Notes on the Iowa Caucus
The internet’s ablaze with analysis of the Iowa Caucus results, so I thought I’d share a few observations of my own on each candidate.
Starting at the bottom of the list, we have one Buddy Roemer, who I don’t know, and… Herman Cain? Cain got fifty-eight votes? Well, we’re off to a weird start, but I’ll assume (that is, hope) that these were just fifty-eight guys looking for a laugh.
Moving up, Jon Huntsman received 745 votes. Yeah, he didn’t campaign in Iowa, so we’ll see how he does in New Hampshire. I’ve only seen him speak a couple times, but he was intelligent enough to form complete sentences containing coherent thoughts, even without a teleprompter, which would at least make him an improvement over our last two presidents. A friend of mine, whose opinion I mostly trust, really likes him, so I suppose for now he’d be a (distant) second choice for me among this crop of Republicans.
Next, with 5% of the vote, is Michelle Bachmann, who unsurprisingly has halted her campaign. I say “unspurprisingly,” because several of the Fox News analysts I saw last night mentioned that she lacked the resources, both financial and organisational, to support a large campaign. Doesn’t it seem absurd that financial resources are so critical to national elections? Ideally, anyone should be able to run, but who can afford it? (Hint: Those who sell out to special interests, with a few exceptions).
Rick Perry received 10.3% of the vote, and… honestly, I wish he’d have been the one to drop out so he’d quit embarrassing the rest of us Texans. Let the other Texan, the one who’s read a few books, represent the state. Also, I guess 13.3% chose everyone’s favourite serial adulterer, Newt Gingrich, in case no other candidate was enough of an insider. Yeah, I just slung some mud, but I’ll always prefer a candidate with some moral authority over someone with skeletons in the closet.
That leaves us with the top-tier candidates, starting with Dr. Ron Paul with 21.4% support. He is, by far, the candidate I’m most likely to vote for, as are many other voters under thirty – which is great news for libertarians and, for that matter, conservatives. I fear there may be an upper limit for how much support he can garner; he wants to cut almost every pet project the federal government has, which means he also alienates a lot of voting blocs. However, as his young followers grow older and start replacing the established Republicans, they’ll gradually begin to undermine the Neoconservative stranglehold on the Republican party. The best thing that could happen for both conservatives and libertarians would be for the Republican party to collapse tomorrow so a more honest third party could replace it, but the next best would be to alter the direction of the party. It’ll be years before we see such a thing come to fruition, but I’ve no doubt that future candidates similar to Dr. Paul will fare much better thanks to the groundwork his campaign is laying.
Finally, we have Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney in a photo-finish. Santorum is the big surprise, though I hear he, like Bachmann, lacks the resources for a large campaign. After reading about him, I can find a few reasons to dislike his ideas, but expect a lot of the sound and fury from the Left on his supposed social conservatism. For that matter, actual social conservatives may also question the sincerity of his beliefs. Also, his campaign banner had the slogan “Faith, Family, Freedom,” which he totally stole from this very blog.
Romney still seems, to me, like the inevitable choice, and I guess he’d be my third pick among this lot. Like most everyone else, though, I can’t get enthusiastic one way or another, so, y’know, whatever man. Barack Obama vs. Generic Republican it’ll be. Mostly likely, I’ll just vote for my usual batch of third-party candidates.
I should also mention that Dr. Thomas Fleming has a fuller analysis of Santorum and Romney here, which I highly recommend reading.
