If you are paying attention
to reporting out of Iowa this morning you know there are many snappy lines to
describe the mess the Iowa caucus process is in right now. It is 7:30 a.m. here,
and the state Democratic Party has yet to announce any results. The candidates
stayed up late last night to talk to their supporters, but as there were no
results, claiming victory was challenging, except for Mayor Peter. Relying on
his campaign's own numbers Pete was the sole candidate to claim a victory in
Iowa. This was, in my opinion, a high-risk, high-reward strategy. If the
numbers, which we all hope will be released sometime today, show him in second
or even third place, then his claim of victory will probably hold. If he ends
up in fourth, however, he will have proverbial egg on his face.
The big loser due to no
results? The pundits say Bernie, because he had the most volunteers, the most
robust ground game, and was expecting to be able to address the crowd last
night and tell them all their hard work paid off. As the scene now shifts to
New Hampshire, a neighbor state to his home Vermont, he is expected to do well
next week in their primary. But he lacks the Iowa “bounce” that has proven to
be so helpful to candidates in the past.
The big winner(s)? It looks
like Joe Biden will probably come in fourth, which will be a dismal result. He
continues to lead in national polling in a match-up with Trump, but he was
hoping (and recent polling suggested) to come in second last night; third place
as worst-case scenario. His campaign has already delivered a letter to the Iowa
Democratic Party complaining about the irregularities in the caucus process,
probably as a way to partially insulate him from a bad result. Whether that
will have the desired effect is anyone’s guess. But a bad result in Iowa will
not help with fundraising, something that has dogged Biden from the start. So,
the fact that Sanders did not claim victory last night may be seen to help
Biden.