Unbelievable night. Given the youth turnout numbers, I wonder what it would have been like if school had been in session and thousands more of the demographic that turned out for Obama were in the state and registered.
Mike just called from the airport to tell me some quick post-game thoughts:
-Looked at the entrance numbers vs. what actually happened. Edwards was the overwhelming second choice in his caucus. People walking in the door were only 19% for Edwards but in his precinct, Edwards got 90% of the second choice votes, which is probably a big reason why he did well statewide. None of the others were viable, Biden/Richardson had 6-7%, Kucinich had 4-5, undecided had 6-7%. Edwards was a lot weaker walking in than realized but picked up a lot of second choices.
-Obama in his precinct as well as across the state overwhelmingly got people who had never been to caucuses before. That was the difference… of the people who had been to caucuses before, Clinton probably won, but Obama just overwhelmed it with new people. If it had been all the old-timers, Obama probably would not have won. High-risk, high-reward, as mentioned here.
-In 1988, the precinct Mike said he was in had 60 people show up in what was at the time a pretty high-turnout race, this time it had 475 people.
-Turnout numbers in urban areas were incredible. In rural areas numbers were same as usual, but in urban areas, Ames, Iowa City, Waterloo, the numbers were off the map.
-In terms of dynamics, Mike said he went to Obama HQ, people were welcoming and friendly and pumped up… what can we do for you… Hillary's HQ the door was locked and there was a guard at the door, grilling you about why you were there. Totally weird. These are the state headquarters in Des Moines, on Election Day, of all places and times.
For the year-end holiday season, my wife Barbara and I do the same thing every year, which is to head to the Midwest and split time between my family in Lincoln, NE and hers in the far northwestern corner of Missouri. This year, I'm going to head over to Des Moines after the family extravaganzas are finished, and take in the final days in Presidentialpalooza land. Should be a hell of a trip, in more ways than one.
This will likely be the last time I write about Iowa before I land in the war zone, as the Omaha/Lincoln media market covers western Iowa as well, and Barbara's family farm is only five miles from the Iowa border, so I will be seeing a lot of presidential campaign action even before I get to Des Moines. Frankly, I don't think I have a huge amount to add to the commentary and predictions you've been seeing every day from every other pundit and writer around: it's a down to the wire, three-way race. From what I hear from Iowans, and read about the race, my best guess right now is that Obama wins, Edwards is second, and Hillary is third, and that the top three stay pretty close together. But things could change in a heartbeat, there are still a remarkably high number of undecideds, and the caucuses are extremely unpredictable.
On the Republican side, don't be surprised to see Romney win in Iowa. Huckabee's field organization is almost 100% volunteer, and he's starting to take on some water. Romney is perfectly positioned to be this year's comeback kid, and win the nomination.
One other thing I want to add as we wind down to the end: I am very proud of the progressive community for the role they've played in these caucuses. They inspired Edwards' hardcore populist message, Richardson's no residual troops pledge, and Dodd's FISA filibuster. And in general, they have moved the entire debate in the right direction. Congratulations to blogs like Iowa Independent, Political Forecast and Bleeding Heartland, and to groups such as Iowa CCI and the Iowa Citizen Action Network and the Priorities Project for all their amazing work.
First off, let me get this out of my system: didn't that Des Moines Register debate suck? Whoa. While I still think Wolf Blitzer is the worst moderator in America, the woman from the Register made a pretty strong case that she's a contender for that award.
Thanks for letting me do that. Now I can move on.
Obama and his campaign team are feeling very confident these days, and they should be feeling good about themselves, they've had a good last few weeks. Hillary's team seems a little panicky, like a usually disciplined team that has lost control of a situation and has lost their sense of discipline.
However, I think things will even themselves out as we go into these last couple of weeks. I'd be surprised if Hillary's team doesn't settle themselves down and perform well at the end. But the real news in Iowa is that Edwards is hanging around, staying close to the other campaigns. I had thought, as I wrote here, that if Edwards stayed in third place that he would start to shed voters, especially given his spending limitations because of his matching fund decision. I think I was wrong, though. He continues to be right in there, very close to the leaders. His populist outsider message has a lot of appeal, and he remains popular as a 2nd choice for folks whose candidacies aren't viable at their caucus. If the frontrunners end up banging on each other in these last couple of weeks, he could benefit from being outside of the line of fire.
