swinging at the curveball
By now you've seen the big news of the day - the Iowa Caucus results:
Kerry - 38%
Edwards - 32%
Dean - 18%
Gephardt - 11%
So what does this mean for the dem primary race? Here's my swing at the curveball the good people of Iowa threw us tonight...hopefully Seth and Josh will chime in with their take on things.
Gephardt: This one's no surprise...Gephardt is done. He will make this official at a press conference at 2pm tomorrow (see his website). So I won't go too much into this. Ryan Lizza called this one a week ago (or at least called that Gephardt wouldn't be picking up any "undecided" support in the final days) but I didn't really believe that he would do so poorly. Gephardt's campaign organization is unrivaled in Iowa and he's the most "union" of all the candidates. Besides his pro-war stance, which didn't seem to matter to Iowans anyway, he is everything an Iowa Democrat is looking for: pro-union, anti-free trade, pro-universal health care, socially liberal. If he can't win in Iowa, he can't win anywhere. Which I guess explains why he's dropping out.
Dick was a good politician back when he founded and was the first chairman of the DLC in 1985, but his leftward shift since he ran for President in 1988 has done him no good. The pro-union, anti-free trade, populist thing just doesn't do it anymore. Dick's an old-school Democrat who couldn't even win in old-school Iowa and that's why he's done.
Dean: Here's me going out on a limb. Dean is done. Besides Gephardt and Lieberman, whose campaigns are essentially dead coming out of Iowa, Dean is the next biggest loser. In fact, I'm going to go so far as saying that this dooms the Dean campaign, though the official end will not come as soon as it will for Gephardt or Lieberman.
Dean has been the front-runner since at least September. He's been slated to win Iowa for the past few months and at one point had a 10-point lead over Gephardt and a 20+ lead over the rest of the field. So what does his loss show? Mostly that he's not the inevitable nominee. This should make a lot of Democrats think again before supporting him (Gore and Bradley are kicking themselves right now). Mostly, it's going to make a lot of voters who bandwagoned with Dean think again. While he'll keep is loyal base of college students and Volvo driving former hippies, about 15%-20% of voting Democrats, he won't take much more, anywhere. People that don't love him and no longer think he's the definite nominee will come to their senses on his inelectability and move to Edwards or Clark. He'll stay in the race through Super Tuesday (March 2) because he has lots of money, a large organization and a strong loyal base of support. But he won't place be winning in the South or the West where he really needs to. In New Hampshire, he'll fall to second or third behind Clark and Kerry. This will further the sense that he is not the inevitable nominee and will sure up his eventual defeat.
Kerry: Obviously, this is a good thing for the Kerry camp. Somehow he came out of nowhere to win this thing. He was polling a distant 3rd or 4th place a week and a half ago and political analysts, predicting a weak showing in Iowa and NH, were about ready write his campaign obituary. I won't speculate on how he won Iowa, many others have done this for me (see TNR blogs) plus I don't know much or care much for the caucus system.
But lets talk about what this will mean for the next few weeks (aka New Hampshire and Feb 3). I don't think the Iowa win is gonna give Kerry the boost he needs to win the nomination. New Hampshire, maybe. He's polling a close third, well within striking distance of Clark and Dean. Furthermore, he's by far the favorite "second choice". So people that were backing others though without much enthusiasm, may move back to Kerry if he was their second choice, especially now that he seems to have come back from the dead. There is, however, a downside. I think Kerry needs to win or get a close second to stay in NH to keep in this thing. This past summer, people were saying Kerry needed to win NH in order to stay in. After all, he was the front-runner from mid 2002 to mid 2003 and NH is next door to his home state. But once Dean took off, Kerry's campaign successfully lowered expectations in NH. His win in Iowa, however, has brought those expectations back up. If Kerry doesn't make it close, his failure to capitalize so close to home will be the story the day after NH and that will mark the end of Kerry.
