The Democrats are slugging it out with not much more than two months to go before the first presidential votes are cast. Greenfield, Iowa, is the sort of small, Midwestern town where the local coffee shop closes at two in the afternoon. But on October 16th the Brick Coffee House kept its doors open well past five to serve the small throng of reporters waiting for John Edwards to arrive. “You are the guardians of what kind of president we’re going to have”, the former vice-presidential nominee told a motley crowd in Greenfield’s meeting hall, including a corn farmer in railroad engineer overalls. “You’re first. You are in a different place.” This is not idle pandering. Mr. Edwards has staked his new candidacy on winning in Iowa in January, when the state’s Democrats will pick candidates at local caucus meetings, and he is not the only one reports the Economist.
Ever since Jimmy Carter’s 1976 victory in Iowa energized his campaign, winning the first state in the nominating cycle has obsessed presidential hopefuls. It was crucial for John Kerry in 2004, who defeated the front-runner, Howard Dean, there. This time around, Democrats John Edwards and Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney are betting big on the state. Iowa is “the whole shebang”, David Plouffe, Mr. Obama’s campaign manager, told the New Republic last month.
Two things must happen for the Iowa gambit to work in 2008. The parties’ front-runners have to lose the state. Then those who do win there will have to translate that victory into new support in the other early primary states. On the Democratic side, where Hillary Clinton is running formidably out in front, the first is distinctly possible. But the second looks improbable, at least for now.
Read it here: The Democrats in Iowa