If you care about the Democrat race for the presidential nomination, you are focused now on the Iowa caucuses. Iowa is the first state to vote. That makes it important. But, is Iowa actually important? Does it matter?
There are two answers here, the media answer and reality. There not necessarily the same answer.
The media makes Iowa all important until the day after the caucuses. Then New Hampshire is all important. As the calendar moves forward, the media forgets all about Iowa.
Reality, however, is that Iowa is really not important for a variety of reasons.
1. Hardly anyone actually votes. In 2016 when Bernie and Hillary were locked in a tough contest, the number of Iowans who voted in the Democrat caucus was about 12% of the number who voted for president on election day. Think about that for a minute. A tiny slice of Iowa voters actually cared enough to come out and vote at the caucus.
2. Not many delegates are at stake. Iowa will send less than 1% of the delegates going to the Democrat national convention. They will almost never be the margin of victory for a candidate.
3. The winner can get a media boost. All those headlines about how X won can help. Even so, in the last 10 contested Iowa caucuses, the winner ultimately got the nomination only 6 times. The win can help, but not all that much.
It's interesting to see who wins in Iowa, but that's about it. It
s interesting, but not crucial.
There are two answers here, the media answer and reality. There not necessarily the same answer.
The media makes Iowa all important until the day after the caucuses. Then New Hampshire is all important. As the calendar moves forward, the media forgets all about Iowa.
Reality, however, is that Iowa is really not important for a variety of reasons.
1. Hardly anyone actually votes. In 2016 when Bernie and Hillary were locked in a tough contest, the number of Iowans who voted in the Democrat caucus was about 12% of the number who voted for president on election day. Think about that for a minute. A tiny slice of Iowa voters actually cared enough to come out and vote at the caucus.
2. Not many delegates are at stake. Iowa will send less than 1% of the delegates going to the Democrat national convention. They will almost never be the margin of victory for a candidate.
3. The winner can get a media boost. All those headlines about how X won can help. Even so, in the last 10 contested Iowa caucuses, the winner ultimately got the nomination only 6 times. The win can help, but not all that much.
It's interesting to see who wins in Iowa, but that's about it. It
s interesting, but not crucial.
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