Don't be shocked if Edwards ends up being first on caucus night.
I don't think he goes anywhere after that, though. I still think the matching fund decision was one of the stupidest decisions I've ever seen in modern Presidential politics, and I think it means he won't make it through a long-distance race.
Iowa, though, is still very much in range for him.
Here's my assessment of where the campaign is at based on my visit this weekend to Iowa:
1. The Obama surge feels real to me. Obama's team on the ground is feeling quite optimistic about things, and they weren't even downplaying things the way most campaigns do who are trying to keep expectations down. Most of the people I talked to while I was there predicted Obama would win, and they give him some clear momentum.
2. I think Hillary is hanging in there solidly. She still has a great organization, which is not losing any steam, and AFSCME and EMILY's List both have impressive independent expenditure campaigns working hard and at a big volume. She's keeping things very close, and if Obama stumbles at all, or she catches a lucky break, she still has a solid shot at winning.
3. My theories about Edwards fading don't seem as likely to me after my visit. His organization still seems just as strong as my last visit, and in some conversations with folks from rural Iowa that came in for Saturday's Heartland Presidential Forum, I get the impression that he is still the strongest of the three in rural IA, which is important.
4. Biden has more momentum than Richardson or Dodd going into the final month, and is picking up traction in some places around the state. I expect him to finish fourth , but he has a very long way to go to pull off a shocker and get into the top three- he's not surging by anywhere near that much, not yet at least.
With exactly a month to go, this race continues to look like a tight race down to the end, and at least right now, feels much more like a 3-way race than a 2-way.
If you think we can trust Hillary on Iraq, consider what her husband said this week while campaigning in Iowa. Former President Bill Clinton claimed to have opposed the War "from the beginning," but that it was inappropriate for him at the time to criticize a president's military decision. For Clinton to say this now reeks of pandering to help his wife win over skeptical Democrats, and is laughable on its face. Not only did Hillary vote for the 2002 Iraq War Resolution, but Bill made explicit statements on the eve of the invasion showing his support. As late as 2004, he even told CNN he had "repeatedly defended George Bush against the left on Iraq." Criticizing a sitting President didn't stop Al Gore from opposing the War - nor did it stop George Bush Sr. from attacking Bill Clinton's foreign policy. Are the Clintons playing a Joe Lieberman strategy to pull the wool over the eyes of Democrats?
I am taking my final trip out to Iowa before I go back to the Midwest for Christmas, at which point I'll just stay through January 3rd so I can see the festivities. So this is my last chance in person to check things out.
I am going in part to go to the Heartland Presidential Forum, an event I have been very excited to be working on for a while now. As far as I can tell, it will be the biggest in terms of attendance of any non-party sponsored event in the last 25 years, the biggest any outside progressive group/groups has ever put together before the caucuses. So it is truly historic, and very cool. My friends there have set up a live webcast at Movement Vision Lab blog starting at 2:30 EST. It's only on C-SPAN, so you should head on over there to check it out.
But I'm also going to try to satisfy my curiosity about a bunch of things a month out from the caucus date. Here's what I will be trying to get a handle on:
1. Is Edwards fading? As recently as November 16th, a blog I respect in Iowa, the Iowa Independent, was still thinking Edwards would be the winner, but I am hearing from a lot of people back there that Edwards seems to be fading, and that some of his supporters are starting to look around for other homes.
2. Is a surge coming for any of the second-tier? If Edwards is fading, that means one of the second-tier candidates has a big shot at moving up to a surprise top-three finish if they can build themselves a surge. I hope to get a sense of which candidates might be real and which are not. From afar, I'm getting a whiff of a mini-Biden surge, but it's hard to tell from here.
3. Has Hillary hit the wall? There seems to be some conventional wisdom beginning to congeal that she has a core that loves her, but isn't getting any traction moving beyond it. And with most of the other campaigns telling their people on their second choices to go to Obama, is she stuck at 25%?
