. The results are interesting in part because they show more change than other metrics. Trump intensity is way up over the past month or so, but he wasn't always the leader in intensity. Once upon a time, John Kasich had a higher intensity score than Trump. Just remember: these count volume only, not sentiment. Your intensity score goes up even if people are making a lot of mean Facebook posts about you.
Sanders picks up endorsements
Bernie Sanders picked up the support of New York City’s Transport Workers Union Local 100 as the Vermont senator looks to close the gap with Hillary Clinton ahead of the state’s primary. John Samuelsen, president of the 42,000-member union, said in a statement that the group sees “a kindred spirit” in Sanders. “Bernie Sanders has been fighting against the powers that be in this country (on) behalf of all American workers his entire life,” he said.
Sanders also won the first endorsement from one of his Senate colleagues this week. Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley in a New York Times op-ed wrote that while Clinton would be a “strong and capable president,” Sanders “is boldly and fiercely addressing the biggest challenges facing our country.”
Unfortunately, it ain't helping him in the New York polls. A new poll from Marist College showed Clinton leading him by 17 percentage points.
Biden says he’d ‘like to see a woman elected’
Speaking of endorsements, or non-endorsements in this case, Vice President Biden seemed like he was heading in that direction earlier this week. In an interview with Mic, Biden said during an answer about Sanders’ recent comments suggesting Clinton wasn’t qualified: “This country’s ready for a woman, there’s no problem, we’re going to be able to elect a woman in this country … I would like to see a woman elected.”
After an aide attempted to cut the interview short, the vice president clarified that his remark wasn’t an endorsement.
“The president and I are not going to endorse because we both when we ran said, ‘Let the party decide.’ But gosh almighty, they’re both qualified. Hillary’s overwhelmingly qualified to be president.”
ICYMI: 5 stories from the past week that are oh-so-2016
• This Pittsburgh man decided to fight “the absurd with absurdity” (USA TODAY)
• Ted Cruz apparently really, really, really likes soup (The Washington Post)
• Will this be the world's most expensive 1986 Oldsmobile Cutlass? (The Evening Sun)
• Bernie Sanders has a campaign office on Clinton Street. No, really. (The Ithaca Journal)
• Which candidate is the true New Yorker? A pizza-based ratings scale (The New York Times)
Contributing: Nicole Gaudiano and Donovan Slack, USA TODAY.