[Iowa-dx] God article on caucuses/popular vote/delegates

[Stephen Tews]

there is one problem with the national delegates mentioned here. they
are not abslute since they won't actually be chosen until the district
and state conventions.  the numbers here are only "projections" based
on this caucuses stated preferences.  we know how "projectiions" have
warped the results of elections before so don't give these too much
credence.


--- "Hart, Holly J" <holly-hart@uiowa.edu> wrote:

>
http://www.press-citizen.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080105/OPINION/801050304/1018/OPINION
> 
> Note the second part, especially.  This shows up how "retail
> politics" (here meaning the kind where the people actually engage and
> decide something) is overtaken by other interests.  Although the
> delegate count per states is set via population and congressional
> districts, not necessarily intended to be unfair initially, you can
> see how it's working now....
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Saturday, January 5, 2008
> 
> Iowa wins political play of the week
> 
> 
> 
> Jesse Tangkhpanya
> 
> 
> 
> This week Iowa saw the largest caucus turnout in its history. Jan. 3
> wrapped up a year's worth of campaigning by almost 20 candidates, and
> ended the campaigns of Senators Joe Biden and Chris Dodd.
> 
> The Iowa Republican results greatly surprised me. I had anticipated a
> Huckabee win but not by so great of a margin. Huckabee didn't just
> beat Romney here, he slaughtered him. Romney had much more money as
> well as a carefully laid down organizational structure that he had
> been building for a year. On top of that, over the course of the past
> month, Romney and his allies launched a coordinated attack on
> Huckabee's record as governor of Arkansas. Meanwhile, former Sen.
> Fred Thompson was on Huckabee's other side, criticizing Huckabee's
> stances, everything from his immigration policy to his foreign policy
> credentials. Yet after all was said and done, he emerged out of
> caucus night stronger than ever.
> 
> A Huckabee win is also very good news for former New York City Mayor
> Rudy Giuliani and Arizona Sen. John McCain, who both seem to feel as
> if they can derail Huckabee more easily than Romney. They view
> Huckabee as a Pat Robertson candidate who easily can be stopped in
> New Hampshire or some of the bigger states.
> 
> The Iowa Democratic Results did not surprise me. On the eve of caucus
> night I had been privately telling people that Sen. Barack Obama
> would win, former Sen. John Edwards would take second and Sen.
> Hillary Clinton would be third. Higher voter turnout meant good news
> for Obama, and every single indicator pointed towards massive voter
> turnout. In the end, Iowa voters voted with their hearts by
> overwhelmingly choosing Obama as the winner of the Iowa Democratic
> caucus, with Edwards barely edging out Clinton for second place. As
> of noon Friday, the results show Edwards receiving 29.82 percent to
> Clinton's 29.42 percent.
> 
> National delegate count
> 
> Interestingly enough, what really matters aren't the statewide
> delegate counts, the percentages or voter turnout. What matters is
> the number of national delegates Iowa Democrats will be sending to
> the national convention -- all the numbers before it simply determine
> how many national delegates each person gets. Obama won 16 out of
> Iowa's 57 national delegates. Clinton actually got 15 -- just one
> more over Edwards who got 14. The reason why Clinton beat Edwards in
> the national delegate count is a true testament to Iowa's complicated
> caucus system. Think of Al Gore in 2000 when he won the popular vote
> but lost the Electoral College.
> 
> The big win for Iowa is not a lock win for Obama. In the race for
> national delegate counts, he still trails Clinton by almost 3-1.
> Right now, Clinton has 169, Obama has 66, and Edwards has 47. The
> reason why Clinton has more delegates than anyone else right now is
> because she has more super delegates on her side. That's right, think
> superman. Super delegates are elected and party officials who are
> automatic delegates to the national convention. So in a sense,
> endorsements can matter, depending on whether or not you have a
> delegate vote behind it.
> 
> On the flip side, this isn't a guarantee of good news for Clinton
> either. When John Kerry surprised everyone by defeating Howard Dean
> in 2004, the Dean camp thought they still could hang on because they
> still had more overall super delegates on their side. But what they
> didn't factor in was the massive buzz created after a Kerry win,
> which propelled him to win nearly every other Democratic primary
> after Iowa. Kerry went on to clinch the nomination, and for all the
> money and buzz that was Dean, went on to fail without winning a
> single state. The good news for Obama people is that Obama is no John
> Kerry or Howard Dean. He will play his Iowa cards wisely, heading
> into New Hampshire with his head held high and the wind on his back.
> 
> Thursday's biggest winners
> 
> And finally, the biggest winner of the night was not a candidate. The
> Iowa caucus had the largest turnout in its history. An initial
> projection for Democrats showed that 220,588 caucused compared to
> 124,000 in 2004. High-end predictions for that race were around the
> 150,000 range. Turnout was also up on the Republican side, with
> 114,000 caucusing as opposed to 87,666 in 2000. Iowa has 2 million
> registered voters, which means that approximately one in six Iowan's
> caucused. That's amazing turnout for a caucus.
> 
> Iowa voters proved to the nation that we do care and that we do vote
> here. We also proved to them that retail politics work. Candidates
> like Huckabee, who had basically no money and no prospects have a
> chance here. They can get outspent by double digits and still emerge
> victorious. We also proved that the outsider candidate can beat the
> establishment candidate.
> 
> This might be the last time we're first in the nation again, but what
> Iowans accomplished as a whole on Thursday make it harder to argue
> against stripping us of our status. Iowa leaders will go into the
> party nomination battles in the future armed with our turnout results
> to make the case again for Iowa to be first in the nation.
> 
> That's why Iowa caucus-goers get the political play of the week.
> 
> Jesse Tangkhpanya is a recent graduate of the University of Iowa with
> degrees in political science and journalism. The last political play
> winners were Sen. John McCain and Rep. Ron Paul.
> 
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