Jan. 2, 2008
Does Iowa Matter?
CBS' Kathy Frankovic: The Caucuses Can Provide A Bounce, But They Don't Always Point To The Eventual Nominee
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Anything Could Happen In Iowa
Jeff Greenfield tells Harry Smith that this is the first presidential race he can remember where nobody could predict the outcome for either party.
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Clinton's Campaign Blitz
With many first-time voters among her supporters, Sen. Hillary Clinton is challenged with convincing them to set aside time to help pick the next president. Jim Axelrod reports.
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Obama Targets Undecided Iowans
Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., is targeting undecided voters as the Iowa Caucus approaches and the race for the Democratic party nomination heats up. Dean Reynolds reports.
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The latest list of primary and caucus dates as states continue jockeying for position.
Is there an “Iowa effect?”
In the last few weeks, the Iowa caucuses have received the saturation coverage usually reserved for the last weeks of a general election. But the race won’t end with the Iowa caucuses - not by a long shot. It is, after all, a contest for delegates - and on the Republican side, none are going to be allocated on Thursday, no matter who ostensibly “wins.” Delegate estimates can be made for the Democrats, but neither party will actually name their delegates to Minneapolis or Denver until the Iowa state conventions are held in June.
So, will what happens in Iowa determine the nominee? Does it even affect the next event in the process - the New Hampshire primary?
Historically, the answers are mixed. And in some circumstances a caucus runner-up benefits more than the winner.
Sometimes Iowa matters. In 1984, Gary Hart finished a distant second in Iowa, getting only about a third the number of votes as front-runner Walter Mondale. But Hart led the rest of the field, and there was a change in New Hampshire polls soon afterward. Prior to the 1984 caucuses, an ABC News tracking poll had given Hart just 13 percent support in New Hampshire, putting him behind both Mondale and John Glenn. In interviewing a week later, conducted over the three days just before the primary, Hart and Mondale were even at 30 percent - and in the interviews done on the very last night, Hart led Mondale 35 percent to 27 percent. Hart beat Mondale in New Hampshire by nine points on February 28; though Mondale became the eventual nominee.
Dick Gephardt’s Iowa victory in 1988 was no surprise, and neither was Paul Simon’s second place finish. They were Iowa neighbors: Gephardt from Missouri and Simon from Illinois. Massachusetts Governor Mike Dukakis finished third. Dukakis was already the New Hampshire front-runner (another case of being nice to your neighbors), a position he held after the caucuses, too. While Gephardt gained about 10 points in New Hampshire, he still ended up in second place there.
The Iowa bump can also be an Iowa dip. In 2004, John Kerry and John Edwards both moved up in New Hampshire tracking polls after their (respective) first and second place Iowa finishes. Howard Dean had been in first place in New Hampshire polls before Iowa, but his third-place finish there cost him support; he lost the New Hampshire primary and with it his hopes for the nomination. (Dean had actually started losing support in New Hampshire before the Iowa caucuses, but the drop continued afterward.)
On the Republican side, polls taken in New Hampshire in 1988, after the Iowa caucuses, showed Kansas Senator Bob Dole (another Iowa neighbor) gaining on George H.W. Bush, who had finished third in Iowa - behind not just Dole, but also televangelist Pat Robertson! A CBS News Poll showed Bush’s New Hampshire lead disappear temporarily: he had led Dole by 24 points before Iowa, but three days after the caucuses, Dole led by three points . However, Bush bounced back to a four point lead in the CBS News Poll right before New Hampshire’s primary day. It was a tough campaign, but Bush did win in New Hampshire - and by nearly 10 points.
In 2000, what happened in Iowa didn’t seem to directly affect the New Hampshire primary. Al Gore defeated Bill Bradley in Iowa by nearly two to one, but eight days later, he barely eked out a victory in New Hampshire. And even though John McCain finished fourth in the Iowa caucuses (behind George W. Bush, businessman Steve Forbes, and even Alan Keyes), he went on to beat Bush decisively in New Hampshire.
