The Republican race is turning out to be a real barn-burner. And the Democratic race, while still feeling lopsided, is no longer the runaway it looked like it might be for a while.
All of which is good! Closer races = more excitement = better turnout = more democracy.
The real shocker is that on the Republican side, national (i.e., sorta meaningless but with symbolic value) polling shows Giuliani in a dead heat with — get this — Mike Huckabee.
According to Rasmussen, Giuliani’s support has dropped from 27 percent to 18 percent over the four nights of surveying a total of about 600 likely Republican voters, decreasing three percentage points the first day and two each of the next three days. Over the same period, Huckabee jumped from 13 percent to 18 percent.
McCain’s next at 14%. Mitt “Mr. 12%” Romney is at, well, 12%.
On the Democratic side, the trend is similar but less pronounced.
[T]he tracking shows Hillary Clinton slipping six points in the past week to 35 percent, matching her lowest standing since Rasmussen started daily tracking almost five months ago. Barack Obama was holding in second place at 23 percent, followed by John Edwards at 17 and Bill Richardson at 7 percent.
Iowa remains extremely fluid on both sides. The GOP race is now routinely described as a “dead heat,” with Romney and Huckabee trading leads that are within the margin of error in various polls. I’m guessing that’s how things will stay through January 3 — unless Huckabee ends up running away with it (which could well happen). I wouldn’t expect Romney’s speech on Thursday to change much, unless he tanks as a result of it. Seems to me like there’s some downside potential there, but not much upside.
The Democratic race is also too close to call in Iowa — polling now shows Clinton and Obama pretty much tied, with Edwards so close as to be within the margin of error.
The stakes are high in Iowa (unfortunately, for reasons Charley has nicely explained). I’ve hypothesized that a Huckabee win in Iowa pretty much kills Romney’s campaign, and I’ll stand by that assessment. As for the Dems, Obama needs to win Iowa to have a shot at catching Clinton, since so far New Hampshire remains fairly solid for Clinton (though her lead is smaller than it was). If Clinton wins Iowa and New Hampshire, it’s tough to see how Obama can rebound in time.
It’s really so unfortunate, as many BMGers have been saying for some time, that these two small, unrepresentative states are going to have such a dramatic impact on the race. But that’s how it’s going to be. Like it or not, big media is going to go apesh*t over the results in Iowa and New Hampshire, and there will be no end of graphics, charts, and analyses of whose “momentum” coming out of those two states is “unstoppable,” and whose “disappointing finish” cannot be “overcome.”
Let’s hope that Howard Dean has got some good ideas for how to reform this seriously broken system.
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p>…I don’t even think what happens in NH matters as much anymore. It’s pretty much Iowa picking the POTUS noms every four years, which is absurd.
As I pointed out elsewhere, the Iowa caucuses as run by the Democrats don’t even meet minimal international standards to coutn as a democracy.
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p>The OSCE has impugned the 10% threshold level (PDF) for a party’s vote total to count in Turkey. On a precinct-by-precinct basis, the threshold in Iowa is 15%. AS the OSCE would say, this leads to some pretty bad “distortions”.
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p>The Hillary-Clinton-Edwards tie likely means that it will come down to the second choice of the other candidates. I’ve seen no pol that breaks down second-place favorites of Iowans by their first-place (and the sample sizes would be tiny, anyway).
The whole point of the caucus system is to be undemocratic. It was designed to hand the state Party-internally agreed upon Presidential candidate, who may or may not be unpopular overall, a victory.
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p>At present I don’t think Iowa so much creates a winner as sets expectations for the frontrunners and winnows out most of the lesser candidates.
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p>I think the real loser of Iowa is Richardson, who will have to drop out, and Dodd/Biden/Gravel are shown the door. About winners…I’d say if numbers hold, John Edwards becomes the weakest link and New Hampshire finishes him off.
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p>After Iowa Obama will have to bet on either New Hampshire or South Carolina. I don’t see him deciding to make his stand in NH. So South Carolina is the crucial fight. And February 5 is the semi-national referendum to either agree with the SC result or oppose it.
Both the Republican and Democratic races may turn on a backward and bigoted state in the Union whose main role in American history has been to repeatedly try to break the country apart.
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p>There’s a lot wrong with this process. A lot.
I know the current mainstream opinion is that Romney has abruptly decided to give this speech to “save” his campaign and to bring back conservative Christian support that he has been losing to Huckabee – but I think something different has been going on.
