WHAT HAPPENS IN IOWA, TRADITIONALLY STAYS IN IOWA
I originally wrote this piece for this past Friday’s TV editorial for RTV 6. With the New Hampshire Primary just a couple days away, I thought it was worth repeating here.
Before anyone gets too excited or too depressed about the Iowa caucus victories for Barack Obama or Mike Huckabee and losses for Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romeny, allow me to sprinkle a little rain on your parade and add some sunshine to your cloudy day.
A win in Iowa doesn’t mean you will win your party’s nomination for the Presidency. Just look back at Bob Dole in 1988 or Tom Harkin in 1992. And to be honest if you lose Iowa in a contested primary, I argue you’re not only more likely to not only win your party’s nomination but also the Presidency: Jimmy Carter in 1976, Reagan in 1980, George H.W. Bush in 1988 and Bill Clinton in 1992.
Now that doesn’t mean Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney can fully count on history as past indicators of future performance. They both spent a lot of time and money to build an organization in Iowa and this is a major setback on the road to New Hampshire.
What should scare Hillary are the independents that came out strongly for Barack because there are a lot of them in New Hampshire and what should scare Romney is that John McCain is running strong in the Granite state and he may deliver the knockout blow to his multi-million dollar campaign.
This is just the first round folks. And there are a lot more rounds to go until Election Day. The Huckaboom could become a Huckabust and Hillary could find a way to get out from between Barack and a hard place. We’ll be watching.
