Iowa’s importance overstated
I’ve never been there, but I’m sure that many of the people who live in Iowa are breathing easier these days.
Those 2016 presidential campaigns have moved on.
People out there can watch their TV’s without the constant bombardment of political ads – an estimated $40 million worth of them; mailboxes full of campaign literature; and incessant calls from campaign operatives begging for caucus votes.
Iowa is no longer at the center of the 2016 presidential sweepstakes.
To be frank, and regardless of anything you may have heard – it never was.
It’s just the first barometer of a year and a half long (some would say overly long) battle to set up housekeeping at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Iowa, which has a population of 3,123,899, or less than one percent of the U.S. population – 30th among states – only has roughly the same number of people as Mongolia.
Mongolia?
While you may have heard that there were records set last week when 187,000 Republicans took part in the state’s caucuses, that’s only 32 percent of Iowa’s registered Republicans.
(Democrats don’t reveal the number of caucus participants, or their actual votes)
I’ll borrow a quote from the Washington Post here: “Winning Iowa is better than winning the first game of a 162-game baseball season, by virtue of the importance placed upon it and how it narrows each party’s field. But when it comes to total voters involved, it’s not much different.”
In other words, all of the breathless cable news chatter, and the wall-to-wall coverage of the Republican and Democrat’s leading candidates have elevated Iowa to a level of importance that’s undeserved.
Nobody can truly claim victory between Hillary and Bernie. The difference in caucus votes between them is miniscule.
Ted Cruz beat Donald Trump handily, if you consider “handily” to mean by 3 percent, or that he’d gotten support from 0.016 percent of the entire nation.
If you throw a pebble into the Youghiogheny River, it’ll make a ripple. A very, very small ripple, that won’t lead the governor to call a state of emergency.
Consider Iowa a pebble.
The raw tallies of caucus votes translate into delegates at the respective Republican and Democratic conventions later this year.
Despite the supposed wide margin of the Cruz victory, he only managed to pick up one more delegate (eight) than Donald Trump did聽 (seven) last Monday.
That really doesn’t matter much when you consider the long history of Iowa’s caucus winners who failed to win the presidency.
Democrats John Kerry, Al Gore, Tom Harkin, Richard Gephardt and Walter Mondale each won the Iowa caucus. As did, Republicans Mike Huckabee, Bob Dole (twice). And in 1980 George H.W. Bush won, but Ronald Reagan won the general election.
Iowa has become more of an overblown ritual, than a meaningful indicator of what’s to come.
Only two presidential candidates, who were non-incumbents, have won their respective Iowa caucuses, and then won the presidency – Barack Obama in 2008, and George W. Bush in 2000.
Last Monday started the process. Tomorrow, New Hampshire continues it.
But the entire primary election and caucus schedule will continue until June 14, when voters in Washington, D.C. have their say.
True, the Iowa results caused several candidates to drop out.
Martin O’Malley, Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Rand Paul saw the bleak handwriting on the wall.
But with so many opportunities for fortunes to change before June, most of the candidates are still holding firm.
Especially since they feel that Iowa’s results didn’t make or break their candidacies.
Pennsylvania gets its turn on April 26.
By then, the herd of presidential hopefuls should be thinned even further.
We’re sure to get our share of endless, and maddening TV ads; telephone calls that interrupt our dinners; and reams full of mailers stuffed in our mailboxes.
Iowa had a fraction of the delegates up for grabs then does Pennsylvania with 210 for Democrats, and 71 for Republicans.
By the time Pennsylvanians make their choices, millions of Americans across the country will have made theirs.
Hopefully, the issues will be settled by then.
Edward A. Owens is a three-time Emmy Award winner and 20-year veteran of television news. Email him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net