But say he does win (or come very close in) NH. The fact is, Kerry has nothing in the February 3 states: Arizona, Delaware, Missouri, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Virginia. He's polling in the low single digits in all of the places I can find polls for. He has very little organization and very little appeal, outside of the veteran community in Virginia. Plus he'll be competing against two southerners. An across-the-board whooping as is likely on February 3rd for Kerry will be his end.
Lieberman: The Kerry/Edwards story in Iowa spells the end for Joe. He's running the "opposite of Dean" campaign and this has very little appeal when Dean's not the front-runner. Especially when the other non-Dean candidates are running pretty similar New Democrat campaigns. When so many candidates are running, style becomes more important than policy since so much of the policy is the same. His rabbi-giving-a-sermon sounding voice doesn't rally the troops like Dean's yelling or Edward's good looks. His decision to skip Iowa was smart, since he probably wouldn't have done much better if he had campaigned there, but anything less than a strong 3rd in New Hampshire will be difficult to overcome, even if February 3rd otherwise would be his day to shine. The momentum Kerry and Edwards have coming out of Iowa, however, will make 3rd place even hard to attain as voters will search for a candidate that seems better positioned against Dean. Look for Joe's "independent" vote to split between Clark and Edwards, his "hawk" vote to go to Clark and his "hardcore New Democrat" vote to split between Kerry, Clark and Edwards. But hey, I'm still going to NH to see what I can do to make my predictions not happen.
Edwards: As my NDN colleagues were predicting as early as this summer, Edwards may be the "come out of nowhere to take it all" candidate we never expected. He ran a brilliant campaign. He spent the first quarter of 2003 raising money, the middle half developing a very comprehensive message and set of policies and the last quarter connecting with voters with a positive, optimistic message. He's largely avoided the fighting which has marked the Gephardt, Kerry, Dean and Lieberman campaigns. Plus he's damn good looking.
Certainly Iowa was a surprise even for him. Although the most recent Iowa polls were calling such an outcome, no one seemed to think Edwards had the organization on the ground to actually get his people to the caucus. But somehow he pulled it off. See Edwards has amazing appeal as a person and a politician and he's spreading a message that is being eaten up by the voters. Even conservatives like Tucker Carlson have commented that he is one of the best "off the stump" speakers ever to grace the political stage. So in this race where style wins, Edwards may be the Giorgio Armani. So what does this mean for his future? He's gonna get a small bump in New Hampshire, mostly from current Dean, Clark and Lieberman supporters. It's not gonna put him to the top, though he should be up there. He's just the kind of guy that New Hampshire voters like. But he spent too much time in Iowa to make his message or image resonate. A strong 4th place finish in NH won't kill him, however, since he has no expectations there.
Edwards is looking forward to February 3rd where he's supposed to shine. In these mostly southern and western primaries, characterized by more moderate Democrats, look for Edwards to make some major gains. South Carolina should be his. Name recognition out of Iowa should give him a boost in Arizona, New Mexico, etc where he has potential but is unknown. I see some major competition between him and Clark for the non-Dean vote (aka 80% of the Democratic vote - see commentary on Dean). I'm not sure who's gonna take it though, so I'm not gonna call it. But look for Edwards to keep going for a while.
Clark: I see mixed things for Clark. He was probably right to skip Iowa. He wouldn't have done well there with a late start organizing a ground effort. Dean's fall will certainly help him among the liberal voters. I see many bandwagonning Deaniacs switching over to Clark in NH. But at the same time, he could be hurt by the rise of Kerry and Edwards. Certainly they're policies are very similar (well if you guess what Clark's policies would be once he announces them). And Edwards and Clark are both charismatic fellas. Look for some of the NH voters who clung to Clark as the alternative to Dean to move over to Kerry and Edwards. So Clark may just stand still - some folks leaving and some Deaniacs joining. Certainly anything worse than 2nd will hurt him since he's been the rising candidate in NH for the past few months. But I wouldn't count him out with a 3rd place finish (debatable about 4th). He's got lots of money and is already working hard in Feb. 3 states where he has a lot of support. His southern appeal will definitely help him in South Carolina and across the west, unless he's battling with Edwards who seems even more southern and is better looking. But look for Clark to stay in for a while.
