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My personal musings about anything that gets on my radar screen--heavily dominated by politics.

2008-01-05

Iowa, After Some Thought Time 

After letting the results from last night soak in for a while, I've added a few insights into my thought process.


A few months ago, I wrote that I thought this election would be about W., except that his influence would dictate that the mood of the electorate would be to pick competence and obvious intellect--a mood of contrast. Based on last night, I would have to say I was wrong.


Or, perhaps, I simply didn't understand Iowa (and, by extension, New Hampshire). In those two states, the prevailing wisdom in the political world is that it is all about "retail politics"--Mitt has basically lived in Iowa for the last year, Huckabee has been behind more pulpits in the last year than Father Guido Sarducci, Obama has served more cookies to the PTA than Marie Barone, and . . . well, you get the idea. In a scenario such as that, the dispassionate analysis that I thought would prevail gets overwhelmed by the personal touch. And nobody is better at the personal touch than Huckabee and Obama.


Whether that will continue to be the case beyond New Hampshire remains to be seen. I would guess that, the sooner the contests start piling up, the sooner the electorate will come to its senses. Which plays right into Rudy's hands--he'll be arriving on the scene just when those contests start piling up.

Secondly, I would have to say that if I were ever running for President, I might be inclined to skip Iowa and New Hampshire altogether--just on principle. And I'm an evangelical Christian. I just think that the religious voters in Iowa demonstrated that they should not be trusted to make serious political decisions for the country. "Either a pastor or a politician be--NOT BOTH"


And, lastly, I have to say it: if there is anybody in the world quite as happy as Rudy is about the way last night played out, it would have to be Osama bin Laden, the Mullahs in Iran, and Kim Jong Il. Is that unfair? Given the statements Huckabee and Obama have made in the past, I think its safe to say that our favorite cast of characters will NOT be intimidated by the American President if it ends up being one of these two.


For more thoughts on Iowa, check out the rest of the RMA:

Mount Virtus
The Daily Blogster
Exvigilare
Thinking Right
Posted by: Michael / 1/05/2008 12:49:00 AM

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