Outside the Iowa State University stadium queues snaked over the concrete as party activists waited patiently to pick up the food provided free by the candidates. Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann served up corn dogs, Texan Congressman Ron Paul's team gave out hotdogs, former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty's campaign handed out barbecued ribs to his supporters.
In between the grand marquees of the candidates, smaller tents held lobbies for favourite conservative causes - pro-life, anti-tax, gun rights - as Iowans wandered through, taking in Christian rock, country music and lots and lots of political chat and Obama-baiting.
But it was inside the grey university stadium that the biggest chunks of red meat were served up. Speeches to the Republican faithful are not for the politically fainthearted.
Libertarian Ron Paul got some of the biggest cheers of the day with his isolationist challenge to an overstretched America.
"We need to defend our borders and forget about the borders in Afghanistan and Pakistan," called out to his supporters. "It is time to bring the troops back home.
Michele Bachmann winning the Ames straw poll Saturday. You didn't have to be a registered voter to cast a ballot - just an Iowa resident over 18 years old in possession of a $30 ticket and a pulse.
Or how the campaigns bused Iowans in from every corner of the state, entertained them with A-list bands, fed them delicacies such as "hot beef sundaes," pressed a ticket in their hand if they didn't have one and, in the case of Bachmann's well-oiled campaign, drove them from the bus to the voting booth in a golf cart.
It was a first-inning snapshot of how the United States elects a president in 2011. But the results of Saturday's conservative-a-palooza carnival on the Iowa State University campus was of limited use to Californian Republicans.
The results were intended to show which campaigns have the organizational strength to compete in the top tier of candidates, and Bachmann is expected to get a short-term fundraising boost.
The Iowa native, who campaigned relentlessly in Iowa for weeks, won 28.5 percent of the vote, narrowly beating Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, who pulled 27.6 percent. Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty finished third, with 13.5 percent.
Early poll front-runner, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman were on the ballot but barely campaigned. Romney received 567 votes, while Gingrich and Huntsman received only 385 and 69 votes, respectively.
Perry gets write-ins
Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who officially began his campaign Saturday in South Carolina, was not on the ballot but received more write-in votes (718) than the other three non-campaigners.
The big winner: the Iowa GOP. It's their major fundraiser of the year.
In California, where the GOP primary isn't until June, Ames is only a sliver of what donors will consider when deciding to where to direct their support.
"The grassroots activists and major donors are already being courted here," the California Republican Party chairman, Tom Del Beccaro, said Saturday. "But what happens this weekend isn't likely to change anything about that over the next three months."
Saturday's results show "that if you can't get people to vote for you if you give them beef sandwiches and peach jam, then you really don't have much of a campaign," said Harmeet Dhillon, chair of the San Francisco Republican Party. Bob Schuman, a San Diego public relations consultant who chairs Americans for Rick Perry, said "This probably matters more for (the primary next year in) New Hampshire than anything." He was one of a number of Perry operatives who helped the Texan receive 718 write-in votes, symbolic to them because it bested Romney's 593.
The campaigns bid for space to pitch huge tents around campus, with Paul posting the high offer of $31,000 to occupy much of a high-traffic courtyard.
Country star Randy Travis performed at Bachmann's tent, where supporters waited for more than an hour to get inside the poll's only air-conditioned space. Family friends of Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania spread scoops of his family's home-canned peach jam on crackers.
Herman Cain, the former Godfather's Pizza CEO, offered slices of his former employer's product and sang a gospel tune backed by former Iowa caucus winner Mike Huckabee.
Cain's choice: "Hold on Just a Little While Longer." Apt, considering he received 8 percent of the vote Saturday. He scored much better than guitar-playing Rep. Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan, who received only 35 votes Saturday.
No comments:
Post a Comment