Media Matters’ Paul Waldman has a very angry article up at The American Prospect that can best be described as a cry of rage and frustration at the predominant position of Iowa (and to a lesser extent New Hampshire) in determining the Democratic presidential nomination, despite another three years of handwringing about the irrationality of the situation. Waldman’s take is distinctive mainly insofar as he assigns principal blame for Iowa’s continued power to the political press corps rather than to the candidates, the DNC, or to Iowans themselves.
I dunno about that. The DNC and the candidates, acting in concert, could have neutered IA and NH for this cycle, simply by refusing to recognize delegates chosen there, and by refusing to campaign there, just as they’ve successfully neutered efforts by MI and FL to change the calendar. The one point (which Waldman doesn’t raise) on which the media seem most responsible is with respect to the DNC’s one timid effort to interfere with the Duopoly, the authorization of a post-IA, pre-NH Caucus in Nevada. If current media coverage is any indication, NV’s theoretically important results aren’t going to get much attention at all as the press corps flies from Des Moines to Manchester in January (indeed, NV could lose its position entirely if IA and NH move up in response to the Republicans’ authorization of significant early events in MI and FL).
Waldman’s argument (echoed by Kevin Drum and Matt Yglesias) that Iowa’s power is actually increasing strikes me as an overstatement of a situation that’s attributable to completely coincidental candidate dynamics. Given the total domination of the field, financially and in terms of national appeal, by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, it’s true that for Edwards, a loss in IA will likely be the end of the road. But HRC can obviously survive an IA loss, and so could Obama, particularly in the case of an Edwards defeat which would create a one-on-one competition that is bound to help Obama. And for Richardson, Dodd or Biden, an upset third-place (much less second-place) finish in IA would represent a new lease on life, not a death sentence.
And look at the Republican side of the campaign: the two leading candidates (according to national polls) for the GOP nomination are both pursuing post-IA victory strategies (one, Fred Thompson, seems to be pursuing a post-IA, post-NH strategy). Sure, the refusal of candidates to boycott MI and FL is a factor here, but in part it’s because there are so many delegates to be won later. Maybe the media will crown Romney the nominee if he wins IA and NH anyway, but it’s just as likely that IA will create a viable dark horse like Huckabee who will muddy the waters.
By examining the low participation rates in the Duopoly events, Waldman does effectively dispute the much-heard claim that voters in IA and NH have earned their power by developing a tradition of careful and knowledgeable candidate vetting, essentially performing a public service for the rest of us, who would prefer to tune in much later. Iowa’s especially low participation rates are, of course, less attributable to apathy than to the peculiar demands associated with spending a long, cold evening listening to boring speeches, mastering the arcane Caucus rules, and also voting on party platform issues. But Waldman’s point is well-taken: it’s not like we’re witnessing the revival of Athenian democracy in IA or NH every four years.
He does not, however, grapple directly with the other common argument for beginning the nominating process as we do: it forces candidates to engage in a form of retail politics that keeps them from simply becoming actors in TV ads. Lest we forget, the first major effort to challenge the Duopoly on the Democratic side–the southern-based version of Super Tuesday held in 1988–produced what was then dubbed a “tarmac campaign” where the candidates never engaged with voters at all, and the results simply confirmed what had happened earlier in NH.
We obviously need a new system for nominating candidates for president. But we need a “system,” not just something that’s different from the status quo. The remarkable durability of the Duopoly has always suggested to me that the best opportunity to abolish it would be in a cycle where an incumbent president is running for re-election without intra-party opposition (a situation that Democrats have only enjoyed once since 1964). Maybe that could happen going into 2012. But shhhhhhh! Let’s don’t talk about it much, or Democrats in Iowa and New Hampshire may start eliciting pledges to maintain the Duopoly forever.

