Blake, all boy!
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Stella's first drive
Got there without a paddle!
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Tonight Liberals, Socialists, Born Agins, Radicals, Conservatives and other politically philosophical voters will come together in Iowa to let the rest of the nation know whether they are rational or insane.
One can only hope whomever they choose will be most suitable and capable in helping get us out of the mess Obama has put us in as a consequence of his effort to radically transform America.
Certainly, Iowans have had sufficient time to meet the various candidates up close and their decisions should, at the very least, be informed.That said, it does not mean their choices will ultimately prevail.
The Republicans have a wide ranging number of accomplished prospects. The Demwits have basically two misfits.
The prospect of a Republican being elected president apparently appeared to be too much of a "lay up" and thus, attracted an exceptional number of candidates which has caused more confusion and harm than good.
Time will tell who survives. (See 1 and 1a below.)
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I leave for Athens tomorrow, for a board meeting of GMOA, so this memo, which was written and posted before the caucus results are complete and announced.
Meanwhile, my computer guru is working on allowing me to return to sending my memos without restrictions placed by GOOGLE.
Stay tuned.
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Dick
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1)
After Final Weekend, Iowa Voters to Get Their Say
DES MOINES, Iowa—Finally: A time for choosing.
More than a year of campaigning comes to a head Monday night in the Hawkeye State. And with it will emerge some answers to questions that have perplexed the most practiced and prepared of political types—including several of the candidates themselves.
History of a sort will also be made, no matter the outcome. For there will now be such a thing as a Donald Trump voter. The blustery businessman has been leading national and early state polls, including here in Iowa. But his support has only been measured as a hypothetical.
Moreover, the Iowa tally will provide the first real indicator of whether this unconventional Republican frontrunner can translate the enthusiasm displayed at his notorious rallies into victory, as a new Des Moines Register-Bloomberg survey of likely caucus-goers suggests. The poll, released Saturday, found Trump ahead of Ted Cruz, 28 percent to 23 percent.
Though the well-funded Texas senator is a strong second choice in the poll, a loss here would challenge his campaign moving forward and clear a pathway to the nomination for Trump, as Cruz himself has warned.
Answers of a similar sort will be provided on the Democratic side too. Bernie Sanders is now within striking distance of Hillary Clinton, who has been organizing and campaigning in Iowa for nearly a year. The same poll found the former secretary of state edging the Vermont senator, 45 percent to 43 percent, within the margin of error.
Iowa isn’t exactly a reliable predictor of eventual nominees, as history shows. But the campaigns pulled out all the stops here over the weekend. Trump arrived at an airport hangar in Dubuque in true dramatic—almost presidential—fashion aboard his personal plane, which he opened up for kids to tour. He slammed both Cruz and Clinton, and urged his supporters to go to their precinct caucuses. Trump also went to church on Sunday with his wife—the second time he has done so this month in Iowa. Jerry Falwell Jr., who recently endorsed the billionaire, campaigned for him on Sunday, hoping to help attract evangelical support so crucial to candidates here. Trump held two rallies Sunday, and continued to lay into Cruz over his eligibility to serve as president, failure to disclose campaign funding from Goldman Sachs, and the idea that he is disliked by his colleagues.
Cruz pushed through the final leg of his 99-county tour with a cast of conservative activists like Glenn Beck and Bob Vander Plaats, along with “Duck Dynasty” star Phil Robertson and Iowa Congressman Steve King. The first-term senator, who has the most robust ground operation in the state, finds himself squeezed between Trump and fellow senator Marco Rubio, who has been on the rise heading into the caucuses. Cruz is running ads attacking both candidates as inconsistent and unreliable, particularly on issues of abortion and immigration, while pitching himself as the only true conservative in the race. “If we stand united, we will win,” he told an audience at a restaurant in Fenton.
Heidi Cruz, who has been effective helpmate introducing her husband at events around the state, sought to address concerns about his likability and also to draw contrasts between him and his opponents. She pitched the candidate as a “consistent conservative—not a campaign conservative” and asked voters to consider values and character when making their decision. She told of her husband singing her songs from Broadway musicals, taking her out for her birthday after a long campaign day, and doing homework with their two daughters.
Meanwhile, Rubio sought to undermine Cruz’s support. “We are going to unite the conservative movement,” he said during an appearance at Iowa State University in Ames. During various campaign stops throughout the weekend, Rubio pitched himself as an electable uniter who would grow the conservative movement. He has played up faith and religion on the stump and on the air, aiming to tap into evangelical support. Rubio’s campaign has also downplayed expectations, hoping to over-deliver. A third-place finish that comes close enough to Cruz and far enough from the other rivals would be considered a success for him heading into New Hampshire. Chris Christie and Jeb Bush, however, also campaigned in Iowa over the weekend and are hoping to blunt any momentum Rubio has before the Granite State primary on Feb. 9.