4. Is the Obama newbie strategy paying off? I wrote this summer about a fascinating Obama strategy of working to recruit and turn out lots of people who had never been caucus goers. If this strategy is beginning to click while he is tied among more traditional caucus goers, plus other campaigns send their 2nd choices to him rather than Hillary or Edwards, this has the possibility of turning into a big win on caucus night rather than a narrow one.
5. What are the expectations games? Going into the last month, you can really begin to get a feel of who is doing the lowering expectations dance. I'm now hearing rumors that Hillary people are saying they will be happy to be in 3rd place, while Obama is trying to put the brakes on the Obama surging stories.
In addition to my reporting on the Heartland Presidential Forum event, I will try to have some answers to these questions in posts after I return on Sunday, so look for my posts early next week.
If anyone has any other questions for Iowa, I'm interested to hear them.
I am both really pleased and really nervous about Huckabee doing so well in Iowa, but the nervous side of me is winning right now in terms of how this could play out.
Like David Sirota here, I am always pleased when populist economics shows up in a political campaign, even when it comes from a Republican and even if the candidate's policy prescriptions generally suck, as is the case with Huckabee. But to see politicians raising these issues, and see voters responding to them, always feels good.
I am also thrilled at the idea of an all-out civil war between the Christian fundamentalist wing and the economic-royalist wing of the Republican Party primary with Huckabee and, say, Giulani, as the two finalists after the smoke clears from the early states would definitely set such a conflagration off. That would not only be fun to see, it could have really exciting long-term implications if it helps conservative Christians wake up to the way they have been used by the economic royalists.
I would add that if Huckabee actually gets the nomination, it might help force the Democratic nominee to become more of a populist on the campaign trail. A race to see who could be most convincing in speaking out for the regular folks against big business, which could be a good thing.
But for all those positives, I worry a great deal about a Huckabee candidacy. For one thing, I'm less certain that the scenario in the above paragraph would play out, and the idea of Huckabee running a strong economic populist campaign while our candidate ran a more cautious, centrist campaign (not hard to imagine, is it?) is horrifying.
But what scares me the most about Huckabee is that I just think he is by far the best general election candidate on the Republican side. Unlike Giuliani, McCain and Romney, he unites and excites the GOP voting base. Unlike Thompson, he is a thoughtful and articulate candidate on policy, and has real accomplishments he can point to from his time in public office. He's warm and charming and optimistic, and doesn't sound like the hardliner he is on social issues. Watching him charm and entertain Stewart, Colbert and their young, urban, liberal audiences was astonishing to me.
If he wins Iowa, the battle royale begins with the economic royalists in the Republican Party. But if Huckabee survives that onslaught, and wins the nomination, don't take him lightly because he seems like a kooky fundamentalist- he will be tough to beat.
Update (Chris): Huckabee continues to surge in Iowa, with the latest Rasmussen poll on the campaign showing him taking the lead over Romney, 28% to 25%, with everyone else far behind. The current five-poll average for Republicans in Iowa is Romney 26.4%, Huckabee 23.6%, Giuliani 13.2%, Thompson 11.4%. Clearly, Huckabee has all of the momentum.
Well, not yet, but the endgame will be fascinating.
Here's where I think things are right now:
1. Obama is making a move right now. Last week, I wrote that if he was going to win, now was the time for Obama to make his move, and the clear trendline in the polling I have seen, both public and private, is that he has picked up several points, and is now at least tied with Clinton, and maybe even up a little. I'm guessing that now settles down, and that Clinton and Obama spend most of the final month in a dead heat, but Obama has established himself as a clear contender for an Iowa victory.
2. Edwards is on the edge. A few weeks back I noted that if Edwards stays in third a few points behind, that he could be in trouble. I said this because his matching funds decision limits his spending options, and because Iowans know he has to win Iowa to have a chance to win the nomination, and may start drifting away if they think he has no chance.
The polling is a little contradictory at this point, but Obama appears to be the one making a move at Clinton's expense, leaving Edwards stuck in 3rd, several points down and stagnant. I think that puts him in danger for more slippage.