The folks at Third Way have a poll and analysis out this week on the politics of abortion. The poll, by the Feldman Group, was actually conducted back in July. The analysis, by Third Way’s Rachel Laser, is new.
The main value of the poll is two-fold: first, instead of trying to force people into “pro-choice” and “pro-life” camps, it encourages expressions of ambiguity, best indicated by the fact that sizable majorities of Americans appear to simultaneously believe that abortion is the “taking of human life” and a practice that should basically be up to women and their families and doctors, not government. Second, the poll is pretty sophisticated in showing significant shifts of opinion on ancillary issues like emergency contraception, depending on whether the question links the subject explicitly to that of abortion prevention.
On a quick reading, the poll analysis seems to suggest that talking about abortion prevention (which is exactly what Third Way thinks progressive politicians should do) can backfire if perceived as a “dodge” of the underlying issue of abortion itself. But the only way around that is to self-label oneself as “pro-choice” before embracing the common ground of abortion prevention, which undoubtedly shrinks that common ground. Short of simply identifying oneself with the morally incoherent views of so many Americans, it’s hard to see a position that won’t ultimately fall prey to the polarized labels. And while reaching out to “the other side” does have the value of lowering temperatures, let’s not forget that we may well be one Supreme Court appointment away from a situation where yes-no questions about the legality of abortion become impossible to transcend.

For your Friday mirthmaking, check out Kos’s jolly take on the new GOP “wide stance” logo and its hidden symbols. Suffice it to say that the designer has not exactly created an artistic triumph of the highest order. Hundreds of comments add to the merriment.

I concluded the previous post by suggesting that Christian Right leaders needed some evidence that their Threat to take a walk if Republicans nominated Rudy Giuliani was shared by actual voters. Well, turns out (via TPMCafe’s Election Central) that there’s a new Rasmussen poll providing just that. It suggests that fully 27 percent of Republicans would go third-party in a hypothetical Giuliani-Clinton contest.
A poll showing support for an unnamed third-party candidate more than a year prior to an election is not terribly solid proof of what voters would actually do after a vicious and polarizing D versus R campaign. But it could raise some serious doubts among Republicans who don’t much like Giuliani but see him as the one guy who could hang onto the White House.

Just in case anybody in Republican elite circles wasn’t paying attention over the weekend when Christian Right leaders gathered in Salt Lake City and then threatened to abandon the GOP if Rudy Giuliani is its presidential candidate, two of those leaders stood on some of the largest MSM soapboxes to repeat The Threat.
On Monday night, Family Research Council president Tony Perkins went on Anderson Cooper’s CNN show and suggested not very subtly that conservative evangelical defections would make a Giuliani nomination “Hillary Clinton’s ticket to the White House.” And today, Perkins’ mentor, Focus on the Family founder James Dobson, has an op-ed column in the New York Times making it clear that while Christian Right leaders aren’t united on a lot of things (including a candidate for president), they are united in the determination to take a walk if Rudy’s leading the ticket in 2008.
The timing and nature of The Threat is hardly coincidental. As yesterday’s Washington Post/ABC poll illustrated, electability is far and away Giuliani’s most valuable credential: fully half of Republicans in that poll said Rudy was the strongest candidate on that front. Perkins and Dobson are trying to raise every possible doubt about the ultimate truth of that proposition.
Sometimes threats are empty, of course. At The FundamentaList, Sarah Posner dismisses this one:

The idea that the Christian right would endorse a third-party candidate is ludicrous, given its pathological need to defeat Hillary Clinton and ultimately maintain sway over the White House. Focus on the Family’s James Dobson has a history of threatening defection from the GOP to endorse a third-party candidate. He has never followed through because he’s savvy enough to know it would render him irrelevant. No doubt the leaks were designed to put pressure on the GOP, not to nominate Giuliani.

Talk like that, of course, will also put pressure on Christian Right leaders to put up or shut up, and the real test of The Threat down the road will be the relative willingness of rank-and-file conservative evangelicals to rule out Rudy, and more importantly, to unite behind a candidate who could actually beat him.

John Harwood has a Wall St. Journal post reporting on a new WSJ-NBC News Poll that many Dems may find surprising:

By a nearly two-to-one margin, Republican voters believe free trade is bad for the U.S. economy, a shift in opinion that mirrors Democratic views and suggests trade deals could face high hurdles under a new president….That represents a challenge for Republican candidates who generally echo Mr. Bush’s calls for continued trade expansion, and reflects a substantial shift in sentiment from eight years ago….In a December 1999 Wall Street Journal-NBC poll, 37% of Republicans said trade deals had helped the U.S. and 31% said they had hurt, while 26% said they made no difference.

