January 9, 2016 - With the first votes of the 2016 presidential primary season set to be cast in just a few weeks , Senator Ted Cruz of Texas leads in Iowa while New York Businessman Donald Trump is ahead in New Hampshire.

In Iowa, Cruz has the support of 27% followed by Trump at 23% and Senator Marco Rubio of Florida at 15%. They are followed by Dr. Ben Carson  at 9% , former Florida Governor Jeb Bush at 7% and Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky at 5%.

The rest of the field is New Jersey Governor Chris Christie at 4%, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee at 2% and all tied up at 1% each are former CEO Carly Fiorina , Ohio Governor John Kasich and former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania.

In New Hampshire the undisputed front runner is Trump at 33% followed by Rubio at 15% and Cruz at 12%. Bush has the support of 9% followed by Kasich at 7%. Tied at 5% each are Christie and Paul. Next up is Carson who has the backing of 4% of those polled followed by Fiorina at 3%.

 December 31, 2015 - Matching her dominance in poll numbers, former Secretary State of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign buttons are the best sellers of 2015.

According to Chris Daniels of campaingbuttons-etc , Clinton campaign buttons when compared with all 5 Democrats and all 17 Republicans running for the White House in 2016 accounted for 18.2% of sales for the year. Clinton's closest competitor and no stranger to retail merchandising himself, is  New York Businessman Donald Trump with sales of campaign buttons of 12.5%. Trump is followed  surprisingly by former Florida Governor Jeb Bush with 8.1%. While current national polling has Bush is low single digits, the percentage of campaign button sold indicates that Bush may be doing better than is actually be reflected in potential voter surveys.

Campaign buttons for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey registered sales of 5.3% followed by Senator Marco Rubio of Florida  with 4.7% and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas , Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Dr. Ben Carson all with 4.6%. Former CEO Carly Fiorina accounted for sales of 4.2%.

Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky had sales of 3.5% followed by Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker with 3.2%. Ohio Governor John Kasich campaign buttons accounted for sales of 2.9% followed by former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina all with  2.6%. Louisianan Governor  Bobby Jindal clocks in at 2.5% followed by former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley with 2.4%. Next up is former Texas Governor Rick Perry with 2.2% of campaign buttons sales.

Having campaign button sales figures as anemic as their actual polls numbers are former Senator Jim Webb of Virginia at 1.4%, former Governor of Rhode Island Lincoln Chafee with 1.3% , former New York Governor George Pataki with 1.2% and former Virginia Governor Jim Gilmore at 0.7%.

In comparing sales just among Democrats , Hillary Clinton campaign buttons accounted for 64% followed by Sanders at 16% , O'Malley 8.6% , Webb 5.2% and Chafee 4.9%.

Measuring their strength of sales just among Republicans, Trump led the field with 18.2% followed by Bush at 11.8%. Compared to other GOP White House hopefuls Christie campaign buttons accounted for 7.7% followed by Rubio at 6.9%, Cruz and Carson 6.7% , Fiorina 6.2 % and Paul at 5.1%.

Long since departed from the race , Walker campaign buttons registered 4.6% of sales followed by Kasich at 4.3%, Graham at 3.9% and Santorum and Huckabee both at 3.7%.

Rounding out the campaign buttons sales figures for Republican presidential candidates was Jindal at 3.6%, Perry 3.2%, Pataki 1.7% and Gilmore at 1.1%.

 December 29, 2015 - Former New York Governor George Pataki has ended his race for the 2016 Republican Party presidential nomination. Despite having severed three terms as governor of the "Empire" state , Pataki's campaign had struggled to gain any support or standing in the polls.

Regularly  registering at 1% or less , Pataki never made the main debate stage in the 5 presidential debates held between August and December of 2015. Because he had garnered so little support its unclear what impact Pataki's exit will have on the remaining 12 candidates battling for the GOP nomination.

 December 21, 2015 - Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina ended his presidential bid today for the 2016 Republican nomination. Graham's campaign had struggled from the start with consistently polling in the single digits.

In a video address to his supports the third term senator said "while we have run a campaign that has made a real difference, I have concluded this is not my time."

Senator John McCain of Arizona who is a close friend of Graham said " republicans have lost our most qualified, thoughtful, fearless and honest presidential candidate not to mention the candidate with the best sense of humor."