The thing that was supposed to put Edwards over the top was his popularity as a 2nd choice, but I think he now has as problem there, too. The 2nd-tier candidates, if Edwards remains stuck in third, will all be trying to sneak by him for a surprise 3rd-place finish. That means they will tell their people to go to Obama as a 2nd choice rather than Edwards. Adding to those problems is that his tougher rhetoric in recent weeks, while rallying his troops, is making it less likely that people will gravitate toward him as their 2nd choice.
3. Clinton in for a fight. Clinton will stabilize her position after slipping a little in recent weeks, and will remain solidly in the hunt for first place. Her biggest problem is that I don't think any of the other candidates will tell their people to go to her as their 2nd choice (in case they aren't viable). Being the national frontrunner means everyone else needs her to lose. I think that gives the edge to Obama.
However, one should never count the Clintons out. They have the toughest and most experience staff in Iowa, and the best network of precinct captains in the state. The Clintons are, as I've noted before, at their absolute best when their backs are against the wall.
Expect a fight to the finish. And if Obama does pull out a win in Iowa, Katy bar the door as folks in the Midwest like to say, for the wildass fight we'll see in New Hampshire.
If Barack Obama is going to be elected President in 2008, now is the time for him to make his move. Coming off of Hillary's stumble in the last debate and- more importantly- the post-debate spin wars, Obama by all accounts (I didn't make it out for the event) was the winner in the Iowa Jefferson-Jackson Dinner sweepstakes. From everything I've heard, his organization made a great impression on Dinner goers, and Obama gave the best speech of the night. His central message that he represents and can deliver real change, which is a strong message in this anti-establishment moment.
Coming at a time of relative weakness by Hillary, and with a strong J-J performance, Obama is now well-positioned to make a major move forward and take the lead in Iowa. If he does that over the next couple of weeks, he might gain real momentum, as all the anti-Hillary folks who have been split between a lot of different candidates might start gravitating in his direction. If he grabs the lead, a lot of people who have been disappointed by his somewhat listless campaign in recent months might be re-interested and re-energized. (How he might react as a frontrunner, and how the Clinton team battles back will make for a very interesting post, because the Clintons are at their best when their backs are against the wall. But I'll wait and see whether it happens before going there.)
Here's the other side of the coin, though: if this potential goes unrealized over the next couple of weeks, and the campaign continues its drift, Obama's probably dead. Folks in Iowa sense the moment of possibility, but if nothing happens to turn it into real movement, they will be left disappointed again, and Obama's moment will have passed. And right now, there's no time left to regain the moment. If Hillary's campaign is able to hold him off right now, I'm guessing it will be down to her and Edwards for first place in Iowa.
One of the things I have been thinking about a lot since the change of the caucus date to January 3rd is how that date, two days after New Year's Day, which marks the official end of the family holiday season, will change the dynamics of the caucuses. Having the caucuses come so close to the holidays, besides being a bummer for the campaign staffers who won't be able to spend much time at home with their families, or partying with their friends, could create some interesting dynamics.
I say this because in a small agrarian state like Iowa, people tend to take the Christmas holidays extremely seriously as a time to be with your family and not pay as much attention to the outside world. Even with the prospect of choosing the next President close at hand, it will only be the most addicted of political junkies who will be as focused as folks usually are in the last week before an election. I'm guessing this will mean several things:
-Volunteers will be harder to recruit in the December 24th-January 1st period than they would have been in the January 2nd-January 13th period if the old date had stayed in effect.
-Potential caucus-goers will be paying a lot less attention than they normally would in the week before caucus day- to ads, to mail, to calls, to everything campaign-related.
-People will also be paying less attention to the news in general, as they will be less likely to be reading newspapers, listening to the radio, or watching the TV news.
-Campaigns will have to be more sensitive than they normally would be in the lead-up to an election. Getting a robocall as you are sitting down to a big family dinner close to Christmas is really going to piss people off. And nasty attack ads over Christmas week will seem even harsher than usual.
