Minneapolis Star Tribune, MN
12-22-07
In Iowa, all is calm, but just for a couple of days
By BOB VON STERNBERG, Star Tribune
And now, at last, the Christmas cease-fire.
All across Iowa, weary from the long, relentless presidential campaign, phones
will stop ringing, knocks on the front door will tail off and TV ads will lighten up, in
more ways than one.
But only for the next two days. Then, the rush will resume to the campaign's first
finish line -- Iowa's precinct caucuses on Jan. 3 -- as candidates emerge from an
unprecedented campaign hiatus that has left them perplexed how to handle a
holiday that fits badly with politics.
David Axelrod, senior adviser to Democrat Barack Obama, acknowledged the
quandary last month. "It's tricky," he said. "You spend 10 months trying to be
Santa Claus and you don't want to wind up being the Grinch, stealing Christmas
and invading people's privacy."
Old Iowa political hands emphatically agree. "This is a state that appreciates
some decorum, so the campaigns absolutely have to pull back," said Dave
Nagle, a Democrat who was a prime architect in giving the caucuses their first-inthe-nation primacy in the 1972 campaign. "But just for two days. It'd be a gigantic
political mistake not to step right back up on the 26th."
A decidedly milder tone in a campaign that had grown increasingly nasty could
be seen in recent days. The campaigns rolled out a new slate of soft-and-fuzzy
ads in Iowa and New Hampshire. Some took the form of video Christmas cards
(Obama, Rudy Giuliani, Hillary Clinton and Mike Huckabee); others engaged in
more general gauzy uplift (Joe Biden, John McCain and Mitt Romney).
All is calm, but briefly
The break will be brief because of a campaign calender that has been crazily
compressed into the very beginning of 2008. After more than two dozen states
jammed their primaries and caucuses into January and early February, Iowa and
New Hampshire landed on dates in the new year's first week.
So the candidates have had little choice but to campaign right up to Christmas,
despite complaints from some Democratic volunteers last weekend that people
were tied up with the holidays.
Most candidates planned to campaign until late Saturday night in either Iowa or
New Hampshire and then suspend appearances until Wednesday. The
exceptions are Obama, who planned to hit the pause button late tonight in
Council Bluffs, and Chris Dodd, whose final appearance is scheduled for just
after midnight tonight. (Obama and Dodd aren't even heading home for the
holidays; they're staying in Iowa.)
Campaign schedules and Iowa news stories show that Democrats Clinton,
Obama, Biden and Bill Richardson will be back on the trail in Iowa on
Wednesday, as will Republicans Fred Thompson and McCain. Returning to the
state the next day will be Edwards and Republicans Huckabee, Romney and Ron
Paul.
"If a candidate comes up with something new between the 26th and the 31st,
they might just break out," Nagle said. "There's always time to do that in Iowa.
This thing is a 100-yard sprint to the end and in all my years, I've never seen
such a degree of volatility -- in both parties."
Rough stuff ahead
Recent polls show just how unpredictable the outcomes remain. For months,
Romney cruised as the overwhelming frontrunner on the GOP side, bolstered by
heavy spending and meticulous organization. Seemingly overnight, that lead
evaporated as Huckabee shot to the top in the state, propelled by support from
the party's large cohort of evangelical Christians.
"Huckabee's sort of already won here," said Steffen Schmidt, an Iowa State
University political scientist. "He moved up so far and fast in Iowa it almost
doesn't matter how he does on Jan. 3. He's gotten a pre-caucus bounce that's
amazing and can only help him in New Hampshire, South Carolina and
nationally."
On the Democratic side, the polls show that both Clinton and Edwards have lost
leads they once held and that the three-way race with Obama is essentially too
close to call.
With the race in such a chaotic state, the nine-day dash that starts Wednesday is
all the more crucial.
Arthur Sanders, chair of the politics department at Drake University, sees a quick
descent into negative campaigning ahead. "Romney has to attack because he
can't afford not to," he said. "When someone rises as quickly as Huckabee has,
his support can't be that deep. It'll be trickier for the Democrats. You point out
someone's weakness, but people decide you're nasty."
During the coming endgame, Schmidt said, media buys and big rallies will miss
the point. "This should be a time of one-on-one organizing, of funneling all your
effort toward the people who will caucus," he said.
In the end, who does the Christmas pause benefit?
"Whoever's in first place," said Drake's Sanders. "But at this point, we don't know
who's in first."
Staff writer Patricia Lopez and the Washington Post contributed to this report.
Bob von Sternberg • 612-673-7184