What’s the untold story with the 2015 – 2016 debates?

Bernie Sanders v. Hillary Clinton.
Why is Bernie still in this race, debating one-on-one with Hilary?  He does not stand a chance, does he?

The DNC needs Bernie up there with Hillary, otherwise there’d be no one to debate with and there’d be no positive news coverage or any good new news coverage to capture media time to keep Hillary in the public’s eye.

Therefore Bernie will be hanging on in order to give Hillary needed media attention, rather than let the Republicans have it all.

Donald Trump v. the establishment candidates.
Why are three establishment candidates hanging on in the face of devastating losses during the primaries and caucuses and Trump’s overwhelming support of the voting public, without hardly even spending any money campaigning yet?   Maybe if only one establishment candidate was running against Trump, he’d get more of the delegates rather than splitting them up among the other establishment candidates?

The RNC needs more the just one establishment candidate, otherwise Trump would get more delegates because if a candidate dropped out, then at least some of his votes would go to Trump.  Therefore by offering more alternatives to Trump, Trump gets less of the available voters’ support and maybe Trump will not reach 1,237, the number needed to win on the first ballot at the convention.

If Trump fails to win on the first ballot, then it becomes a brokered convention and most of the delegates previously committed to vote for Trump are thereby freed up to ignore the will of the individual voters and the delegates are free to vote at their own will.

Therefore the RNC will be applying pressure on the remaining establishment candidates to remain in the race for the upcoming primaries and caucuses in order to try to keep the outsider, Donald Trump, from reaching 1,237 votes on the first ballot.