Why the change? Harwood has an interesting clue:

In a March 2007 WSJ/NBC poll, before recent scandals involving tainted imports, 54% of Democratic voters said free-trade agreements have hurt the U.S., compared with 21% who said they have helped. While rank-and-file Democrats have long blasted the impact of trade on American jobs, slipping support among Republicans represents a fresh warning sign for free-market conservatives and American companies such as manufacturers and financial firms that benefit from markets opening abroad.

Harwood has more to say about the interesting trends suggested by the new poll. Meanwhile, Dems can be encouraged by yet another indication that they are in solid position to win the support of a healthy chunk of moderate Republicans in November, ’08.

Democrats are raising some richly-deserved hell about Bush’s behind-closed-doors veto of legislation to increase funding for The State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). The bill would have increased the number of impoverished children covered from about 6.6 million children to more than 10 million.
Democrats are now organizing to override the veto. MyDD’s Todd Beeton reports that More than 200 “Rallies For Our Children’s Health” protesting the veto have been scheduled around the country by unions and progressive groups. The legislation passed the Senate by a veto-proof majority, including some conservative Republican Senators. But the bill is believed to be about 15 Republican votes short of the amount needed to override his veto in the House by the October 18 deadline.
An ABC News/Washington Post Poll conducted 9/27-30, found that 63 percent disapproved of Bush’s “handling of health care,” respondents favored Democrats “to do a better job of handling health care” by a margin of 56-26 percent and 72 percent supported the SCHIP increase (25 percent opposed), even when told that “opponents say this goes too far in covering children in families that can afford health insurance on their own.”
In other words, it is hard to imagine a more vulnerable veto for Dems to attack.
Glenn W. Smith, blogging at George Lakoff’s Rockridge Institute web pages, has an interesting idea — publicly asking those voting against the expanded SCHIP coverage to explain their vote to children “who cannot afford treatment for whooping cough or measles, luekemia or juvenile diabetes.”
In addition to the usual neocon ideologue drivel about “federalizing health care,” Bush argues that we can’t afford to insure just 3.4 million additional poor children this year, which would cost about $7 billion yearly, or about the cost of 41 days of the Iraq War. As Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Senator Edward M. Kennedy put it “Today we learned that the same president who is willing to throw away a half trillion dollars in Iraq is unwilling to spend a small fraction of that amount to bring health care to American children.”
Crediting Bush with fiscal responsibility on this issue is a huge stretch, explains blogger Hale “Bonddad” Steward in his HuffPo post, noting that “total federal outlays have increased from 18.5% of GDP in 2001 to 20.3% in 2006. That’s some fiscal prudence….Discretionary spending increased from $649.3 billion in 2001 to $1.016 trillion in 2006. That’s a 56.47% increase.”
Tobin Harshaw has a New York Times article revealing the lame white house rationale for the SCHIP veto. He quotes a white house source echoing Bush’s explanation the bill is a bad idea because it would raise (cigarette) taxes to add some adults and middle class kids to the coverage. Harshaw also quotes a Heritage Foundation blogger arguing that the bill favors “wealthier” states and another blogger complaining about the bill being funded by a cigarette tax hike of 39 cent per pack.
But don’t expect much GOP dissent among the GOP presidential candidates. As John McCain said in a CNN interview, “Right call by the president.” McCain also referred to the cigarette tax as a “phony smoke and mirrors way of paying for it.”
This is a good fight, well worth the Dems’ maximum firepower, and DCCC Chairman Chris Van Hollen has called for a district-by-district campaign to hold the R’s accountable, and radio ads are already running. Even if we fall short of the 15 Republican House votes needed, the override effort will dramatically brand the Democrats as the party that actually does something to help uninsured kids. Dems must make it loud and clear that health care for all kids is a critical element of real national security, and that this bill is a very modest beginning in that direction.
Every Republican opposed to the override should be cornered on their vote and called to explain the morality of denying less than 4 million poor kids decent health care at a cost equivalent to the cost of just 41 days of the Iraq war, while every member of congress has their families covered at tax payer expense. The squirming of GOP Presidential candidates under such intense scrutiny should make for entertaining YouTube clips.