Both Rubio and Cruz know there are voters still deciding between them in the final hours.
“Cruz shares my values, but Rubio is more electable,” said Loren Looft, a factory worker from Armstrong who came to see Cruz speak in Ringsted. He definitely plans to caucus, but admitted he won’t make his final decision until Monday evening.
Cindy Myers, a dietician from the town of Nevada, came to hear Rubio speak in Ames but is planning to support Cruz because she considers him a fighter. “I was on the Trump train for a while, but you just aren’t sure where he’ll end up,” she said. “I kind of expect him to be the nominee. He’s very popular, and it’s OK, because he is bringing in a large group of people who haven’t voted Republican before.”
As competitive as the race is for the Republicans, Democrats find themselves with an even closer contest. Both Clinton and Sanders campaigned in various parts of the state this weekend, turning up the heat on each other.
The former secretary of state campaigned at Iowa State University on Saturday with former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords and her husband, Mark Kelly, focusing on gun laws and aiming to draw a contrast with Sanders on the issue. Bill Clinton and their daughter, Chelsea, were on hand for evening rallies intended to get out the vote.
“The stakes couldn’t be higher,” Hillary Clinton said, urging the audience to “build on the progress we’ve made.” As in 2008, she again finds herself in close competition with an unlikely insurgent who is appealing to young voters. But she appeared confident in her messaging throughout the weekend, even as Sanders seemed to be gaining momentum.
“I have learned a lot, and I believe I’ve been a better candidate,” she said of campaigning in a tightening race.
The Clinton camp has a more robust and geographically diverse ground operation in the state, which figures to serve her well as far as delegate allocation goes in the caucus format. The Sanders team hopes college students who have taken to the Democratic socialist’s campaign go home to caucus and thus expand his reach for delegates. Sanders argued throughout the weekend that if turnout is high, he will win. If not, he admitted, he won’t.
At a rally at the University of Iowa, the two-term senator used the odds as an incentive. “How would you like to make the pundits look dumb on Election Day!” he said to a boisterous crowd at the university’s Field House. Not caucusing, Sanders said, “is to allow someone else to make important decisions about your life. I think that’s dumb.” Vampire Weekend and Foster the People, along with various other musicians, played at the rally. At the end of the night, Sanders and his wife joined them on stage for a rendition of “This Land Is Your Land.”
Kamila Agi-Mejias, an art therapist from Coralville, came to the rally wearing a “Bernie” T-shirt, stickers, and a light-up sign. She was enthusiastic about caucusing for the candidate, and helped her daughter fly home to do so as well. Agi-Mejias hopes Sanders will win Iowa, but wants Clinton to win the nomination because, she believes, she is more electable and that “it’s time for a woman.” She hopes Clinton will choose Sanders as a vice president.
Several students interviewed by RCP remarked that while they would be supportive of Clinton in a general election, they were passionate about Sanders. Some were unsure whether their schedules would allow them to actually attend a caucus on Monday night.
“I always think change is good, and I feel like it’s time for maybe a slight change and not the same old politics we have,” said Noah Zouine, an engineering student at Iowa State who came to the Clinton rally but is going to caucus for Sanders. “Clinton might bring change, too, but Sanders would have more of an impact.” Brandon Jones also said he’s supportive of Sanders, but isn’t sure whether he will make it to a caucus. “He is very relatable to me,” said Jones, also an engineering major. Clinton, he said, “seems like she is piggy-backing off a lot of what Sanders says.”
Both students were not yet registered to vote, but expect to do so Monday night.
“As the saying goes, Hillary Clinton is the head and Bernie Sanders is the heart,” said Grant Freeman of Mount Vernon, Iowa, who came to see Clinton. He is undecided about which candidate he will support, but plans to caucus. “I once thought we would be best to find a candidate who could beat the Republicans. That was John Kerry and that didn’t work at all, because we didn’t go with the person we actually liked, which was Howard Dean,” he said, recalling the 2004 election.
Beside him, Linda Kautz, a music assistant from Estherville, said she is definitely caucusing for the former first lady. “She’s got the experience to take our country forward,” Kautz said while holding a sign proclaiming her support. But, she acknowledged, the race is uncomfortably close. “It’s scary, because he knows what he’s doing,” Kautz said of Sanders. “He did the campaign right, by getting a lot of younger people to back him.”