Because people will be paying less attention to politics and news in that week before the caucuses, campaigns really should focus on solidifying voters' preferences before December 24th hits. I think the race is more likely to remain stable in the final days because of the timing, meaning a last-second surge such as in the 2004 caucuses for Kerry and Edwards will be less likely this time.
Being an old campaigner, and an avid student of campaign tactics, I am fascinated to see how the campaigns decide to deal with the holiday factor. They certainly can't, and shouldn't, stop campaigning in that December 24th-January 1st week the way campigns have historically done, but I think they would be making a grave mistake if they operate on a business-as-usual basis. How caucusgoers react to this funky calendar is just one more weird thing in a very weird race in 2008.
As to who it helps, I don't think there's any clear answer to that except to say that, for the reasons listed above, it probably helps whoever goes into the final week ahead.
On another note, I have some follow-up to posts written previously. New polling I've seen this week seems to show Edwards' TV ads have stabilized his situation and kept him within shouting range of Clinton and Obama. One of those same polls also shows confirmation of what I had seen from some private polls that Edwards is strong enough in the 2nd choice race to pick up a lot of ground on caucus night. This combination of factors has Edwards' position much strengthened.
This is a short post, because I've been on the road all week, and now there's a conference in town I need to go schmooze at. The thing I wanted to alert the political junkies reading this who are following the Iowa caucuses is that Edwards has started to slide in some recent polls. In an earlier post regarding Iowa, I mentioned that Edwards was at a danger point with caucusgoers, who follow the daily ups and downs of the polls as much as any voters in America. They know that Edwards has to win Iowa to have a chance at the nomination, and my fear for his sake was that if he started consistently running several points down to Obama and Clinton, people who had been with him before might give up on him, and he would start to lose points more quickly. (This is one of the reasons Gephardt slipped so badly in the end in 2004- Iowans knew he had to win IA, but it didn't look like he would beat Dean, so the anti-Dean folks started moving to Kerry and Edwards.)
There is plenty of time to reverse this trend. Edwards is a good closer, has a great message, has a lot of support in rural caucuses where delegate weighting is heavier than in other precincts, has some good ads up, and is many voters' second choice, which as I discussed last week is always a factor in the caucuses. So there are still plenty of reasons for Edwards people to keep hope alive. But keep watching those poll numbers. If he keeps shedding points, and one of the second-tier guys starts to heat up a little, we could have a new candidate in the top three before long.
As many political junkies know, unlike in most other elections, in the Iowa caucuses voters' second choices sometimes matter a great deal, because if your first choice doesn't have 15% of the folks who show up at that precinct, they have to pick some other caucus to go to in the second round. What this means in practical terms this year, unless there is a surprising surge or slide by some campaign, is that the top three candidates- Clinton, Obama and Edwards- will be viable in most precincts, and everybody else will be non-viable in a great many caucuses throughout the state. That means that if you are with a front-runner, who your second choice is probably doesn't matter. But if you are for Richardson, Dodd, Biden, Kucinich or Gravel, who your second choice is will likely matter a lot.
Who are those folks most likely to go with in the second round on caucus night? One of the danger spots for Hillary may be in the politics of second choices. I am getting the word from multiple sources in the Edwards campaign that they are very pleased with how they are polling in terms of the second choice issue, and Obama people seem satisfied on this score as well, but I've also been told by multiple rival campaign that Hillary is not doing so well in this regard, that the people who are for her are solid but that she doesn't have much in the way of being folks' second choice. I e-mailed multiple folks on the Hillary campaign staff how they were doing in terms of the second choice, and got radio silence back, which I'm pretty sure is a bad sign.
That this would be the case makes logical sense to me. If you are for the wildmen, Kucinich and Gravel, Hillary isn't going to be your second choice. If you get behind Dodd because of his strong stand on FISA, or Richardson because of his strong stand on residual troops, Hillary's probably not your backup choice. And with most frontrunners, the people not with them are looking for somebody else in general, and tend to coalesce behind whatever alternative is still in the game.