If you tend to think of the progressive blogosphere as primarily an echo chamber in which lefty dittoheads are led around by celebrity bloggers, you should check out the raging debate going on at DailyKos over Markos Moulitsas’ condemnation of John Edwards’ decision to accept public financing. Markos’ four posts on the subject have drawn a total of 2,408 comments, which is a whole lot even for that very large site.
I haven’t had the time to read anything like all those comments, but get the feeling that overall sentiment is more or less equally divided between those who agree with Kos and those who don’t. Some of the debate tracks the broader blogospheric debate between partisan and ideological approaches; many Edwards supporters among the Kossacks basically consider him the only acceptably progressive major candidate, and consider Kos’ willingness to write him off as a surrender to a likely HRC nomination. But while there’s plenty of angry disagreement with Kos’ conclusions, there are very few Edwards supporters who are inclined to defend his public financing decision as a matter of principle rather than practical expediency. On the other hand, a DailyKos reader poll suggests that the decision, and Kos’ reaction to it, doesn’t seem to be changing many minds about the Edwards candidacy.

It’s Wonderful Wednesday for Senator Hillary Clinton, who’s dominating political news with a double-barreled accomplishment: third-quarter fundraising numbers that return her to the top of the money pack after trailing Barack Obama for a good while; and a new Washington Post/ABC national poll that shows her with the support of a majority of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents.
On the money front, Clinton raised $27 million in the third quarter as compared to Obama’s $19 million (though her margin shrinks to $3 million if you exclude funds usable only for the general election; and Obama continues to have a solid lead in overall primary fundraising). But the bigger news was that she topped Obama in the number of new donors. Up until now, Obama’s ability to raise money from a small-donor base has been one of the signatures of his campaign.
The new poll shows Clinton expanding her lead in the nominating contest from a 41-27 margin over Obama in the last Post-ABC survey a few weeks ago to a 53-20 margin today (Edwards remained stable at 13, with no other candidate exceeding 3%). But the poll’s internal numbers are what makes it potentially significant. Here’s how the Post‘s Chris Cillizza summarizes them:

Women continue to be the bedrock of Clinton’s campaign strength; she takes 57 percent among women compared to 15 percent for Obama and 13 percent for Edwards. But, among men, too, her numbers have ticked up considerably and she now leads Obama 48 percent to 26 percent. In the Post poll earlies this month, Clinton received just 29 percent among men while in our July survey she drew 40 percent among men.
Her numbers have also grown among self-identifying Democrats and Democratic leaning Independents. Among the former group, Clinton is now at 56 percent — a ten point increase from the Post’s early September poll — while among the latter her number has increased 16 points to 46 percent.
Clinton is ahead among every age group (55+ voters is where she runs strongest with 60 percent support), in every region of the country (65 percent in the Northeast) and at every education level (high school or less 59 percent). White voters favor Clinton 52 percent to 17 for Obama and 16 percent for Edwards; black voters go for Clinton over Obama 51 percent to 38 percent.

On top of everything else, 57% of poll respondents now think Clinton is the most “electable” Democrat, indicating that as we get closer to actual voting and electability concerns typically rise, she’s turned that liability around, for the moment at least.
You can stare at these numbers for a while and come up with a few potential HRC weaknesses (e.g., the likelihood that her standing among African-Americans might decline in a one-on-one competition with Obama), and an Iowa loss might well change everything–but in general, she’s looking very strong.
After a week in which most of the media coverage of Clinton rev-olved, believe it or not, around Deep Analysis of her distinctive laugh, you’d have to guess she enjoying a good, uninhibited belly laugh today.

MyDD’s Todd Beeton reports on the DCCC’s impressive radio ads and robo calls nailing 8 House Republican incumbents for voting No on SCHIP expansion. Most of the ads link their votes against SCHIP expansion to the House members hypocritical vote in favor of their generous health care plan for themselves, an issue which resonates strongly with many voters. For example, this one against FL-24’s GOP Rep. Tom Feeney:

Did you know Congressman Feeney gets health care at taxpayers’ expense, but Feeney and Bush are blocking health care for 10 million uninsured children? Tell Tom Feeney to put families first

A clever way to bring combined focus on two unpopular Republican votes. For more on the ad campaign, check the DCCC article on the ads here. See also Ted Kennedy’s post at HuffPo noting that taxpayers cover 72 percent of health care premiums for members of congress and the President.