Polls show nearly 40 percent of potential voters aren’t firm in their decisions, and interviews with voters at various events, both Democratic and Republican, throughout the weekend bore that out. Iowa may not always pick presidents. But it does know how to spring a surprise. Just ask Rick Santorum.
Caitlin Huey-Burns is a national political reporter for RealClearPolitics. She can be reached at chueyburns@realclearpolitics.com.
1a)
1a)
Defining Presidential Down
If this election is so crucial, why have the front-runners been so awful?
In 2014 I wrote a book that made the case that the United States, for all of its problems, was not in decline. Now and again I have my doubts.
The results of Monday’s Iowa caucus won’t be known until after this column goes to print. But here’s what we know already about the four top contenders. No prizes for matching names to descriptions:
1) A compulsive liar with a persecution complex, a mania for secrecy, and a bald disdain for rules as they apply to lesser people.
2) A bigoted braggart with a laughable grasp of public policy and leering manners of the kind you would expect from a barroom drunk.
3) A glib moralizer who is personally detested by every single senator in his own party, never mind the other one.
4) A Sixties radical preaching warmed-over socialism to people too young to know what it was or too stupid to understand what it does.
Such are the character traits of the candidates now vying to possess the nation’s nuclear launch codes. This being a free country, they are entitled to their ambitions. This also being a democracy, we are responsible for our political choices. So how is it that we have come to choose this?
That’s been a topic of earnest commentary ever since it became clear that Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders weren’t just blips on the political horizon. The dominant explanations tend to run to the economic, sociological, technological or generational. You’re in your 50s, the recession hits, you lose your middle-income job and are waylaid by debt. You’re not going to be hired to design apps, so you wind up as a limo driver or restaurant hostess. You’re one of what columnist Stu Bykofsky has movingly described as “Throwaway Americans.”
The Donald? Why not?
There’s surely some truth to this, borne out by historical experiences from Weimar to Buenos Aires. Except life in today’s America is not remotely comparable to Germany in the 1920s or Argentina in the 1970s. There’s no hyperinflation or mass unemployment, no underground armies of left-wing revolutionaries or right-wing reactionaries. Nor is the economy worse now than it was in the 1970s, to say nothing of the 1930s or 1890s. We live in an era of mediocrity and anxiety, not collapse and tragedy.
The real difference, to adapt a line from Daniel Patrick Moynihan, is that we’ve spent the better part of a generation defining “presidential” down. There was a time when some form of military experience or outstanding civilian service was considered a prerequisite for the presidency. Or when first-term senators did not presume to run for the White House without putting in time, paying dues, making friends and authoring some significant piece of legislation. Or when conspicuous character flaws or pending legal jeopardies were automatic and irrevocable disqualifications.
But all that is in the past now, and the moment that happened can be precisely dated. It began with Bubba. It began when America made its first presidential-level accommodation with the mores of the 1960s, and when it made a self-conscious choice to redefine, and demote, the concept of character in the hierarchy of political virtues.
Jimmy Carter came to office promising never to lie; he pledged an American government “as good as its people.” Bill Clinton lied, flagrantly and frequently, and he made us complicit in his lies. With Bubba we became a nation of pseudo-sophisticates, people who believed that the mark of the discerning voter was to see through—and past—the “character” issue. What mattered were results. In the halcyon 1990s, that seemed to work.
Today’s degraded politics is partly a result of that moral accommodation. It’s also the result of an intellectual accommodation. Let’s face it: If Mr. Clinton brought dishonor to the Oval Office, George W. Bush brought shallowness to it. Presidential aspirants were once expected to deliver finely tuned debating points about Quemoy and Matsu. After W, it became pedantic to expect candidates to know the names of the leaders of India and Pakistan.
And now we have Mr. Trump, who lived through the entire Cold War without, it seems, ever hearing of the nuclear triad, or thinking about it, or being embarrassed by the thought that he’d never heard or thought of it. But he thinks he’s fit to be president, and at this writing a plurality of Republican voters seem to agree. Not to worry: President Trump will take that triad, add a prong, make it a nuclear fork, and stab our enemies to death with it. Just you watch, people.
Now we are at the start of an electoral season that Americans say is of the utmost importance even as they make the most flippant choice of front-runners. And while a few thousand voters in Iowa may not be tantamount to the will of the American people, they aren’t immaterial to it, either.
Sober up, America. We’re a republic only for as long as we can keep it.
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