[NYTr] How Iowa a Polite Insurgency (Doyle)

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

The Independent - Jan 5, 2008
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article3309996.ece

How Iowa plotted a polite insurgency

By Leonard Doyle in Des Moines

Barack Obama sprinted up the podium, like the basketball player he is,
to the wild and enthusiastic cheers of his overwhelmingly youthful
supporters. His victory speech was pitch perfect for the moment.

"They said this day would never come. They said our sights were set too
high. They said this country was too divided; too disillusioned to ever
come together around a common purpose," he told his audience.

"But on this January night – at this defining moment in history – you
have done what the cynics said we couldn't do; what the state of New
Hampshire can do in five days; what America can do in this New Year."

Standing in the crowd, with tears of emotion rolling down his cheeks
was Ben Schneider an 18-year-old college student from Maryland who had
volunteered to work for the Obama campaign and had been camping out on
floors for the past week. "Three of us came out and we've been staying
in a place with no furniture, but it has been amazing," he said. "What
I admire about Obama is that he is bringing a new type of politics into
play, he works across ideological and partisan lines.

"Look, we even have Republicans working for him," he added. " All this
stuff about him being too young or not having enough experience to be
president is nonsense. Look at how he laid it on the line his whole
life as a community organiser in Chicago, turning down high-paying
corporate jobs. "

"He's a genuine guy and we have never seen anyone like him in my
lifetime," he added. "What we have seen here in Iowa is a grassroots
local campaign on steroids."

Back in the Fort Des Moines Hotel there was a forlorn mood in the
Clinton camp. There was not a single high-powered guest to be seen on
the floor, until the results came out and Hillary Clinton's staff
quickly ushered a crowd to appear behind her as she addressed a battery
of television cameras.

Yet even hours before the voting began it was becoming clear that the
game was up for Mrs Clinton. As she and her husband perfectly coiffed
and wearing matching green scarves came striding through the lobby of
the hotel after lunch there was a look of bleak despair on their faces.
As the door of their waiting secret service limousine clunked shut, Mrs
Clinton, looked towards Bill and made an angry gesture with her hands.
For a woman who never tired of telling the plain folks of Iowa of the
inevitability of her election as president, it was evident that as far
as Iowa voters were concerned, there would be no restoration of the
Clinton White House in the near future.

Yesterday there was disbelief at how an overwhelmingly white state,
with a long legacy of racial bigotry, managed to choose a 46-year-old
black man as its Democratic nominee for the White House by a thumping
majority. The high priests of the Republican party were equally
mystified as to why well-drilled party activists had opted for Mike
Huckabee, an electric-guitar-playing former Baptist televangelist who
was a virtual unknown until a month ago.

But as neighbours met, in church halls and schoolhouses across the
state to partake in the archaic but highly democratic caucus system, it
was clear that the Iowa electorate – flinty, clear-eyed, and polite to
a fault – had insurgency in mind. Democrat or Republican, their genial
nature betrayed a seething anger at what they view as the brazen
incompetence of President George Bush. Other factors in the
inflammatory mix were despair at the needless deaths of the country's
young soldiers, fears for their own jobs, their rickety healthcare
system and the future of the planet.

At the Emanuel Elementary School in Des Moines, Bill Brauch a Democrat
caucus supervisor repeated over and over that the turnout was "beyond
belief, absolutely beyond belief". There were, he said, 10 times more
people at the school than the last time a caucus was held.

Among them was 89-year-old Jim McCollum, a former actuary. He was not
in the slightest bit interested in Hillary Clinton. "I've knocked
around for a bit and attended caucus meetings since the1940s" he said,
"but I have never been more convinced than now that we have a real
leader in Obama.'

"He's the only one not in the pocket of special interest [groups] and
lobbyists and the only one who can bring about fundamental change in
America's way of doing business.'

