Posted by DEAN SKIP RUTHERFORD – State Senator Jeff Smith (D-Missouri) is the subject of the documentary film “Can Mr. Smith Get To Washington Anymore?” The film was about his strong but unsuccessful campaign for Congress. Jeff came to the Cliinton School when we showed the film and subsequently was elected to the Missouri State Senate. As an elected official and educator, he closely follows politics. While he is supporting Barack Obama, his Iowa election analysis, as I anticipated, is both interesting and informative:
Jeff Smith’s Predictions and Analysis:
Democrats:
Obama 33
Edwards 32
HRC 26
I’ll preface this by saying that I still feel like any of the three could win. But right now Edwards seems to have some late momentum, drawing much bigger-than-expected crowds across the state and benefitting from the December dust-ups between Obama and Clinton. Obama had tremendous momentum for a month or so following his speech at the Jefferson-Jackson dinner in early November, but the aforementioned sparring with Clinton appears to have turned off some of the undecideds. Edwards–who started the attacks on Clinton last summer and escalated in the early fall–somehow seems to have emerged in the public perception as the positive, above-the-fray candidate, which is important in a multi-candidate field since some portion of the mud candidates sling inevitably ricochets back onto the attacker.
Obama has also been drawing huge and energetic crowds. The $64,000 question, of course, is whether or not young people will turn out for the caucus. There’s been a candidate nearly every cycle–from Teddy Kennedy to Gary Hart to Bill Bradley to Howard Dean, who claims that he’ll be able to dramatically broaden the caucus electorate. So far, they’ve mostly flopped. And so for Obama, the scariest internal number in yesterday’s Des Moines Register poll showing him with a clear lead had to be the 73% of his supporters who had never attended a caucus.
The good news for Obama is that young people are probably more resistant to extreme cold than older folks. The weather is expected to be in the high teens and low 20s throughout most of Iowa Thursday night, which does not bode well for the Clinton campaign, which is dominant among senior women but lagging badly among the under-40 set.
Another interesting wrinkle helping Edwards is the second-choice vote–the supporters of any candidate who does not reach the 15% viability threshold in a precinct are able (but not required) to switch to their second-choice candidate, presuming that he/she is viable in that precinct. I think the first choice Democrats made in this race was whether or not they would be with Clinton–the established brand. Those who decided to look at other options are, I believe, unlikely to gravitate towards Clinton now. Given surveys showing that Edwards is the most frequent second choice pick of other candidates, he stands to gain substantially in the second round of caucuses. Be on the lookout for both formal and informal deals during the second-choice voting. Dennis Kucinich, for instance, has asked his supporters to switch to Obama in the second round, which will make a difference in places like Jefferson County (where the county seat of Fairfield is home to the Maharishi School of the Age of Enlightenment, and over a quarter of the residents practice Trascendental Meditation, like UFO-believer Kucinich). Other informal “deals” may occur: for instance, if Clinton is not viable in a certain precinct, her precinct captain may encourage their supporters to support Edwards over Obama since he is thought to be less equipped (financially and organizationally) to compete with her in the cross-country 25-primary sprint through February 5th.
If turnout is very high, Obama probably wins. It means his disproportionate share of first-time caucusgoers have indeed decided to brave the cold and spend a couple hours talking politics with their neighbors. If turnout is low, and only the usual caucusgoers turn out, Edwards, who has the lowest proportion of first-time caucusgoers among his supporters, probably wins. Clinton’s fate depends less on overall turnout and more on the generational breakdown of the electorate; to win she needs a strong turnout among seniors and among first-time female caucusgoers over 30.
Republicans:
Romney 32
Huckabee 27
McCain 15
Thompson 12
Giuliani 7
Huckabee has shown in the last couple weeks that his campaign isn’t ready for prime time, both substantively (primarily on foreign policy) and politically (the press conference debacle involving his refusal to attack Romney). Unable to raise money for most of the year, Huckabee has a third-rate staff and little formal grass-roots organization. How well the home schoolers and church groups can turn people out for him without the oversight of a campaign infrastructure remains to be seen. As discussed above, getting people out to caucus (for as long as two hours on a frigid night) is different than getting people to vote. It takes much more infrastructure, something that Romney has worked meticulously for over a year to develop. Though his policy shifts and inconsistencies have plagued Romney, most Reagan-style conservatives prefer him to Huckabee, who they find unacceptable on fiscal issues.
Working against Romney is the fact that some more savvy McCainiacs may caucus for Huckabee in an attempt to stop Romney from winning Iowa and building up a head of steam going into NH, where McCain needs a win. However, since Republicans do not have to meet a viability threshold, there is no second-choice voting, which will mitigate the number of sophisticated caucusgoers engaging in the above strategy.
McCain has been racking up newspaper endorsements and his comeback story is impressive, but like Huckabee he has little organization in Iowa – and few Republican caucusgoers are likely to look to the Register for advice.
The knock on Fred Thompson from the start was that he lacked the fire in the belly. Well, he’s settled any debate on that. The day before the caucus, Thompson has one event scheduled in Iowa. (Romney has seven.) Enough said.
Giuliani is ignoring Iowa and focusing on Florida as his slingshot into the February 5th primaries. Accordingly, he won’t get out of single digits.
Like Edwards, Romney can’t win the nomination without winning Iowa, and he knows it. That’s why he’s gone all out to build a durable organization, and now he must execute. Say what you will about Romney (and I don’t have much good to say myself), but if there is one thing he has proven in his life, from Bain Capital to the Olympics to his presdiential campaign, the guy knows how to execute. That’s why I think he comes from behind to win on Thursday.