Where Are They Now?

The conventional wisdom, of course, is that Mike Huckabee and Barack Obama were the big winners, and that Mitt Romney and Hillary Clinton were the big losers last night in Iowa.

But is that really so?

To some extent, all of those who participated last night were winners in the sense that they participated, and put it on the line.

In American politics, we love a guy or gal who mixes it up. And in modern Republican politics, one of the enduring frustrations is that our political leaders often seem too willing to give up in a fight, especially a policy fight. Too many of them appear to always be looking for the compromise position that will end the fight, rather than slugging it out to a reasonable solution. When I hear a candidate say, "I'm the candidate who can work with Democrats," it gives me pause! That is the earned rap on John McCain, and is why he is often jokingly referred to as Senator McKennedy.

On the other hand, the frequent weakness of Democrats, is that they never stop fighting, including amongst themselves -- "even for an eggshell."

Quick quiz! Name the Democrat contender this year who said -- or ever implied even once -- "I can work with the Republicans." Still thinking? Forget it!

Lurking in the background of this years Presidential race, is the perception that a few of the Republican players simply gave themselves a bye in the early rounds. If you take it to a baseball analogy, they literally announced in advance that they would skip the first couple of innings! Rudy Giuliani, and to a somewhat more limited extent, John McCain fit into this category. Rudy's strategy is to win the nomination, by selectively marshalling his resources for only certain key geographic fights, and his campaign manager gets a little testy when challenged as to why this doesn't send a message that he really doesn't care about the places he is already foregoing.

But what does it say about his willingness to fight the good fight in the General Election? What does it say about a Republican candidate who is unwilling to compete in a primary or caucus that is either exclusively limited to Republicans, or heavily weighted by them? You have to have a strategy in the general that will give you a victory in the battleground states. But in the primary?

There is more than a bit of perceived arrogance in that attitude, and it is surely something that will linger into the General. In fact, to some extent it contradicts Rudy's main claim, which is that he is best positioned to beat the Democrat nominee in the fall, who he has said will be Hillary Clinton.

Well, not in Iowa, you won't, Rudy! Nor in New Hampshire -- which actually has a small piece of coastline. They were both states that were competitive in 2004. Why should someone who wants to the the President of the United States not at least take a shot at a showing in all of the States? Rudy is being so selective, he even risks being derisively tagged as the "bi-coastal" candidate.

So, neither Romney nor Clinton were losers last night in their willingness to fight.

Who will win in New Hampshire on either side, is very much up for grabs.

As to the history of the "carry-over" effect -- Iowa to New Hampshire -- there is simply no real pattern there, except in the case of sitting Presidents running for re-election.

Remember former President Bush having the "big mo" coming out of Iowa in 1980? Ronald Reagan won in New Hampshire and the primary race was all but over. Remember eight years later in 1988 when Bob Dole won in Iowa, and then lost to Vice President George Bush in New Hampshire by eight and a half points a few days later? Dole left New Hampshire an angry man . . . "Stop lying about my record!" . . . and lost the race.

The Romney campaign now points out that no one has failed to obtain at least 18 points in Iowa and go on to win the nomination and the Presidency. Some will say that is splitting hairs a bit, but there is that factor of being willing to put up a convincing fight, even in defeat, that will factor into the overall primary campaign, and to some extent affect the general.

As for former governor Mike Huckabee, he had a very impressive but very focused victory, with the bulk of his caucus-goers being evangelical Christian participants. Last night on CNN Bill Schneider noted that Huckabee attracted only 14% of the non-evangelical participants in Iowa last night.

Here is from the AP story.

More than half of GOP voters said they were born again or evangelical Christians, and nearly half of them supported Huckabee, according to entrance interviews by The Associated Press and the television networks. Romney led among non-evangelical voters by 2-to-1 or more.

And from the CNN analytical coverage:

In Iowa, entrance polls of caucus-goers showed that 3 out of every 5 Republicans were self-described born again or evangelical Christians. Huckabee beat Romney by better than 2-to-1 in this voting bloc. Among the rest of Iowa's Republican electorate, however, Huckabee finished a distant fourth behind Romney, McCain and Fred Thompson.

In New Hampshire, social conservatives are not as influential. This potentially opens the door for Romney to regain the upper hand or for McCain to repeat his 2000 victory.

The Arizona senator will find himself in a two-front battle: against Romney for the hearts and souls of GOP voters and against Obama for the state's unpredictable and sizable independent electorate.

So, does John McCain go through this weekend boasting, "I'm the guy who can work with Democrats," in order to try to fight for those independent voters with Obama?

Or, is he now the guy between Mount Monadnock and a hard place?

Looks like it's time to head north and get a closer view!

Susan Estrich Sez, "Make Our Day!"

In a quick 17 second clip, prominent Democrat political operative Susan Estrich commented thusly last night on Fox News Channel.



Here is the rough transcript of the clip posted on YouTube by bcompton33:

"Huckabee. Huckabee could win tomorrow here in Iowa. Huckabee is the Democrats' dream! Now, he's the kind of candidate who can do very well in the Iowa Caucus, (and) taps into something, but he - can Republicans nominate Huckabee? Honey, I'm dancing at the Inaugural Ball!"

