Iowa is a “threshold test” for conservatives such as Representative Bachmann, notes polling expert Nate Silver in his FiveThirtyEight blog. It’s necessary that they do well there, though a good performance may not be sufficient to push them over the top.
Now Bachmann has to be considered the favorite to win the Iowa caucuses early next year, according to Mr. Silver.
Bachmann was there too – she was not about to cede her home turf of Waterloo, Iowa, without a fight. But she stayed in her bus until it was time for her to take the stage, according to reporters who were there. After an initial introduction by a local official, she was still nowhere to be found, according to Ben Smith and Jonathan Martin of Politico. It took a second introduction to get her up to the microphone.
“By the time she made her big entrance to bright lights and blaring music, the crowd seemed puzzled,” wrote Messrs. Smith and Martin.
But this single incident isn’t the only thing that’s created a buzz about Perry’s perceived abilities on the stump.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry released his first videos, proclaiming the Republican theme that President Obama has a failing record on job creation and in how he handled a difficult economy.
Even as the president arrived in Cannon Falls, Minn., to launch his three-day bus tour to explain what his administration had done to stimulate jobs, small business and economic development particularly in rural areas, Republicans wasted no time attacking Obama.
In his video ad, Perry claimed to be “America’s jobs governor,” touting his efforts to create jobs in Texas. Eschewing subtlety, the Perry video showed a rising sun to illustrate the narrator’s promise that hope was on the horizon.
In addition to jobs, the narrator sounds the additional GOP political themes that “record debt and our president’s refusal to control spending led to our nation’s credit rating being downgraded for the first time in history.”
In an interview with the Associated Press, Perry also trumpeted his economic record in Texas, which he said was better than those of his principal rivals, Mitt Romney and Rep. Michele Bachmann.
“I respect all the other candidates in the field," Perry said, "but there is no one that can stand toe to toe with us.”
Former Massachusetts Gov. Romney, considered to be the leader in the race for the GOP presidential nomination, also complained about the Obama record, attacking the president’s bus tour.
Calling the visit a “Magical Misery” tour, Romney’s ad featured Minnesotans saying they would rather Obama stayed in Washington and “do something about jobs” than visit the state.
Obama’s bus trip takes him through Minnesota, Iowa and his home state of Illinois.
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