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p>Romney has been saying all along he will avoid giving a JFK-esque speech on his religion. I’ve never believed him. I think his campaign has been waiting all along to make this speech in the few weeks before Iowa and New Hampshire to gain some positive press before voters go the polls. I think this speech (unfortunately) will boost Romney’s campaign – it will provide a lot of positive attention about his commitment to religious tolerance, his defense about his own personal beliefs, and of course whatever he’ll say about Mormonism essentially being an outgrowth of Christianity and that he too loves Jesus Christ, blah, blah, blah.
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p>Think of all the press and attention this speech will get and provide of all those voters who are still undecided with a chance to take another look at Mitt just as their making their final choice.
then he’s timed it badly. He shouldn’t have done it (a) with a month to go; (b) shortly after the polls started showing Huckabee winning Iowa; and (c) shortly after it was revealed that he’s been telling Republican crowds that he wouldn’t consider putting a Muslim in his cabinet.
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p>No, I’m going with the original theory: this is in reaction to the Huckabee surge.
The Romney run has imho been twofold in purposes all along. One leg was to actually win the nomination or Presidency, of course. The second one was always to make the case for the legitimacy of Mormonism, to press the point from the most commanding and legitimated position possible.
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p>The money from Utah to Romney’s campaign always came with those particular strings attached. Now that he just can’t seem to make the breakout from the 10-12% Republican backing he has- if the speech ‘works’ and gets him to Giuliani/Huckabee numbers and potentially the nomination, excellent. If it doesn’t work that way and yet achieves some sort of gain of acceptance for Mormons among the Christian Right, that’s $40 million not actually wasted in Mormon eyes.
I definitely think he can pull out a win in IA, so much so that I am staking money on it in a futures market, but my friend and colleague on the debate team a self described “Wall Street Journal conservative” is scared to death of Mike Huckabee and so will the big corporate donors that generally like to hear their Republicans give pro-business policies. Mike Huckabee is a modern day Williams Jenning Bryan without the flowing oratory or the funny hats, he is a social conservative but an economic populist. On labor, trade, and entitlement program expansion he and Edwards are nearly identical.
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p>What I see out of a Huckabee victory in IA is Romney dead on arrival in NH and his supporters flocking to a solid business conservative like Guliani or McCain. It’ll then be a fight between Guliani and Huckabee to keep the Christian conservatives in line and it will be great if the party finally fractures over this division between theocrats and corporate Republicans.
[Huckabee] and Edwards are nearly identical.”
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p>Identical?
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p>Huckabee supports card checks instead of elections to organize unions?
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p>Huckabee supports a $9.50 minimum wage?
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p>Huckabee has a universal health insurance plan, with individual mandates, that puts public programs into the mix with private insurers?
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p>Can you provide some quotes or links to these Huckabee stances that are identical to Edwards’ stances?
As publius of Obsidian Wings points out, Huckabee’s retail politics may have pushed him up out of single digits, but he didn’t have the campaign organization to know about the NIE, nor did he understand the NIE’s implications when a reporter told him about it. He’s not ready to be a frontrunner because he hasn’t built the organization. Publius’ post is worth a read.
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p>Huck may have Chuck Norris on his team, but he would be in a better position if he had an actual team of foreign policy and defense policy experts to keep him informed.
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p>Mitt’s organization does extend into other states beyond Iowa. He’s got people in NH, in Michigan, and in South Carolina, and so on. Mitt can lose Iowa and still win this. This morning I briefly saw Morning Joe on MSNBC saying something about how Huckabee’s account of releasing Wayne Dumond doesn’t add up. You watch, folks, we are going to see a lot of Wayne Dumond stories soon. Don’t forget that Mitt’s campaign hired the Republican operative with close ties to Matt Drudge, and as for the Mainstream Media–Drudge rules their world.
Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada may well be small and unrepresentative. But they, particularly Iowa and New Hampshire, are where it’s at. So, we need to make use of the advantages offered by small states.
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p>Namely: The goal now should be to make clear to the Democratic voters of these states that Dennis Kucinich is the only real Democrat in the race, and thus the only viable choice. If Kucinich came out of any much less all of the first four with a win, suddenly all the commentators, including folks here, would be turned on their ear. The race would suddenly be very different. And, a Kucinich vs. Huckaby general would be very interesting.
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p>Don’t all jump on me for naivete. It is possible, and you all know it. Unlikely, yes. Impossible, no.
I saw a rumor that Huckabee indeed told the state’s parole board that he supported the release of a convicted rapist at: http://www.theleftcoaster.com/… , there has been much dispute over it. I think it’s rather obvious that Huckabee won the debate big. It’s why he surged into first place in the polls. But I like his book” Character Makes a Difference”, which is the great insight into the life. I am impressed by his words. Here is the book I found http://dealstudio.com/searchde… , anyone who is interested in him can have a look at it!