On the night of the Iowa caucus, Obama received support from approximately 38% percent of Democrats who participated in the event. For the Democratic Party in general, there was a 90% increase in caucus-goers, showing that not only avid advocates of politics voted, but also people who generally avoid the time-consuming process. As for Obama, his message of change successfully motivated the youth--Americans between the ages of 18 and 30 who seldom vote--to come out in masses that rivaled the elderly. According to CNN news, Hillary is now trying to the court young voters in New Hampshire after seeing Obama's tactic prove valuable. After the results of the caucus, Obama delivered one of his characteristic speeches full of hope and enthusiasm and asserted that he hopes the Iowa win exemplifies one of, “the most American of ideas — that in the face of impossible odds, people who love this country can change it.” In addition to young voters, Obama also received support from a notable number of independents, a trend that could really help him in New Hampshire since a significant percentage of the state’s residents consider themselves independents. According to some entrance polls in Iowa, Obama actually received more support from older women than Senator Clinton. The outcome of the caucus serves as reinforcement for the Obama campaign to continue with the themes of change, hope and unity. The current front-runner, surmised the situation by commenting, “We won union and non-union, we won men and women, black and white, we gave thousands of people who'd never participated in politics before a reason to believe." After the Iowa caucus, Senator Obama criticized Hillary, a source of major competition, for her efforts to tailor her campaign in the last few days before the New Hampshire primary by saying “We don't need more heat. We need more light.” Interestingly, in an appearance on TV, Edwards conveyed an idea that he considers himself the other “change candidate" and asses that the fight for the democratic nomination will now center on he and Obama—not Obama and Clinton. A new poll presented by the Concord Monitor showed that Obama has come within a statistical error of Hillary’s New Hampshire lead and the article’s author attributed his success not only to Iowa but also to Obama’s visit a few weeks ago where he received a lot of local press. While Obama has begun to kick up the campaigning in New Hampshire, many political analysts have begun to project the ramifications of a second Obama victory on this coming Tuesday.
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2 comments:
So relating to Carlson's podcast, will Obama be able to continue and build his momentum from Iowa into New Hampshire? Carlson discussed the short period between the two events, and how that will limit the momentum for the winners. It seems Obama peaked at the right time anyways, so I don't think his campaign is as worried about the momentum from Iowa. Basically, it appears Iowa will influence the Democratic New Hampshire primary, because Obama is continuing his momentum, and it seems to have been a big boost to get that decisive of a vote over fellow front runners. However, Iowa's impact upon NH will remain to be seen.
It will be interesting to see if Obama can keep his lead in New Hampshire and if he does i think he will be very hard to beat in the rest of the primaries. Another thing to watch will be Clinton and how her points are effected by her placing third and losing to Edwards. i don't think many people saw this coming and
i think now Clinton is going to have to change something in her campaign very quickly or else Obama may run away with the nomination with help from Edwards.
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