At long last, the voting has begun. This week, Iowa voters shocked the world by giving Obama and Huckabee clear victories. Then the candidates rushed to New Hampshire where they had a debate with an unusual format. For a change, they actually debated each other a bit!
So let’s cut right to the weekly grades (in order of most likely to succeed in getting nominated):
THE REPUBLICANS
Mike Huckabee:
Huckabee has been underestimated from the start. As an under-funded, evangelical candidate from a small state, he has demonstrated a gift for connecting with voters with an unvarnished message of economic populism and social conservatism.
But the trick for Huckabee is expanding his support outside his core evangelical base. New Hampshire and many of the upcoming primaries have a much smaller percentage of evangelical voters than Iowa. In addition, the establishment GOP distrusts Huckabee’s economic populism and fear he is unelectable in the general election. Indeed, some of the criticism of Huckabee suggests surprise that the evangelical base would presume to demand power – as if they should be happy being taken for granted by the GOP in perpetuity. In a sense, Huckabee’s success represents the splintering of the Reagan coalition comprised of evangelical conservatives, Wall Street, and the country club elites. Where will Huckabee’s supporters go if he doesn’t win? Well, if the GOP nominee is someone who the evangelical base doesn’t like or trust (like Giuliani or Romney), we may have a repeat of 2006 where they simply stay home.
From here, Huckabee won’t win New Hampshire. But if he beats expectations by coming in a close third behind McCain and Romney, or shocks everyone by coming in second, he may become unstoppable. He is already doing very well in South Carolina and Florida and could also do well in Michigan, where fellow evangelical Pat Robertson was successful years ago.
Grade: A
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John McCain:
McCain finished the Iowa caucus in fourth place, a hair behind Fred Thompson. Not so good, but he really didn’t campaign in the state very hard. But like Hillary’s poor showing, his fourth place showing suggested that the Bhutto assassination did not have a significant effect on the race – it didn’t shift the focus from “change” to “experience.”
But McCain has to be disappointed. While he knew he had no chance to win Iowa, he wanted to finish at least a solid third. It’s embarrassing to finish behind Fred Thompson, a candidate who barely campaigned at all in the state and who lately looks groggy and confused. And now with Obama’s victory, even McCain’s position in New Hampshire is in jeopardy. Like Iowa, New Hampshire permits independent voters to vote in the state primary. If Obama had lost, perhaps New Hampshire independent voters would have been inclined to vote for McCain rather than a weakened Obama. But Obama won decisively, particularly among Iowa independents, and now polls show him doing very well among New Hampshire independents. While Romney has been weakened by his loss in Iowa and his debate performance in New Hampshire, McCain could be hurt if a groundswell of independent voters desert him for Obama. It’s becoming a war of attrition — who will be hurt more by the events of the last week — McCain or Romney?
As for the debate, McCain’s performance was mixed. On the positive side, he got a few zingers in against Romney, as did others. But at age 71, it’s difficult for McCain to be the personification of change, particularly in contrast to the young visionary from Illinios. Substantively, the focus on McCain’s failed immigration bill in the debate also hurt. McCain was on the defensive for quite a while as he tried to parse a definition of amnesty. As for his one claim to fame among GOP voters — his advocacy of the surge — his rivals tried very hard to dilute the significance of his support by claiming, with some revisionism, that they were equally supportive of the surge from the beginning.
Two factors remain in McCain’s favor. First, many in the MSM absolutely adore the guy and will continue to fawn over him for so long as he is in the race. Second, his popularity among independents and even some Democrats makes him the GOP’s best chance in the general election, if he can only survive the GOP primary season.
Grade: B-
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Mitt Romney:
Romney had another bad week. He was supposed to win Iowa but he lost decisively. While he tried to discount the significance of the loss, the fact is he spent more money and time in Iowa than any other GOP candidate. Romney expected and needed victory there. Now his back is against the wall. If he can’t win in his own backyard of New Hampshire, he may be irreparably damaged. He has in his corner the GOP establishment that clings to him as their last great hope to uphold the George W. Bush legacy. They will fight and claw to prop him up, even if it means eating one of their own, Huckabee. Doing so means violating Reagan’s 11th Amendment, but the establishment GOP is becoming desperate. If Romney loses, their only back-up is Giuliani, who has been steadily declining for weeks and was special-ordered to take on Hillary, not Obama.