Kerry - 38%
Edwards - 32%
Dean - 18%
Gephardt - 11%
So what does this mean for the dem primary race? Here's my swing at the curveball the good people of Iowa threw us tonight...hopefully Seth and Josh will chime in with their take on things.
Gephardt: This one's no surprise...Gephardt is done. He will make this official at a press conference at 2pm tomorrow (see his website). So I won't go too much into this. Ryan Lizza called this one a week ago (or at least called that Gephardt wouldn't be picking up any "undecided" support in the final days) but I didn't really believe that he would do so poorly. Gephardt's campaign organization is unrivaled in Iowa and he's the most "union" of all the candidates. Besides his pro-war stance, which didn't seem to matter to Iowans anyway, he is everything an Iowa Democrat is looking for: pro-union, anti-free trade, pro-universal health care, socially liberal. If he can't win in Iowa, he can't win anywhere. Which I guess explains why he's dropping out.
Dick was a good politician back when he founded and was the first chairman of the DLC in 1985, but his leftward shift since he ran for President in 1988 has done him no good. The pro-union, anti-free trade, populist thing just doesn't do it anymore. Dick's an old-school Democrat who couldn't even win in old-school Iowa and that's why he's done.
Dean: Here's me going out on a limb. Dean is done. Besides Gephardt and Lieberman, whose campaigns are essentially dead coming out of Iowa, Dean is the next biggest loser. In fact, I'm going to go so far as saying that this dooms the Dean campaign, though the official end will not come as soon as it will for Gephardt or Lieberman.
Dean has been the front-runner since at least September. He's been slated to win Iowa for the past few months and at one point had a 10-point lead over Gephardt and a 20+ lead over the rest of the field. So what does his loss show? Mostly that he's not the inevitable nominee. This should make a lot of Democrats think again before supporting him (Gore and Bradley are kicking themselves right now). Mostly, it's going to make a lot of voters who bandwagoned with Dean think again. While he'll keep is loyal base of college students and Volvo driving former hippies, about 15%-20% of voting Democrats, he won't take much more, anywhere. People that don't love him and no longer think he's the definite nominee will come to their senses on his inelectability and move to Edwards or Clark. He'll stay in the race through Super Tuesday (March 2) because he has lots of money, a large organization and a strong loyal base of support. But he won't place be winning in the South or the West where he really needs to. In New Hampshire, he'll fall to second or third behind Clark and Kerry. This will further the sense that he is not the inevitable nominee and will sure up his eventual defeat.
Kerry: Obviously, this is a good thing for the Kerry camp. Somehow he came out of nowhere to win this thing. He was polling a distant 3rd or 4th place a week and a half ago and political analysts, predicting a weak showing in Iowa and NH, were about ready write his campaign obituary. I won't speculate on how he won Iowa, many others have done this for me (see TNR blogs) plus I don't know much or care much for the caucus system.
But lets talk about what this will mean for the next few weeks (aka New Hampshire and Feb 3). I don't think the Iowa win is gonna give Kerry the boost he needs to win the nomination. New Hampshire, maybe. He's polling a close third, well within striking distance of Clark and Dean. Furthermore, he's by far the favorite "second choice". So people that were backing others though without much enthusiasm, may move back to Kerry if he was their second choice, especially now that he seems to have come back from the dead. There is, however, a downside. I think Kerry needs to win or get a close second to stay in NH to keep in this thing. This past summer, people were saying Kerry needed to win NH in order to stay in. After all, he was the front-runner from mid 2002 to mid 2003 and NH is next door to his home state. But once Dean took off, Kerry's campaign successfully lowered expectations in NH. His win in Iowa, however, has brought those expectations back up. If Kerry doesn't make it close, his failure to capitalize so close to home will be the story the day after NH and that will mark the end of Kerry.
But say he does win (or come very close in) NH. The fact is, Kerry has nothing in the February 3 states: Arizona, Delaware, Missouri, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Virginia. He's polling in the low single digits in all of the places I can find polls for. He has very little organization and very little appeal, outside of the veteran community in Virginia. Plus he'll be competing against two southerners. An across-the-board whooping as is likely on February 3rd for Kerry will be his end.