So will what happens in Iowa make a difference in New Hampshire? For the last two months, polls in Iowa have shown a tight three-way Democratic contest, with Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards fighting for the lead. The race could end that way, especially with the two-part Democratic process, in which supporters of candidates with low initial support reallocate themselves to more viable contenders. That’s not a typical outcome for Iowa. And without a clear winner, would anyone benefit? As for the Republican race, we’ve seen Mitt Romney‘s lead shrink as Mike Huckabee moved up, but recent polls suggest Huckabee slipping. Would a Romney win now help him defeat McCain in New Hampshire, or will McCain repeat his 2000 success there even without a strong finish in Iowa?
There’s no clear precedent - but at least 2008 will give us a new case study or two about the “Iowa effect!”
P.S. Unfortunately, the people of Iowa and New Hampshire have not benefited from what should have been a week of peace on earth (peace, that is, from polling). While CBS News abstained, eight other polling organizations released Iowa polls that included interviews conducted between December 26 and 31. However, only two organizations have done that in New Hampshire. And voters in the rest of the country, at least, have had a poll holiday.
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The CFR has hijacked the foreign policy of both parties and their main goal is to destroy American sovereignty and our constitution leading to the formation of a North American Union with Canada and Mexico.
Dr. Ron Paul is NOT a member of the CFR and he is the only pro-peace and pro-liberty candidate running for president.
You mean "Bring Back Corruption!"
Voting for Huckabee would be another vote for the Arkansas corruption machine. Judicial Watch wisely placed both Arkansas politicians in its top ten list of most corrupt politicians.
Huck is a very funny guy. He is a joke-a-minute with the one-liners, but we need a serious executive in the White House. We tried Bill Clinton''s aw shucks folksyness but in a post-9/11 world, we can''t afford to have a commander-in-chief like the Huckster who just last week, at a press conference APOLOGIZED for that assassination in Pakistan. I know that he misspoke, but a President can not make major guffaws like that! If he were the president and if he said that major blunder, our embassies would be attacked and US citizens would be in peril before he could issue a retraction.
Huck is not Presidential.
Huck likes to pardon murderers and thieves. Soft on Crime
Huck loves government programs and taxes.
Huck is not fiscally conservative at all.
Do not be fooled by his cutesy folksiness. The ''pastor'' did not even graduate from seminary.
Huck is not presidential.
HOGWARSH! I have read all the negative and positive information I can find on Hillary and nothing in it eludes to this krap being true.
He''s also the only candidate that still believes in the tooth-fairy.
Iowa please look past religion and look at track record and potential.
If you believe anything else, then you should undermine the influence of Iowa and New Hampshire in the the political process.
Iowa and New Hampshire represent the political spectrum of 19th century America. But its a constituency that carries a lot of influence because they own a lot of property.
On the other hand, when an elected official makes a political endorsement, they are putting their career on the line since a poor choice could cost them their office. When elected officials endorse Romney, they are making a carefully calculated commitment based upon what they think will really happen.
It doesn''t mean they are sure that person will win. Sometimes they endorse someone they don''t want to be on the bad side of if they did win. Romney would be a formidable president if elected, and quite a few people in public office want to be on the right side.
The fact that many politicians have endorsed Romney tells you something important about what they percieve about the elections. Ordinary folks are not as important as they are taught. Pulling the voting machine lever is not the same as pulling the levers of power.
The bottom line is that Romney is a very cunning and influential person in the world. Yes, being in the CFR is a prerequisite to power. Being wealthy and well connected is important. Projecting the right image to voters is necessary. But being a true man of the people who will fight against privilege and power is the death knell of any political campaign.
President Romney: get used to it.
-Posted by metroduck75 at 12:52 PM : Jan 02, 2008
Not to shock you, but the consensus among economists is that the economic state of the 90''s was due to the internet boom, not anything Bill Clinton did.