Romney’s lesson from his Iowa loss seems to be to appropriate Obama’s message of change. This caused McCain in the debate to chuckle that Romney is indeed the candidate of change, given his proclivity to change his positions opportunistically. Romney cannot switch from being the establishment candidate to the change candidate like he’s putting on freshly pressed khakis. It’s not going to fly, particularly when he insists Bush can do no wrong. Huckabee was shrewd in the debate to contrast himself to Romney by saying he’s not running for George Bush’s third term. Huckabee’s remark made clear that he’s willing to take the risks of being a change candidate, while Romney is the status quo.
Grade: C-
Update (1/7): Our friends at TPM offer this snapshot of Romney’s rough weekend.
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Rudy Giuliani:
Giuliani is drifting into irrelevancy. He basically skipped Iowa, and the results reflect his neglect. He’s taking a similar approach to New Hampshire. Some observers suggest this is because both states require the kind of retail politics that Giuliani detests. He doesn’t want to press the flesh, answer questions from real voters and work tirelessly from hamlet to hamlet. Rather, he wants to run slick TV ads and make staged speeches from behind a podium. Now he must win Florida where he has invested most of his time and money in recent weeks. The problem is Huckabee didn’t get the memo and is leading in Florida, while Giuliani is drifting downward. If this trend continues, Giuliani may not even win the GOP primaries in New York and New Jersey, where he is naturally expected to win easily.
Giuliani’s other problem with relevancy, following Iowa, is that he was custom-ordered to combat Hillary. The idea was to have an epic rematch of the 2000 senate race in New York, and he had surrounded himself with many veterans of that campaign for this reason. Giuliani’s nastiness might have been almost appealing next to Hillary’s often steely demeanor. But now Obama could be the Democratic nominee, presenting Giuliani with a very different kind of opponent than Hillary. Giuliani’s nasty, partisan and arrogant approach to governing would contrast unfavorably with Obama’s hopeful message of change and reconciliation (not to mention Obama’s beautiful family of four contrasting with Rudy’s three marriages, adultery scandal and alienated children). In short, Obama makes Rudy the wrong guy at the wrong time.
Grade: D+
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THE DEMOCRATS
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Barack Obama:
I completely underestimated just how special Obama is. Just as Bill Clinton towered over his rivals in the 90s in terms of sheer political talent, Obama looks to be uniquely talented among today’s field, perhaps of historical proportions. I also overestimated the potential negative effect of the Bhutto assassination on his campaign. Now many admirers who feared he could never win a 98%-caucasian state like Iowa will come out and vote their convictions. Substantively, his efforts to include Republicans and independents in his coalition succeeded in Iowa and seems to be gaining traction elsewhere, in contrast to the more combative tone of John Edwards. After 8 years of the divisive Bush administration and two years of partisan gridlock on Capitol Hill, his approach is tapping into a latent demand.
For now, his prospective opponents are paralyzed. The GOP candidates, when given an opportunity by Charles Gibson to criticize him, largely declined. Sure, Fred Thompson called him a liberal (oh, the horror), but Huckabee and Ron Paul spoke positively of him and claimed to be surfing his same wave of generational change. Sorry guys, he’s Hawaiian and knows how to surf, and you don’t. As the right wing National Review Online put it: “Okay, you write the piece that takes him down. You take this lovely and inspiring story of racial reconciliation and torch it all to hell. You write the expose of the second coming of Martin Luther King.”
Obama’s debate performance was good enough, although he looked exhausted (understandably). But he made no gaffes and came across as presidential. With little time left before the voting, that’s all he had to do. ABC’s George Stephanopoulos was critical after the debate about Obama’s remark to Hillary that she is “likeable enough,” but after reviewing that part of the debate carefully, you can see he has a small smile as he utters the words. I think it was meant to be playful teasing, not a nasty dig. By contrast, I think the MSM has misinterpreted Hillary’s remark that preceded Obama’s comment. When told she was viewed as less likable than Obama by New Hampshire voters, she responded by saying her feelings were hurt, but that she would “find a way to go on.” This was pure Hillary sarcasm, not a moment of humility and vulnerability as some in the MSM perceived. She doesn’t care if people don’t like her – she buried such feelings under scar tissue long ago.
Lastly, as the GOP candidates acknowledged, Obama’s success despite Clinton’s argument that she is more experienced may serve to inoculate Obama in the future, because Iowa voters have decided that they are comfortable with his record and prefer his message of change. If Obama beats her again in New Hampshire, the “rolling the dice” attack will be dropped permanently by Obama’s primary opponents. Of course, the general election is a whole new ballgame.