Lieberman: The Kerry/Edwards story in Iowa spells the end for Joe. He's running the "opposite of Dean" campaign and this has very little appeal when Dean's not the front-runner. Especially when the other non-Dean candidates are running pretty similar New Democrat campaigns. When so many candidates are running, style becomes more important than policy since so much of the policy is the same. His rabbi-giving-a-sermon sounding voice doesn't rally the troops like Dean's yelling or Edward's good looks. His decision to skip Iowa was smart, since he probably wouldn't have done much better if he had campaigned there, but anything less than a strong 3rd in New Hampshire will be difficult to overcome, even if February 3rd otherwise would be his day to shine. The momentum Kerry and Edwards have coming out of Iowa, however, will make 3rd place even hard to attain as voters will search for a candidate that seems better positioned against Dean. Look for Joe's "independent" vote to split between Clark and Edwards, his "hawk" vote to go to Clark and his "hardcore New Democrat" vote to split between Kerry, Clark and Edwards. But hey, I'm still going to NH to see what I can do to make my predictions not happen.
Edwards: As my NDN colleagues were predicting as early as this summer, Edwards may be the "come out of nowhere to take it all" candidate we never expected. He ran a brilliant campaign. He spent the first quarter of 2003 raising money, the middle half developing a very comprehensive message and set of policies and the last quarter connecting with voters with a positive, optimistic message. He's largely avoided the fighting which has marked the Gephardt, Kerry, Dean and Lieberman campaigns. Plus he's damn good looking.
Certainly Iowa was a surprise even for him. Although the most recent Iowa polls were calling such an outcome, no one seemed to think Edwards had the organization on the ground to actually get his people to the caucus. But somehow he pulled it off. See Edwards has amazing appeal as a person and a politician and he's spreading a message that is being eaten up by the voters. Even conservatives like Tucker Carlson have commented that he is one of the best "off the stump" speakers ever to grace the political stage. So in this race where style wins, Edwards may be the Giorgio Armani. So what does this mean for his future? He's gonna get a small bump in New Hampshire, mostly from current Dean, Clark and Lieberman supporters. It's not gonna put him to the top, though he should be up there. He's just the kind of guy that New Hampshire voters like. But he spent too much time in Iowa to make his message or image resonate. A strong 4th place finish in NH won't kill him, however, since he has no expectations there.
Edwards is looking forward to February 3rd where he's supposed to shine. In these mostly southern and western primaries, characterized by more moderate Democrats, look for Edwards to make some major gains. South Carolina should be his. Name recognition out of Iowa should give him a boost in Arizona, New Mexico, etc where he has potential but is unknown. I see some major competition between him and Clark for the non-Dean vote (aka 80% of the Democratic vote - see commentary on Dean). I'm not sure who's gonna take it though, so I'm not gonna call it. But look for Edwards to keep going for a while.
Clark: I see mixed things for Clark. He was probably right to skip Iowa. He wouldn't have done well there with a late start organizing a ground effort. Dean's fall will certainly help him among the liberal voters. I see many bandwagonning Deaniacs switching over to Clark in NH. But at the same time, he could be hurt by the rise of Kerry and Edwards. Certainly they're policies are very similar (well if you guess what Clark's policies would be once he announces them). And Edwards and Clark are both charismatic fellas. Look for some of the NH voters who clung to Clark as the alternative to Dean to move over to Kerry and Edwards. So Clark may just stand still - some folks leaving and some Deaniacs joining. Certainly anything worse than 2nd will hurt him since he's been the rising candidate in NH for the past few months. But I wouldn't count him out with a 3rd place finish (debatable about 4th). He's got lots of money and is already working hard in Feb. 3 states where he has a lot of support. His southern appeal will definitely help him in South Carolina and across the west, unless he's battling with Edwards who seems even more southern and is better looking. But look for Clark to stay in for a while.
posted by Marc at 1:18:00 AM
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