Susan recently referred to Huckabee derisively as the "Jenny Craig of Republican politics" -- with her apologies to Jenny -- suggesting that many Democrats were frothing at the mouth over the prospect of running against him.

Of course, the gravelly-voiced pundit -- with apologies to Mike Gravel -- hasn't always been the greatest of prognosticators. Perhaps it was also seeing the latest Iowa numbers of her favored candidate, Hillary Clinton, beginning to resemble a sudden downward swirl, that prompted an immediate need on Susan's part to be overly enthusiastic about something!

More On The Huck Feign

(Updated: 01/01 pm)

Yesterday, AP writer Ron Fournier supplied additional details in an analysis piece, "Analysis: Huckabee May Have Gone Too Far." He described Huckabee's arrival at the presser and his sudden "change of heart" in the room filled still with anti-Romney signs and boards, and a large backdrop declaring "Enough is enough!"

When Huckabee arrived, he announced he had just changed his mind. The ad wouldn't run. It was too negative.

"I believe the people of Iowa deserve better, and we are going to try and give them better ...," he said.

But he didn't. Instead, Huckabee showed off the spot to the journalists, knowing full well his negative message would seep out of the room. He told the media to pay close attention.

"You're not going to get a copy of it," he warned, "so this is your chance to see it, then after that you'll never see it again."

The media laughed.

First Read, an MSNBC political blog had the story up as well, which they tagged as "Huck's Strange Day." They link to today's Des Moines Register piece by Lisa Rossi, which lead with:

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said Monday that he had pulled a television advertisement targeting competitor Mitt Romney that was scheduled to be
broadcast in Iowa before Thursday's Republican presidential caucuses.

He showed the ad instead in a room packed with reporters at the Marriott hotel in downtown Des Moines.

Further down in the article, Lisa noted:

Reporters asked whether it was hypocritical to pull the ad, then show it to journalists.

"People want to be cynical about it, they can be cynical about it," Huckabee said. "If I said we were not going to run an ad ... you'd say, 'Where's the ad?' "

First Read also linked to AP Ron Fournier's analysis piece, as had Powerline's John Hinderaker in his piece of late yesterday, borrowing from Founier's header -- "Did Huckabee Go Too Far?"

John certainly seems to think so, noting Fournier's point that some of the anti-Romney lines in the ad Huckabee now claims to eschew, are lines that he has regularly been using, and continues to use in his stump appearances.

Hinderaker thus concludes:

The media helped to build Huckabee up, but if Fournier's reaction is typical, the honeymoon may be over.

(Update) Here a link at YouTube to portions of the presser.

As you can see from the video, under questioning from Carl Cameron at Fox, the following exchange took place:

Cameron: "So, if you've got all these placards, an ad that your not going to run, and a week's worth of commentary calling him (Romney) dishonest, are you saying that as of now these staffers should take these placards down, and that you won't say it anymore?"

Huckabee: "That's correct."

Yet he somehow insisted it was all true.

Today, Bob Krumm tagged it all "The Baptist Preacher's Gamble." His theory is that Huckabee's internal polls were finally was catching up to what others' were showing, and

"that the Passive Aggressive Pastor pulled yesterday’s stunt because he has seen his poll numbers and knows that they are "end-of-campaign bad.'"

More at Bob's post yesterday with additional links to media reaction noting the bizarre nature of the incident.

Krumm make a good point. Huckabee is an a "must win" situation in Iowa, and without an organization or money if he loses. So if he is tubing, this may simply have been a "kinder and gentler" version of the Dean "Scream."

LIMITED COMMUNICABILITY NOTICE

New Year's Eve, 2007:
(updated & corrected)

Boy, I was going to put up a real doozey of a post here, one strongly suggesting that Mr. Huckabee's behavior -- as described in this New York Times article by Katharine Q. Seeyle, Saying He Pulled Negative Ad, Huckabee Shows It*, and also described at this post on the NY Times political blog, The Caucus -- was frankly a little bizarre, and would likely lead anyone to believe that Mr. Huckabee seems to want it all ways!

As the article described Mr. Huckabee's latest maneuver:

DES MOINES — In an act of political jujitsu, Mike Huckabee has halted a negative ad that he was about to broadcast on television Monday against his Republican rival, Mitt Romney. But while claiming the moral high ground, he proceeded to show the ad to a roomful of reporters, photographers and television cameras who are repeating his anti-Romney message for free while Mr. Huckabee declares that his hands are clean.

But, I decided at the last second that I would NOT put this up as a regular post for consideration by just anyone who might happen to read it.

Therefore, you are hereby notified that this post is posted subject to the following strict disclaimer.

Notice of Disclaimer:

This communication is ONLY intended to be read by reporters, and is being posted here ONLY for the purpose of demonstrating what I could have posted, had I decided to post a regular comment.

If you are not a reporter, please ignore the entire content of this post, even if you have already read it.

Thank You.

Trochilus

(Notwithstanding all of the foregoing, the following notice is posted without regard to any limitation of meaning whatsoever, whether perceived, imagined, or otherwise.)

Happy New Year, Everyone!



*Note: The Hill also published a 12/31version of the story, Huckabee pulls negative ad, vows to go positive, by Sam Youngman.