Iowa opts for electability, not Dean

Last Monday night in Iowa the Democrats began the delegate
selection process, which will eventually determine the candidate
who will run against President Bush in November.

The Iowa caucuses mark the beginning of a whirlwind campaign
that moves on to New Hampshire on Tuesday, and will continue until
one candidate gains a majority of the delegates in the 2004
Convention.

Going into Iowa, Howard Dean was considered the clear
front-runner. He raised more money than his opponents, garnered the
support of 500,000 volunteers and secured the endorsements of
several powerful Democrats, including Al Gore and Bill Bradley. And
he was leading in every national poll.

After Monday’s caucuses, however, the dynamics of the race
have been altered dramatically. With John Kerry’s stunning
victory and the distant third-place finish of Dean, the pundits are
scrambling to re-handicap the battle for the Democratic
nomination.

Why was the Dean express derailed in Iowa?

The most significant reason for the upset of Dean has to do with
the stunning pragmatism of Iowa Democrats. Polls discovered that
electability was most often cited by caucus-goers as the main
reason for their vote. In other words, Iowans who voted Monday
night were most concerned with choosing the candidate they felt had
the best chance of defeating President Bush in the general
election. A candidate’s stand on the issues was less
important.

In the two weeks leading up to the caucus, when most Iowans
started to pay attention and admitted to making up their minds,
Howard Dean looked anything but presidential. He snapped at a voter
during a debate. He got involved in a nasty war of words with Dick
Gephardt.

The anger that has inspired his faithful followers started to
scare many undecided voters.

Aside from these recent troubles, many Iowans who really began
to study the candidates and what they had to offer concluded that
Dean might be burdened with other, more fundamental flaws that
would make him an inferior opponent in November.

Maybe Dean would appear too extreme to attract the centrist
swing voters that are necessary for either party to win among such
an evenly divided electorate. Kerry, and to a lesser extent John
Edwards, seemed to benefit from this calculation about Dean and his
chances against Bush.

If Dean’s third-place finish was primarily a function of a
lack of electability, then ordinary voters in Iowa would only be
following in the footsteps of the political elite during the past
three decades. The trick for parties during the nominating process
has been to find a candidate who is ideological enough to satisfy
the base, but moderate enough not to alienate swing voters.

Erring on the ideological side can be very costly. Barry
Goldwater and George McGovern were both the favored candidates of
their respective parties and best represented the ideologies of
those parties at the time. Both were massacred in the general
election. 

Since then, there have been many examples of constituent groups
voting with their heads rather than their hearts. In 1984,
African-American voters in the South heeded the wishes of prominent
black leaders and gave Walter Mondale most of their votes, rather
than Jesse Jackson.

In 1992, the powerful unions shunned Tom Harkin in favor of Bill
Clinton. Harkin was better on labor issues, but the unions wanted
to win. They reasoned that they were better off with their second
choice, Clinton, who was more likely to get elected.

On the Republican side, Christian conservatives became very
pragmatic in 1996 and 2000. A majority mobilized for Bob Dole and
George W. Bush. In both races, there were candidates who could have
been friendlier to the agenda of the Christian right, but once
again, Dole and Bush were seen as better bets to win the general
election.

All of these groups calculated that it was much more important
to win with an ideologically inferior choice than to lose with
their number one guy.

So, what does this mean for the rest of the nomination race?
Will Democrats in other states follow Iowa’s lead and base
their vote on electability? Or will they vote their hearts no
matter what? I believe electability will continue to trump
ideology. Democrats of all stripes agree wholeheartedly that
President Bush must be evicted from the White House. Bush’s
recent State of the Union address only served to reinforce those
sentiments.

If Democrats want to win in November. If they want to win more
than anything, they will try to select the candidate that gives
them the best chance of defeating the incumbent president. It may
be Kerry, with his heroic military record, it may be John Edwards,
with his Southern roots, or it may be Wesley Clark, who possesses
both. One person it will not be is someone who will serve as a
punching bag for President Bush and Karl Rove.

Democrats in New Hampshire, Delaware, South Carolina, Michigan,
California, Pennsylvania and so on, would be wise to pay attention
to a seemingly off-handed comment made by Rove a few months ago,
when Dean was emerging as the Democratic front-runner. Rove was so
excited about the prospect of facing Governor Dean in the
presidential campaign that he mused aloud about supporting his
campaign.

Something tells me Karl Rove would not be as confident about a
challenge from Kerry, Edwards or Clark. If Democrats continue to
vote with their heads (and opt for electability), instead of their
hearts, that is exactly what he’ll get.

Cohen is a graduate student in the political science
department.