Well Cruz won big over Trump (any win over Trump is "big") in Iowa last night... and what do we take away from that?
1. Trump was complacent.
Relatively speaking, Trump did not appear to be working this as hard as Cruz. I understand that Cruz made a visit to every Iowa county.
In a state that loves political seduction, that accomplishment was very big with a great visual and a solid story to tell.
2. Cruz out-organized everybody.
Let that be a lesson to you: having a literal political army of workers and volunteers dedicated to identifying and then getting out your own vote is now a requirement. Those who fail to do so make that decision at their peril.
I've heard that as many as 1000 staff, workers and volunteers were out there for Cruz... a ratio of roughly 18 caucus-goers to one campaign worker.
That's an impressive number. Given the GOP caucus goer universe, a similar effort here in Clark County would require a group roughly around 750, given 140,000 GOP voters.
Of course, that mechanism would be difficult to run properly in a state where party registration is not required. That's what makes voter identification so important around here.
Nevertheless, given Trump's advantages in money and earned media, there's really zero excuse for his failure to organize a ground game... that SHOULD have been the best ever seen. That means he either got bad advice... or he got good advice and refused to take it.
Sometimes, a cult of personality simply isn't enough.
3. Besides Rubio, the best course of action would be for every other RINO (Bush, Kasich and Christie) to bail out. Huckabee called it a day. I've also heard that Gilmore is gone.
Their votes, combined, would likely have gone to Rubio which would have put him over the top instead of 3rd.
Drudge is reporting that Bush actually blew $2880 PER VOTE.
Take a chill pill, Jebbie. You and the other establishment types are over.
4. A divided universe, no matter how angry, is no more effective than a complacent, happy universe.
Face it: the anger out there is palpable. As I forecast yesterday, the anti-establishment vote met or exceeded the 60% figure.
But the division there mirrored the GOP division here.
Had our local RINO element avoided selling us out to the democrats, we would have a GOP county council chair instead of this left wing idiot, Boldt, and we'd never have heard of the Three Stooges and Boldt would not have been able to restore two years of his tax increases on us so quickly.
5. Polls towards the top of the player card are not worth much in Iowa.
No one that I saw had Cruz polling with what turned out to be anything close to his final number.
Bad polling? Out of date (stale?) polling? Bad models?
Even the entrance polling to these events was way off, showing Trump at 27 and Cruz at 22.
Bad polling is worse than no polling at all.
Conclusion:
I was going to say that Trump should have gone to the debate. But even if he had, given his other technical weaknesses, would it have made that much of a difference?
I doubt it. Some, perhaps, but likely not enough to overcome Cruz's advantage in ground game.
A great looking plane, poorly engineered, is likely doomed to fall out of the sky if the nuts and bolts are missing.
Trump's biggest failure was Caucus turn out. Had he put the mechanism in place to get HIS voters to the caucuses, there might have been a different outcome.
Time will tell. Next stop New Hampshire.
1. Trump was complacent.
Relatively speaking, Trump did not appear to be working this as hard as Cruz. I understand that Cruz made a visit to every Iowa county.
In a state that loves political seduction, that accomplishment was very big with a great visual and a solid story to tell.
2. Cruz out-organized everybody.
Let that be a lesson to you: having a literal political army of workers and volunteers dedicated to identifying and then getting out your own vote is now a requirement. Those who fail to do so make that decision at their peril.
I've heard that as many as 1000 staff, workers and volunteers were out there for Cruz... a ratio of roughly 18 caucus-goers to one campaign worker.
That's an impressive number. Given the GOP caucus goer universe, a similar effort here in Clark County would require a group roughly around 750, given 140,000 GOP voters.
Of course, that mechanism would be difficult to run properly in a state where party registration is not required. That's what makes voter identification so important around here.
Nevertheless, given Trump's advantages in money and earned media, there's really zero excuse for his failure to organize a ground game... that SHOULD have been the best ever seen. That means he either got bad advice... or he got good advice and refused to take it.
Sometimes, a cult of personality simply isn't enough.
3. Besides Rubio, the best course of action would be for every other RINO (Bush, Kasich and Christie) to bail out. Huckabee called it a day. I've also heard that Gilmore is gone.
Their votes, combined, would likely have gone to Rubio which would have put him over the top instead of 3rd.
Drudge is reporting that Bush actually blew $2880 PER VOTE.
Take a chill pill, Jebbie. You and the other establishment types are over.
4. A divided universe, no matter how angry, is no more effective than a complacent, happy universe.
Face it: the anger out there is palpable. As I forecast yesterday, the anti-establishment vote met or exceeded the 60% figure.
But the division there mirrored the GOP division here.
Had our local RINO element avoided selling us out to the democrats, we would have a GOP county council chair instead of this left wing idiot, Boldt, and we'd never have heard of the Three Stooges and Boldt would not have been able to restore two years of his tax increases on us so quickly.
5. Polls towards the top of the player card are not worth much in Iowa.
No one that I saw had Cruz polling with what turned out to be anything close to his final number.
Bad polling? Out of date (stale?) polling? Bad models?
Even the entrance polling to these events was way off, showing Trump at 27 and Cruz at 22.
Bad polling is worse than no polling at all.
Conclusion:
I was going to say that Trump should have gone to the debate. But even if he had, given his other technical weaknesses, would it have made that much of a difference?
I doubt it. Some, perhaps, but likely not enough to overcome Cruz's advantage in ground game.
A great looking plane, poorly engineered, is likely doomed to fall out of the sky if the nuts and bolts are missing.
Trump's biggest failure was Caucus turn out. Had he put the mechanism in place to get HIS voters to the caucuses, there might have been a different outcome.
Time will tell. Next stop New Hampshire.
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