Posted on 08/14/2011 3:58:28 PM PDT by evilrooster
The Ames Straw Poll, a sideshow Iowa Republican Party fundraiser, is finally over. The best thing about this straw poll is that it cuts to the chase and gets to the very heart of American politics – bribery.
The presidential politicking season finally kicked off in earnest as Republican Party candidates all gathered in the heartland for a bit of old fashioned Americana. They feasted upon heart clogging delicacies such as fried butter on a stick and engaged in the fine political art of bribery. Yes, the straw poll results are not about the candidates’ ideas, their personas, their debate skills or much of anything else of importance in selecting the most qualified candidate. The straw poll results are about who can entice the most voters with free tickets (at 30 bucks a pop), free bus rides and free food -- in other words, bribery.
True, voters may accept a bus ride from Tim Pawlenty, feast upon pizza provided by Herman Cain, take tickets from Ron Paul and end up voting for Michelle Bachmann but it all inevitably comes down to which candidate has the best bribery machine in place in Iowa. What do the straw poll results mean for the candidates? For most, it means they need to exit from the race immediately because they never had a shot at the nomination to begin with. They couldn’t even bribe people to vote for them.
A look at the order of finish may shed some light on what the Ames results means for the future of each candidate.
Michelle Bachmann
She gave out plenty of tickets, fed lots of people, stuck to her sound bites and got lots of votes. She is a tea party favorite and showed some skill at organizing a campaign.
Ron Paul
The Libertarian received 4,671 votes. Iowa has a population of over 3 million. Unfortunately, each and every potential general election supporter that Ron Paul has or will ever have in Iowa showed up in Ames. His supporters are fanatics and none would dare miss the opportunity to demonstrate their support for their kooky candidate (even though he is more often right than wrong, Paul is still a fringe candidate). They also demonstrated the upper limits of Paul’s campaign.
Tim Pawlenty
He bribed the most Iowans and still couldn’t beat his Minnesotan rival. Thankfully, he has already withdrawn.
Rick Santorum
When one considers that Pawlenty is gone and Paul is a perennial poll anomaly (like he is in every poll), Santorum actually did quite well, all things considered. He comes in 2nd by default. He has now moved himself into dark horse territory.
Herman Cain
I like Herman. He spent almost no money in Iowa and finished in the middle of the pack. What he says resonates with voters but he will, unfortunately, never rise out of his middle of the pack status. Herman’s campaign will go nowhere.
Mitt Romney
The front runner. The one to beat. The media-proclaimed golden child. The winner of the straw poll in 2007. Romney came up a loser. Give it up Mitt. You are toast. You were beaten by write-in votes for a Texan. With Perry’s entrance your chances of carrying a single state in the south are now over. So is your campaign.
Newt Gingrich
The former Speaker’s fantastic debate performance, his intellect and his past accomplishments were meaningless in Iowa. Newt is a “qualified” candidate with experience but with all too much baggage to overcome. I would love to see Newt trounce Obama in a Presidential debate, as only Newt can, but that is a fantasy that will never happen.
Jon Huntsman
PLEASE get out of this race. Now.
Others
Sarah? Saaarrrraaaaaah?????
<crickets>
Sarah tested the waters with just her presence in Iowa. The former, not-quite full term, Governor of Alaska was surrounded in Ames by the press, by her fans and by the curious. Her alternate approach to Iowa was interesting, if nothing else. Her potential supporters no doubt voted for her political twin, Michelle Bachmann. Each appeals to the exact same base. Palin ceded the tea party limelight to Bachmann in Iowa and grabbing the spotlight back from Bachmann in the future will be detrimental – for both of them. There will be no President Palin as long as Bachmann is in the race. Bachmann, encouraged by her win, isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
The Ames straw poll winner was, of course, Rick Perry. He thumbed his nose at Iowa by declaring his candidacy on its big day, did not appear on the ballot and still out-performed Mitt Romney (and other candidates) without eating so much as one of the 59 featured Iowan foods on a stick. The coyote shooting Governor of Texas avoided premature heart disease and still garnered 6th place in total votes cast. Pawlenty is gone so, by default, he moves into 5th place. Paul is the kooky polling anomaly so when we remove the Texas Congressman from consideration Perry actually moves into 4th place. He wasn’t even on the ballot in Iowa and garnered significant enough write-in support to beat Romney so we can move him up one more position for good measure into 3rd place (sorry Herman – it’s an arbitrary decision but no one said life is fair).
I don’t know who Perry had to bribe to do so well in Iowa but -- it worked.
Also as someone who has watch politics for over 30 years, I have some advice to all the supporters of the various candidates.
Stop the trash talk. It will not help, but hurt your chosen candidate.
Trash talking the other guy only hurts your chosen candidate, you do not build anything by tearing down everyone else.
As Pawlenty learned this week, Republican voters are not interested in the least in fighting with their allies. We all know who the real enemies are and don't take kindly to those who do the Dems PR work for them.
Trash talking the other candidate then going to their supporters later asking them to support your candidate is a sure fail strategy.
The way to win the Republicans and Conservatives voters is to tell them why YOUR candidate should be chosen.
Stop the trash talk. It will not help, but hurt your chosen candidate.
Trash talking the other guy only hurts your chosen candidate, you do not build anything by tearing down everyone else.
You clearly suffer from a classic case of “PDS.”/s
The political landscape has definitely shifted.
Yes, they do love to buy enough entries and spam these polls.
His supporters are fanatics and none would dare miss the opportunity to demonstrate their support for their kooky candidate...
They're about the strangest little cult I've ever seen.
But they can be entertaining.
Deep fried butter on a stick? Sounds too low-cal. I wouldn’t eat it unless it were wrapped in bacon first.
Is that you, Pat Robertson?
In the entire history of the Ames Iowa Straw Poll, the only candidate that ever won the Ames Iowa Straw Poll and went on to win the Presidency was George W. Bush.
The Ames Iowa Straw Poll is a classic example of a Self-Selection Bias poll: Absolutely worthless.
Case in point:
Pat Robertson: Won the Ames Iowa Straw Poll in 1987 by 9 percentage points
Who is the "GOP Establishment" candidate?
I though Perry was labeled as the "GOP Establishment" candidate and he ignored Ames.
later
They feasted upon heart clogging delicacies such as fried butter on a stick and engaged in the fine political art of bribery.
This author obviously did not attend the Straw Poll and doesn’t know the difference between the State Fair and the Straw Poll. No deep fried butter at the Straw Poll. YThese events were 30 miles apart from another.
Deep fried butter on a stick? Sounds too low-cal. I wouldn’t eat it unless it were wrapped in bacon first.
Yes, that’s right, they have chocolate covered bacon at the fair. I heard it was actually fairly good.
There is at least one here on FR running around threads and flaunting that he/she is going to write in Ron Paul.
In other words, voting for Obama.
A democrat.
Should be repeated: The author was not there and did not bother to become familiar with how the Straw Poll works or even where it took place! Sour grapes?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.