The one thing that might overcome this problem for Hillary is highly skilled and experienced precinct captains. They are the ones whose job it is on caucus night to go to the non-viable caucuses and negotiate, beg, plead, and cajole with folks to join their camp. My sense is that Hillary seems to have the best network of experienced precinct captains of any campaign, and that network could help her overcome the lack of 2nd choice support. But it's a dangerous problem for her, and makes that five-point lead she's shown in recent polls a lot more shaky.
For reasons I have written about on OpenLeft.com in the past, I don't have the strong anti-Clinton feelings that many people in the OpenLeft.com community have. In fact, in many ways, I like her, so I wasn't waiting around for the ideal anti-Hillary candidate to emerge like some folks were. I think she is both a better person and candidate than some of my fellow OpenLefties feel. But even so, I was intrigued by the potential of a Barack Obama campaign when the possibility surfaced late last year. Like everyone else I know, I was blown away by his 2004 convention speech, and was delighted by his charisma. I had gotten to know him a little bit on a personal level, and was impressed by his intelligence and insight. Being the Midwesterner through and through that I am, I also liked a lot of the old, sensible Midwestern staffers he had surrounded himself with.
The other thing that really heightened my interest was that as the campaign started to gear up, all the staffers I knew were talking about how this was going to be a really different campaign, that they had a unique kind of candidate and were going to run a truly innovative campaign, and that conventional wisdom on issues and strategies were going to be thrown out the window. The idea of such a campaign run by an African-American son of an immigrant, someone with the kind of compelling vision of American progressivism shown in his 2004 speech, had me really fascinated.
I got to thinking about all this anticipation, and the campaign we've seen since, after reading Matt Stoller's post here on Friday about all the disappointment and cynicism in the blogger community about Obama right now.
It is by no means time yet to do an Obama post-mortem, as he is still very well positioned to win Iowa, has a remarkable field operation there and in NH, and has the money and internet donor base to sustain a campaign through February 5th, no matter what happens in the early states. There is still plenty of time to change the dynamics of this campaign. But there also isn't any doubt he is having problems: he has slipped in the polls nationally, he has slipped in Iowa, and he has slipped in NH. The bloggers Matt cited aren't the only ones wondering what is going on with the campaign.
The great mystery of the Obama campaign so far is when they have such a unique and compelling candidate with such a fresh voice, why are they running such a conventional wisdom campaign? From their issue positions to their debate strategy to their day to day tactical positioning, they have run a campaign that keeps neatly within the lines of the campaign lane they've picked out to drive in. Every time he does a policy speech it fits within the outlines of Democracy policy establishment conventional wisdom. Every ad they do feels just like all of the usual political ads you see on TV. The strangest thing to me is that the kind of campaign they are running feels exactly like the others I've seen before. It's the politics that is broken, upper middle income-oriented, tired of partisan bickering campaign that Gary Hart, Bruce Babbitt, Paul Tsongas and Bill Bradley all chose to run. The weird thing is, none of those guys won the primary, let alone the general election. I guess maybe the veterans of past campaigns felt like with a charismatic guy to wage that kind of campaign, it would finally win. But right now, it feels like it's headed into the same ditch as all those other campaigns did.
I remain mystified as to why Obama has not followed his own rhetoric and run a truly different kind of campaign, one that has an innovative approach to the big issues, one that embraced bold goals and ideas for how to solve the messes Bush has left behind for the next President. (If I'm missing something in terms of boldness and innovation on either policy or political strategy, let me know, Obama fans.) Maybe if he started to do that, his campaign would suddenly get interesting and start to catch fire again.
Like I said, there's still plenty of time, and he is without questions within striking distance in Iowa. But I'm still waiting, and I think a lot of other folks are as well, for the creativity, courage, boldness, and different kind of campaign that I was expecting when this race began. If he starts to finally show that, he might yet be our nominee. If he keeps doing the same old, same old, you have to bet on Hillary.
The short answer is not necessarily, but I sure wouldn't bet against her there, either.