IOWA- Edwards & Huckabee
NH- Clinton & McCain
"Anything Could Happen In Iowa
Jeff Greenfield tells Harry Smith that this is the first presidential race he can remember where nobody could predict the outcome for either party."
not really oustide of the LDS beltway-
Oh there''s Larry Craig- oh but like I said the LDS beltway includes Idaho for sure...
A bunch of white farmers in Iowa have the pulse of America? This is a sick joke right
Change the system: Have California, New York, Florida, Texas, and then Michigan or Illinois in the first week of primaries. ( I do not live in any of these.) Then have 5 a week, one from each region, roughly, a week afterwords.
Why can two tiny, non-representive of the rest of the nation, make or break a candidicy? By the time I get to vote, it will be decided. Most people live in the 5 states I named. Have the polls open all week, with th eresults released on Saturday. From there you will have a much better, and more accurate numbers, per party.
The only thing that matters is where the decimal point lands on the check to Diebold.
Posted by Slpdisk at 05:02 PM : Jan 02, 2008"
The first presidential candidate who cares about the constitution and your personal liberty since 1828. If you want to be free, you will vote for Ron Paul. If you like being a slave in the current totalitarian tyranny, any other candidate will do the job.
If it''s Clinton, people will question how electable can she be if she couldn''t even beat the two nice younger guys, even when she had the advantage of an experienced organizational machine.
If it''s Obama, people will question whether people are ready to elect a black president (fair or not) or whether the general public is too skeptical to take a chance on hope.
If it''s Edwards, people will conclude that if he couldn''t even win in a state he''s been cultivating for 4 years how''s he going to carry the states where his populist message doesn''t play well, especially if he doesn''t have the $ to compete with Obama and Hillary.
I don''t know if it''s really fair or accurate to make those conclusions, but that''s just my gut feeling about how people judge competitions.
I don''t know though . . .
If it''s Hillary, people will think omg she''s an unstoppable machine (very intimidating!)
If it''s Barack, people will think omg maybe we CAN dare to hope (lots of excitement!)
If it''s Edwards, poeple will think omg wow he took down the powerhouses, maybe he CAN take on the big corporations and get results (roars from the crowd!)
I also refused, and to this day continue to refuse to say a pledge of allegiance to a piece of cloth representing a false concept, and catering to people who regard me and mine as lesser humans.
As to the other reasons, all the other candidates are just as guilty, except for the religious angle, which is not only totally irrelevant, but also the product of a complete lack of education.
Face it, you are simply afraid that a N word might become Mr. President N word. It would be a relief if we could hear, just once, you racist cowards quit hiding behind lame excuses, outright lies, and uneducated speculation.
Just tell the truth, that you are not ready to deal with "Mr. President N word"...
Posted by LawyerTom1 at 06:04 PM : Jan 02, 2008
And the Electoral College is "State of the Art" - right !
There is a saying "If it works, don''t mess with it !"
A bunch of white farmers in Iowa have the pulse of America? This is a sick joke right
Change the system: Have California, New York, Florida, Texas, and then Michigan or Illinois in the first week of primaries. ( I do not live in any of these.) Then have 5 a week, one from each region, roughly, a week afterwords.
Why can two tiny, non-representive of the rest of the nation, make or break a candidicy? By the time I get to vote, it will be decided. Most people live in the 5 states I named. Have the polls open all week, with th eresults released on Saturday. From there you will have a much better, and more accurate numbers, per party.
Posted by random_radar
Can someone please please post more info about this guy??? All I know is that people say to vote him he accepts donations from white supremists and that my neighbors with the confederate flag flying high in their front yard now have a big Vote for Ron Paul poster to go along with it... With that info in hand there''s no way in hell I''d vote for him
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by quetzal666
January 4, 2008 12:12 PM PST
- where is Iowa???
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See all 26 Commentswho cares???