Let me add one last note about Michelle Obama, who joined the campaign trail in New Hampshire. She is likeable, bright, persuasive and very genuine. This weekend her appearance at a small gathering in New Hampshire was televised by CSPAN as she spoke about being raised on her father’s modest blue collar income and attending the neighborhood public schools in Chicago before she was later accepted at Princeton. She was convincing when she described herself and Barack as regular folks dealing with the same issues as many American families. When she was done, an audience of all ages (although probably 98% white) was putty in her hands, greeting her with warm hugs and supportive remarks. She exudes a calm authenticity like Barack. Perhaps reflecting a generational change from Hillary’s era — a post-feminist sensibility — she seemed very comfortable describing herself as a mom and a professional, without a definitional tension between the two. She would likely contrast very favorably to the GOP nominee’s spouse, presumably Janet Huckabee, Cindy McCain, Ann Romney or Judy Giuliani.
Grade: A
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Hillary Clinton:
What does it mean when the head of your campaign is a pollster and he is completely ambushed by a resounding defeat? It means your campaign’s leadership is clueless. The problem is, Hillary’s campaign manager/pollster, Mark Penn, works very closely with Hillary and she personally approves every ad, message and strategic decision of the campaign. So unless she is prepared to fire herself, a change in campaign leadership won’t make a difference. She never expected to finish third behind John Edwards. The campaign is furious at Bill Richardson, who they believe put her in third place by sending his supporters to Obama. The Clintons believe they “made” Richardson by appointing him to the UN and as DOE secretary, and you don’t cross the Clintons.
In the debate, Edwards and Richardson both seemed to side with Obama over Hillary. Edwards pressed her buttons when he referred to her as the status quo. It brought out her sense of entitlement, and she declared, contemptuously, that change is “hard work” (implying that Edwards and, in particular, Obama have not done hard work as she has). She proceeded to angrily list a few of her memorized accomplishments benefiting New Hampshire residents — as if to say “how dare you question the magnanimous acts of the queen.” It was not an good moment for her. Indeed, there was a split screen with Edwards when she was making her angry statement, and you could see Edwards was holding back a smile as she ranted. Her tone triggered memories of her condescending comment in the 90s about how she could have stayed home and baked cookies instead of pursuing her career. Given that the stakes for her in the debate could not have been higher, she blew it right there.
Grade: D
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John Edwards:
As with Romney, winning second place isn’t going to get you gold medals. His hard-edged populist message has a lot of appeal with disaffected voters, but Edwards’s problem is he is not the best messenger for Joe Trippi’s message, his campaign manager who seems to be taking a page from his playbook for Howard Dean’s campaign that he ran in 2004. He’s a former DLC moderate, Southern senator who, like Hillary, voted in favor of authorizing war in Iraq. He also had a very hopeful message four years ago. Now he has moved to the left with a sharper edge, vowing to bring a fight to greedy, powerful corporations. Frankly, his description of his battle with vague enemies seems a little cartoon-like and fake, and apparently most voters in Iowa recognized that.
Now Edwards faces defeat in New Hampshire, and is unlikely to win in his birthplace, South Carolina. Indeed, it’s hard to point to a state he will win. His only hope is to knock out Hillary and remain as the alternative to Obama, should he falter. However, it will be tricky as a Southern white man for Edwards to go negative on Obama. It will be interesting to see how Edwards navigates that line if he finds himself in a two man race. Surely the GOP will be watching closely.
Grade: B+
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5 responses so far ↓
missivesfromsuburbia // January 7, 2008 at 9:20 pm
As a woman and a liberal, I feel completely let down by Hillary. She was not my first choice, but I certainly would have happily voted her into the White House if the opportunity arose. Now I fear if it came down to her and McCain, I would vote for her as the lesser of two evils. As a woman, she has been held to a higher standard. Fair? No. But those are the rules, and she failed to play the game by the rules. She has turned every bit as nasty as the GOP, and it’s not even possible to put her on the ticket as the VP as this point, because she’s positioned herself in such radical opposition to the boys in the race. Tsk, tsk, Mrs. Clinton. You’ve only managed to reinforce the stereotype that women in power can’t be smart and aggressive — they can only be bitches.
