The presumption that it is only a matter of time before Biden collapses may rest on nothing more than wishful thinking. The data suggest he has a broad base of support.

The RealClearPolitics average shows Biden (34.7) has twice the support that a sinking Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) (17.7) commands. The old CW for Sanders was that he was a front-runner; the new CW is that he’s past his prime. “Bernie Sanders seems to be getting squeezed from two sides,” Chuck Todd explained on Meet the Press. “Joe Biden’s got in, his numbers grew. Bernie Sanders’ got lower. . . . [T]he less you were paying attention the more likely you were a Bernie Sanders supporter. The point being Biden took a bunch of soft supporters.”

With Sanders declining, he risks falling into a distant second with a tightlypacked group of contenders. In the RCP average, Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) draws close to 10 points, Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) gets 8 percent and South Bend, Ind, Mayor Pete Buttigieg is at 6.2 — with everyone else below 4 percent. The quartet not only carves up the not-Biden vote, but may work to keep them all of them below the 15 percent threshold, the minimum for winning delegates.

However, even if one or more of this group falters, there is no guarantee someone else can consolidate the not-Biden vote. The Republican Echelon Poll, for example, found that in one-on-one match ups, Biden wins going away against Sanders (61/25), Harris (63/20), Buttigieg (65/17) and Warren (66/19). This is a single poll, a Republican one at that, but at this stage no single candidate seems capable of matching Biden’s appeal.

The two polls of likely Democratic primary voters, completed last week by Tel Opinion Research, a Florida-based firm, show the former vice president with a 21-percentage point lead over the second-place candidate, Sen. Bernie Sanders, in New Hampshire and an even bigger Biden lead over him of 27 points in South Carolina.....

“Biden’s current lead in these surveys is not just because there are so many people in the race,” Tyson said. “He’s not just winning in the open-ballot test with a crowded field of candidates. He’s crushing the others in the head-to-heads.”

In the New Hampshire head-to-head matchups, Biden’s 66 percent to 22 percent lead over Sanders was larger than his 58 percent to 29 percent advantage over Elizabeth Warren, who represents neighboring Massachusetts as a senator.

Biden led Pete Buttigieg, mayor of South Bend, Indiana, 63 percent to 21 percent.

In the South Carolina head-to-heads, Biden leads all three of his main rivals by 52 points or more: 70 percent to 15 percent lead over Sanders, 71 percent to 10 percent advantage over Buttigieg and 67 percent to 15 percent over Warren.

GOP senators say that if the House passes articles of impeachment against President Trump they will quickly quash them in the Senate, where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has broad authority to set the parameters of a trial.

While McConnell is required to act on articles of impeachment, which require 67 votes — or a two-thirds majority — to convict the president, he and his Republican colleagues have the power to set the rules and ensure the briefest of trials.

“I think it would be disposed of very quickly,” said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)....

“Why on earth would we give a platform to something that I judge as a purely political exercise?” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), another member of the Judiciary Committee. “We have to perform our constitutional duty, but if people think that we’re going to try and create a theater that could give you the perception that this is a matter that rises to the level of Watergate, that’s nonsense.”

Tillis said he would support McConnell bringing the impeachment process to a quick close, and that any kind of extended trial would be “rewarding what I view as bad behavior on the part of the House.”