Posted by
Pasadena Phil on Tuesday, January 08, 2008 1:59:50 PM
Updated for news on Hollywood support shift. See bottom of page.
There are two important points I want to make about the Iowa caucus:
First, Republicans are already losing against Democrats in side-by-side races. Given a choice, independents are showing up in numbers to vote Democrat.
Second, there may not be enough Republicans remaining in the GOP to nominate their own candidate.
One of the big stories to come out of Iowa was the ginormous turnout. Most of the increase went to Democrats by far. Twice as many Democrats turned out to vote as Republicans. It is usually equal for both parties.
Also disturbing for the GOP was the enormous number of young voters who turned out to vote for Obama. Keep that in mind when contemplating a Giuliani, Thompson or ghostly McCain nomination.
Labor turned out to vote for Obama. This does not bode well for any Republican in the industrial states for the general election.
There are many more such statistics that all point to one thing: Obama is rapidly transforming this race on the Democratic side by re-invigorating the party with enthusiastic new voters and many of these new voters are young. Enthusiasm, turnout, youth and money. That's a grand slam.
That Huckabee defeated Romney in Iowa may be a big story in the small and shrinking pond of the GOP but the only enthusiasm on display was by evangelicals anxious to vote for one of their own to keep a Mormon from winning. From the Des Moines Register:
"Typically, as many as 45 percent of Republican caucusgoers are
evangelicals, but Thursday night they were a mighty bloc with 60
percent, said Redlawsk, the University of Iowa professor. "A 15 percent
bump up in that group, if they're all going Huckabee's way, makes all
the difference."
The enthusiasm and energy in the Democratic race transcended the GOP's petty and personal squabbling and thus relegated the Republican race to irrelevancy. Republicans may very well be headed for a monumental loss in November. It is like watching the old, newly expanded NHL as the Western (expansion teams) and Eastern (old teams) divisions worked through the playoffs as if the Western champion had any chance in the Stanley Cup finals. Winning the East was winning the Stanley Cup. And so it may be in 2008 for the Democrats unless the Republicans rediscover their base and get their act together.
As John Hinderaker of Powerline, who has a rosier outlook, warned last Friday,
"Republicans are going to have to wake up from their slumber pretty soon
if their candidate is to have a chance in November. Or maybe there just
aren't enough Republicans these days to give the party much of a chance."
"Maybe there just aren't enough Republicans." That is a big, big issue. What we saw in Iowa and are now seeing in New Hampshire is that independents and Democrats might have more influence in determining who becomes the GOP nominee than Republicans themselves.
I expect see reports soon that Democratic party registrations are growing because of Obama. That was clearly in evidence in Iowa. In the last numbers I saw from the November 2006 election, Democrats accounted for about 30% of registered voters to the GOP's 25-26%. There is no evidence that GOP registrations have gone anywhere but down since then. I know that because were that not true, you can bet that the desperate RNC would be trumpeting it from sea to shining sea - and around the clock. They aren't.
That brings up another question. How many registered voters does a party need to be competitive nationally? The Democrats may be on their way back to 40% while the GOP sinks to 20% or lower. Keep that in mind the next time you read a poll querying GOP voters only. By purging itself of its base of conservatives, the GOP might have tossed its ability as a major party to produce a winning candidate. Worse yet, in a primary system where most states allow independent and crossover voting, it is debatable that Republican voters can even select the candidate of their choice. If they can't, then who is doing the selecting?
New Hampshire may very well demonstrate that in a two-party system organized as it is, a party that outnumbers its opposition party by 2 to 1 has the power to select the nominees of both parties. Obama will get the lion's share of independents and maybe a larger-than-expected share of disaffected GOP moderates in New Hampshire next Tuesday. If the Democratic voter turnout again outnumbers the Republican turnout by a great margin, will the Republican winner even matter? We will once again end up with a liberal selected by Democrats and independents.
Come February 5, the third-party path might look very inviting for a well-funded independent candidate. Those who say that Hillary Clinton will eventually derail Obama are engaging in the same wishful thinking as those who argue that Giuliani will win once he gets to the Florida primary and then February 5. Risky strategy. Hillary may very well win New York, New Jersey and Florida but it is a big mistake to assume she will win California, Michigan, Ohio and many other states. The Hollywood crowd is rapidly moving into the Obama camp (see 1/8 update below)* and her early losses will probably seal that deal.
And so it is very likely that the Republican nominee will be facing Obama. "Old and cranky" is not going to beat "young and dynamic" Obama and there is no outflanking Obama to the left, even with Giuliani (think Bill Clinton), McCain (think Ted Kennedy) and Huckabee (think Jimmy Carter) as the nominee. It just doesn't look good for Republicans.
I don't believe that a party comprised of a fuzzy, unmotivated and bland 20-25% of registered voters can be considered a major party. It may be a liberating blessing for Romney to get knocked out early. He could quickly link up with a Duncan Hunter and declare his to be the only conservative ticket. And since 30-33% of registered voters describe themselves as "conservative" and another 25-28% as "moderate leaning conservative", I argue that this ticket would at least come in second, ahead of the Republican ticket. I believe they could actually win.
Huckabee won in Iowa and is not seeing any new money. McCain will probably win in New Hampshire but not see any new money either. The way things are going, the GOP nominee will get crushed in November for lack of ideas, enthusiasm, and money. What else would you expect when the opposing party is picking your nominee? The Republican Party has been reduced to a meaningless label bereft of ideas and members.
In a two-party system, why is it that one party gets to field two candidates while the other party has none? Obviously, there is only one party, the Unified Establishment Party. We need to find a conservative candidate willing to take on both UEP candidates by running independent. Right now, I don't see Romney getting knocked out nor running independent. Ron Paul might. I expect him to.
Admit it. Faced with the choice of uber-leftwing and inexperienced Obama, a certifiably nutty and liberal Huckabee, narcissistic liberals like McCain and Giuliani, wouldn't you vote for an independent Ron Paul? Even if he won, it would be harmless because the next president is likely to win with less than 38% of the vote and facing an even more conservative Congress. Controlling Congress is what matters and conservatives are in the driver's seat there.
It's the only way to beat a one-party system. Could happen. You never know.
*Updated 1/8/08: Hollywood abandoning Hillary in droves to jump on the Obama train. There is nothing like this happening on the GOP side other than all the conservatives who abandoned ship over the amnesty fight. It just keeps getting worse. And latest results from New Hampshire are telling us that the independents think the Republicans should run McCain against Obama. I can't think of any reason why Republicans should be celebrating no matter who wins.