You have to admit John Edwards is still the hottest guy running for office and would be the best looking president since JFK. Not enough of a reason to vote for him? I beg to differ.
Durano Lawayan // January 8, 2008 at 7:30 am
RKR, I gotta hand it to you, you are really into this political contest. The amount of work here is quite impressive.
Rudy Giuliani’s run will decline drastically as Hillary Clinton’s fortunes are eroded systematically by the Obama wave. As it is, you are right in saying that Rudy has been rendered irrelevant. Mitt Romney will continue to get support from the GOP since he is their best bet to preserve the gains (Read: greed for their interests) of a Bush “3rd Term”. His good looks and Kennedy copycat ways may fool some voters. Florida will register an upset in favor of Romney in what is potentially a tweaking of methods that caused the Gore defeat 8 years ago. Huckabee’s run will be remembered as a pleasant Iowa surprise and end there. Thompson would probably back off from the race after New Hampshire. McCain will win New Hampshire and continue to be a contender. He is the sentimental favorite, even of the MSM, but his age and endurance will not be overlooked by voters. I agree that he would look puny as a change agent compared to the Illinois Senator as well as Edwards. Ron Paul has the right track when he talks of America’s Foreign Policies, but he is ignored and dismissed as a ranting old fart, even by the GOP. The close race between Romney and McCain may move the GOP to select them both as its Presidential and Vice-Presidential bets, to downplay the Mormon issue and the 3rd term tag. If McCain agrees, as VP, he would have sold his ideals to the empire of the dark forces. Regardless of what GOP does, I still see a Democrat victory in 2008.
Hillary’s problem is that she can’t let go of her Iron Man persona and it appears she has done away with her feelings a long time ago. Claiming she has worked on change for 35 years while her younger opponents have no such experience raises the question: “Your methods must have failed because why are we in this mess?” Obama dismissed this claim effectively by saying you can’t have the same players, using the same methods, under the same rules, and expect a different result. Attitudes and orientations change and Hillary’s team fails to connect because of their insistence on their kind of combative approach and fighting stance with steely personalities in a man’s world. This is her most tragic error. By positioning herself as more man than woman, she is rejecting herself as a woman in particular and all women in general. That you have to be more than a man to be President, in contrast to Michelle’s being a wife and mother, is denying the very essence of what she is supposed to represent. Americans are tired of war. Vietnam, Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Iraq II, the generations involved in this war still live; and Obama’s consensus approach is a change that is believable if only for its logic, even without the beautifully worded rhetoric.
Obama’s uncanny ability, through his message of hope have inspired and excited the youth which now form the core of his formidable machinery on the ground, on top of their superior knowledge of the internet that nets them access to thousands of voters who would have otherwise remained untapped or would have dismissed elections as an exercise in futility.
Obama is creating a wave, an unstoppable wave that will take America out of the mess its older generation has buried it, into the dawning of a new face and image for the US to its foreign allies and the world in general. I hope.
Edwards is expected to collapse from the race after New Hampshire.
I’ve said enough. –Durano, done!
Momo Fali // January 8, 2008 at 11:33 pm
I really can’t even believe how badly Hillary blew it. She let her emotions get the better of her at a time when I was hoping the public wouldn’t jump to conclusions about her, and about women in general. Now everyone will be saying how they knew a woman would crack under pressure, how she’s hormonal, and menopausal, and whatever else they can come up with for an excuse not to put a woman in the White House. You’d think she’d of known that and kept her cool.
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Ironically, some polling analysts believe her “near-cry” actually helped her with male voters, because it softened her steely persona that bothered them. It was probably the debate and the “iron my shirts!” heckler that got women voters angry and to side with her. Rumors that the heckler was later seen getting into a limousine with Mark Penn and Ann Lewis are completely unfounded!
-RK Ref
Durano Lawayan // January 9, 2008 at 3:06 pm
I guess the near breakdown brought out her human side and made her a real person. She also said she “listened to them” and other connecting phrases and statements.
She remains a contender in my book.
–Durano, done!
BuzzeeDad // January 13, 2008 at 6:08 am
Thanks for the education, as I am shamefully ignorant on all things politics. Mainly it’s because I see our political system as one that swallows up ideas. Too many checks and balances. I liken it to trying to spice up the ocean by dumping a bottle of hot sauce into it. No matter how potent that bottle is, it still gets dwarfed by the massive ocean, thus rendering it useless. Pessimistic, I know.