I'll start out doing what I and a thousand other writers constantly writing about the Iowa caucuses constantly do: reminding you once again of the incredible trickiness of polling in a caucus situation. Caucuses are interactive events, where the abilities of the precinct captains, the social dynamics in the room on caucus night, the second place choices of caucus attendees, and the vagaries of delegate counts all have big impacts on the actual results. So always, always, always take caucus poll results with a huge grain of salt. In a normal poll, the margin of error is 3-4 points. In a caucus poll, you should triple that.
The other thing to keep in mind is that the front-runners have been closely bunched for many months now, and remain that way. Modest trendlines for a couple of weeks this early out have to be weighed in with a 9-month trend showing consistent tightness between the numbers of the top three. I would be a little surprised, given that 9-month pattern, if the trend line doesn't settle back down again soon into more of that 3-way tie dynamic.
Having said that, I am getting the sense that, as close as this race continues to be, Hillary's Iowa campaign has turned a corner to some extent. As I've written about before, the Iowa campaign is firing on all cylinders. Her field operations are being executed very well. The Vilsacks, who are highly regarded in the state, are working their asses off for her. People are finding her more likable personally than they expected they would.
Most importantly in terms of her gaining in the polls, she is starting to solidify an advantage with older women, which has been the campaign's most highly targeted demographic group from the beginning. Historically, women have been over 60% of caucusgoers, and over-50-year-olds have also been over 60% of caucusgoers, so obviously older women are a huge percentage of caucus attendees. And for a woman candidate, the older half of the baby boomer women, the ones who lived through the dawning of the women's movement in the 1960s and 170s, and can remember when abortion was still illegal, the appeal of a woman candidate is very big. Hillary has targeted that cohort from the beginning, and I think it is paying off.
I think the Iowa race is a long way from being over, and I don't think Hillary is pulling away to any significant degree. But she has established herself as the candidate with an edge right now, a smaller and more changeable advantage in Iowa than nationwide to be sure, but still with the lead.
The other dynamic to watch if Hillary keeps the lead for awhile to come is the danger to Edwards. While Iowa caucusgoers make up their own minds, they do watch polls and trends, and they know that Edwards has to win Iowa to have a chance at the nomination. If he is perceived to be slipping in Iowa, he may start sliding dangerously, maybe even finishing out of the top three and opening the door for one of the second-tier candidates.
Assuming Iowa is still first in the nation (this calendar stuff just keeps getting weirder and weirder), the biggest single variable in terms of bounce, momentum, and changing the nature of the race is the surprise factor. If candidates finish in the order national reporters expect them to, it doesn't change anything. McCain's gamble to skip Iowa in 2000 worked because nothing surprising happened there, and he was able to make his stand in New Hampshire. Wes Clark's gamble to skip Iowa in 2004 blew up in his face because of Kerry's upset victory- it totally blew Clark out of the media spotlight and ended his chances.
You can go back over time and check it out:
-In 1976, Carter's momentum out of Iowa was unstoppable because his victory was such a big surprise
-In 1980, Carter was expected to win Iowa, did, and nothing changed in the dynamics of the campaign
-In 1984, Mondale got nothing out of a widely expected Iowa landslide win, but Hart got a huge boost because pundits didn't expect him to be in second place.
-In 1988, Gephardt was expected to win Iowa and did, but all the surprise was on the Republican side with Pat Robertson finishing first, so Gephardt got no bounce at all
-In 2000, the Gore-Bradley race in Iowa was thought to be more competitive than it turned out to be, so while it wasn't a surprise for Gore to win, it was a surprise that he crushed Bradley so badly, deflating Bradley's NH campaign.
One variable this year is that the top three Democratic candidates are so closely bunched at the top. If things stay that way all the way to the end, whoever wins probably will get a boost, especially if it's a solid victory.
The big surprise, though, would be if any of the top three fades in the last week of the campaign, and one of the second-tier candidates slips ahead and finishes in the top three. I would not be surprised to see that happen, and if it does, it would utterly destroy whichever of the top three candidates slip, and would give a really big boost and a lot of attention to the surprise top three finisher. If that turns out to be Richardson, with his "no residual troops" issue, and his Hispanic base in all the February 5th states (plus Nevada in between), this could suddenly become a very exciting race.
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