Obamamentum?
Mort Kondracke writing at Roll Call (via Real Clear Politics), looks at some numbers - and the quirkiness of the Iowa Caucus - and thinks there is a real possibility of Hillary Clinton losing the state and the nomination.
Yet, defeats in Iowa and New Hampshire could burn through the firewalls and re-create the dynamic of 1984, where the establishment candidate, former Vice President Walter Mondale, almost lost the nomination to fresh-face challenger Sen. Gary Hart (Colo.).
Mondale pulled it out only because his staff succeeded in convincing the media that Georgia and Alabama were the key contests on Super Tuesday. Mondale won them, though Hart won bigger states like Florida, Massachusetts and Washington, and even bigger primaries later in Ohio and California.
To the extent that polling is reliable in a caucus state like Iowa, indications are that Clinton is in deep trouble. The topline ABC/Washington Post poll results showing Obama with 30 percent, Clinton with 26 percent and former Sen. John Edwards (N.C.) with 22 mean less than other factors.
Specifically, the polls indicate that second-tier candidates like New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, Sens. Joe Biden (Del.) and Chris Dodd (Conn.) and Rep. Dennis Kucinich (Ohio) split up 25 percent of the vote among them.
The way the Iowa caucuses work, after a first round of balloting, candidates receiving less than 15 percent support get dropped on subsequent ballots, putting a premium on being the second choice of caucus-goers.
In early November, the CBS/New York Times poll indicated that Edwards was the second choice of 30 percent of supporters of second-tier candidates, while Obama was favored by 27 percent and Clinton by just 14 percent.
It is actually that second tier bear trap that makes the whole thing dicey for Clinton. Once the lower tier is cut off, who the votes go to makes a huge difference. And it does not look like the backers of the lower ranked candidates like Hillary Clinton all that much. If Obama goes into New Hampshire with momentum, the dynamics of the race change quite a bit.
By Mwalimu Daudi, Wednesday, 28 November , 2007 @ 9:33 pm
Three opinions:
1. I doubt that Hilly will lose the nomination, no matter how badly she does in Iowa and New Hampshire. Clinton Inc. is too efficient a mud machine to let this happen. I think that Kondracke is underestimating the brutality of the Clintons in their pursuit of power.
2. The good news (from my perspective, anyway) is that Democrats like Obama, Biden, Dodd, Kucinich, Richardson and Edwards are about to get a small taste of what Clinton Inc. did to Republicans back in the 90s. It won’t knock any sense into their empty heads, but it will be fitting justice for their part in helping to create the Clinton monster in the first place.
3. No matter how bruising the primary fight becomes, the MSM will expect all Democrats to rally enthusiastically around the nomination of Hilly. A faux “era of unity and good feelings” will be proclaimed after the sea of mud has receded, and the MSM will savagely rake any Democrat who dares to dissent. It will be fun to watch the losers for the Democrat nomination being forced to mouth platitudes about what a great president St. Hillary will make!