Iowa: What Can We Learn From 2004?
Conventional wisdom: Iowa caucuses reduce the field to the top three candidates.
On 19 January 2004, Iowa proved the death knell for the presidential aspirations of Rep. Richard A. Gephardt, from the neighboring state of Missouri. Gephardt had won Iowa in 1988, but the nomination eventually went to Massachusetts Governor Michael S. Dukakis, who lost to George Bush the Elder. In 2004, Gephardt bowed out the day after the event, having placed fourth with 11% of the delegates. He pledged his support to Sen. John Kerry (MA).
Former (five time) Vermont Governor Howard Dean was another casualty of Iowa, but for a different reason. Dean, a relative unknown from a small state, had captured the imagination of Americans disgruntled with America's entanglement in Iraq. (He had also captured the endorsement of former VP Al Gore.)
Dean placed third (with 18%, he had been polling at 24% the night before), but his post-Iowa downfall was not the vote: it was media-induced. At a post-event rally, he was leading supporters like a cheerleader, shouting to be heard over the noise of the crowd, insisting the campaign was not over:
Not only are we going to New Hampshire, Tom Harkin, we're going to South Carolina and Oklahoma and Arizona and North Dakota and New Mexico, and we're going to California and Texas and New York … And we're going to South Dakota and Oregon and Washington and Michigan, and then we're going to Washington, D.C., to take back the White House! Yeaararh!!!
However, the microphone capturing the event for TV filtered the crowd noise. While Dean could hardly be heard in the room full of thousands of cheering supporters, the TV feed -- sans crowd noise -- made him sound like a mad-man. Almost a month later, CNN would perform a mea culpa and apologize: immediately after Iowa the clip was shown 633 times on broadcast news stations (not counting talk shows, local TV and radio).
CBS reporter Eric Salzman speaks to the challenge facing candidates with every public event, placing the blame not on the gatekeeper (TV executives) but the campaign for its naivete:
The Iowa speech has become a problem because Dean's aides either failed to recognize or failed to convince their candidate that when he speaks to a roomful of people, he is not speaking to a roomful of people: he is speaking to a television camera.
That camera might pick up an entire speech, but it will only disseminate sound bites; quick, interesting, entertaining, news-making sound bites... [Technological determinism at work here to help deflect responsibility: the camera disseminates no edited feed without human intervention, ie, choice]
Dean's Iowa speech demonstrates in one clear cut example how unprepared his campaign was for the transition from the early days of fluffy feature stories to the days of microscopic scrutiny and unrelenting news cycle repetition. And now they're paying the price.
This intense micro-scrutiny (the "gotcha" moment) is turning elections away from information-rich events designed to help citizens become knowledgeable in their civic duty and into a modern day "bread and circus." I'm sure Plato is silently nodding his head, his worst fears of democracy (mob rule) playing out for all to see, if only we would open our eyes.
It is much easier for a candidate to play to populism and the camera than to shed light on how he or she might handle the challenges of the White House: how to bring the national debt under control before it swallows all hope for our children and grandchildren ... how to respond to climate change (regardless of its origin) and reduce dependence on foreign oil, all without crippling the economy ... how to transition the economy, and our support services, as boomers enter retirement ... how to control run-away health care costs ... and, yes, how to disentangle ourselves from Iraq ... all the while attempting to unite a county that seems split in half, with too many people seemingly more interested in whether their leader attends church and what's going on in their neighbor's home (bedroom, computer room, smoking room, refreshment center) than in a reasoned approach to real problems.
Color me pessimistic today: maybe it's Seattle's gray.
Post-Script: Crystal Ball Gazing
This is the first time that both parties have had competitive races the same election cycle. Candidates need to either win, place or show:
- 1972, winner: undecided (McGovern was 3rd)
- 1976, winner: undecided; (Carter was 2nd)
- 1980, winner: Bush (Reagan was 2nd)
- 1984, winner: Mondale
- 1988, winner: Gephardt (Dukakis was 3rd)
- 1992, winner: Harkin (Clinton was 4th)
- 1996: winner: Dole
- 2000: winners: Bush and Gore
- 2004: winner: Kerry
In 2004, the final Democratic tally in Iowa was Sen. John Kerry (MA), 38%; Sen. John Edwards (NC), 32%; ex-Gov. Howard Dean (VT), 18%; Rep. Dick Gephardt (MO), 11%; and Rep. Dennis Kucinich (OH), 1.3%. [Right before 2004, NBC/WSJ poll: Dean (24%), Clark (19%), Lieberman (12%), Gephardt (11%), and Kerry (7%).] Horse-race polls aren't that helpful when it's also important to know who is someone's #2 choice.
Deborah White makes a compelling case for Barack Obama's win, citing several second tier candidate pledge of support in the second round of voting tonight.
I'm unwilling to forecast beyond the obvious: the top three Democrats will be (in alphabetical order) Clinton, Edwards and Obama. I don't see any of the second tier candidates pulling a surprise in the home stretch; I think voters have a pragmatic streak (hence Dean's loss in 2004, relative to polling data) and want a candidate who is electable. The top three Rs will be Giuliani Huckabee, McCain and Romney.
Til tomorrow.
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