My Assessment of the Major Candidates and Why Sanders is the Most Electable G.E. Candidate

There are two major factors that are going to decide the 2016 election:

1)The anti-establishment mood in the country
2) Working and middle class economic issues

The candidate who can best tap into these basic factors will be best positioned to win the general election.
I think Sanders is that candidate.

Here is my assessment of the leading candidates:

Sanders is positioned to best gain support from the basic factors driving the election if he can do two things:
1) Continue to maintain relatively high likability ratings
2) Convince voters he can lead the military and keep them safe.

If he can do both of these things well he can win in a wave election. I expect him to accomplish both tasks well enough to win.

Clinton's problem is twofold: she will be the establishment candidate who has low likability ratings. This would normally be fatal were it not for the poor crop of Republican candidates. She is running against the anti-establishment tide and because she is not viewed as trustworthy outside of her core groups,it will be difficult for her to win new voters based on her positions on the issues. Her best chance of winning is to draw an unpopular or an incompetent opponent. If she is the nominee, expect a close contest (51-49 or 52-48) that could go either way with little of no coattails.

Trump could have won this election if he was a competent politician and not a boy in a man's body. He has a chance to win the nomination but he will have almost no chance of beating Sanders and except for a major scandal, little chance of beating Clinton.

Cruz is the most dangerous Republican candidate now running because he is fairly intelligent and will attempt to tap into the anti-establishment mood. He would for this reason run better against Clinton. If he could make himself less scary and more likable he could be the next Reagan. I don't expect him to succeed and so I expect him to likely lose to both Clinton and Sanders,

Rubio - I am underwhelmed by Rubio's performance so far. I see him as a light weight playing above his weight.However, because he is the least objectionable and the most generic of the major Republican candidates, he could, barring a major scandal, run a very close race against Clinton but probably lose to Sanders.

Bush has not much of a chance to win because his name is Bush. He has little chance to win the nomination but if he is the nominee he would be viewed as an establishment dandy without a clue about the middle class. Bush would probably run best against Clinton but probably lose 51-49 or 52-48 in a low turnout election.

The other Republicans: Carson, Christie, Kasich, Florina, and Paul have almost no chance of being nominated. So, I am going to bypass them.

There are two other Republican who could win if they were drafted: Romney and Ryan. I think each would probably have a good shot at defeating Clinton in a very close election. I think Sanders would probably beat them but a close election loss for Sanders would be possible.