As the voters poured into the school auditorium, it was clear that the
night was going to be Obama's. His supporters, as close to a
cross-section of America as it is possible to find in Iowa, sat
cross-legged on the stage, passing out bottles of water and checking
the results from other precincts on their Mac-books and Blackberries.
After the first headcount the horse-trading was supposed to begin, but
with the Obama faction more than double the size of its two closest
rivals, the Clinton campaign and that of the old-style left-wing
populist John Edwards, a quiet victory party got under way.

Then, furiously, the Edwards camp lobbied for the votes of candidates
who had not made the threshold and by the end of the evening their man
had knocked the Clinton camp into third place. By the end, it was an
astonishing 155 votes for Obama, 78 for Edwards and 69 for Clinton. The
pattern would be repeated in hundreds of similar meetings across the
thinly populated farm state.

Later as she drank from the bitter cup of defeat and congratulated her
two main rivals, Mrs Clinton repeated her mantra of "change", even
though she had Bill on one side and Madeleine Albright, his former
secretary of state on the other.

But after coming third in Iowa, Mrs Clinton has just four days to prove
she is electable. If Mr Obama wins the New Hampshire primary, the
expectation is that he will also win South Carolina with its large
number of black Democrats. With the wind in his sails and huge momentum
generated by three consecutive victories, he will be in the best place
possible on " Tsunami Tuesday" on 5 February when 22 states go to the
polls in one day.

The Clinton campaign must now reassess why the combined message of
experience and change made no real impression in Iowa despite
bombarding the population with slick television ads until an hour
before voting.

Iowans, it seems, were looking for authenticity more than experience
and they found it in Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee, two people who
give straight answers on the important questions.

A secret service agent, a die-hard Republican who works for both the
Obama and Clinton details came away from the campaign so impressed by
by the former's decency that he voted for him. "He looks you in the
eye, calls you by your name and says thank you," the agent confided,
"Hillary just cuts you dead."

DEMOCRATS: 239,000 caucused

BARACK OBAMA 37.58 per cent

With a comprehensive win, the charismatic Illinois senator sends a
message to Democrats across the US that he is the man to beat.

JOHN EDWARDS: 29.75 per cent

Second place represents something of a victory for the 2004 running
mate of John Kerry. Some commentators had written him off.

HILLARY CLINTON 29.47 per cent

Suddenly it all looks rather bleak for the Democrats' matriarch. As the
show shifts to New Hampshire, the former first lady has to win.

BILL RICHARDSON: 2.11 per cent

The Governor of New Mexico, Richardson is best know as a hostage
negotiator and has been nominated four times for the Nobel Peace Prize.

JOE BIDEN: 0.93 per cent

The veteran senator withdrew following this poor show. He also ran in
1988 but quit following claims that he plagiarised speeches by Neil
Kinnock.

CHRIS DODD 0.02 per cent

Another faller at the first hurdle, Dodd represents Connecticut in the
Senate. Like Biden, he is known as a foreign policy specialist.

REPUBLICANS: 108,000 caucused

MIKE HUCKABEE: 34.4 per cent

Before yesterday few outside Arkansas knew much about the state's
Governor. But the bass guitarist is now a serious challenger for the
Republican nomination.

MITT ROMNEY: 25.4 per cent

The former Massachusetts governor had been leading Iowa until last
month. Romney, a Mormon, was known as a "socially liberal" Republican
in office.

FRED THOMPSON: 13.4 per cent

A lawyer-turned-actor who once took on the role of president,
65-year-old Thompson now faces an uphill battle if he's to play the
part in real life.

JOHN MCCAIN: 13.2 per cent

The Vietnam veteran once dubbed John "Wayne" McCain did not campaign
hard in Iowa, instead opting to focus his attention on New Hampshire.

RON PAUL: 10 per cent

A 10-term Congressman, Ron Paul is opposed to the Iraq War. His
libertarian views should serve him better in the North-east than in
Iowa.

RUDY GIULIANI: 3.5 per cent

The former New York mayor was another who gave Iowa something of a body
swerve. Despite that, trailing in last has dented his campaign.