The power rankings are vindicated (sorta)! Obama's the man! Joy in mudville!

The Des Moines Register poll was also more right than wrong: it predicted a 7-point victory for Obama. They had Clinton and Edwards a point apart but had the order wrong.

Obama!

Did I say: Obama!

I'm violating my no blogging while boozing rule, but GO OBAMA!!!!

Truly exciting! What I saw tonight was the same thing that attracted me to Obama when I saw him in Florida early last last year: this is the candidate who will bring transformational change and repair our standing in the world. With Bush, we've lost eight critical years. Obama is the candidate best suited to aggressively go after our most pressing issues: climate change, ending the war, bringing health care to all Americans. We need a candidate who can not just fight the good fight, but get shit done.

And Obama can win BIG: there's no other candidate I'd rather have at the top of the ticket if I'm running a tough race in Florida, Ohio, or out West. One thought about Edwards, because although I'm with Obama, I really appreciate the race he's run. If he'd run in 2004 like he had in 2008, we'd probably be coming from a re-election party tonight. But timing matters, and Obama is the one for 2008. I think Obama's looking good to win the whole thing. Happy caucus night, all.

I'm highly skeptical of the entrance/exit polls. It's nearly impossible to geographically hit enough places to get a statistical sample that makes sense.

Note that CNN isn't reporting what the overall totals were from their entrance/exit polls. I'm guessing that's because it doesn't match the actual results.

These data are pretty interesting. One random thing you might otherwise miss--the distribution of ideology among parties.

Republicans
Very conservative - 45%
Somewhat conservative - 43%
Total - 88%
Moderate and liberal - 12%
Dems Very liberal - 18% Somewhat liberal - 36% Total - 54% Moderate and conservative - 46%

The GOP, at least if Iowa's any example, has reaped what it has sown--it is now a fringe party catering only to the far and radical right.

Kari, I'll look at it more closely tomorrow, but in the past, the entrance polls have been highly accurate. Maybe CNN's methodology isn't up to snuff, but there's no reason to dismiss the type of polling itself.

It's a good win for Obama and Huckabee. Obama's victory speech was remarkable. Nevertheless, I'd caution against reading too much into these results.

Winning Iowa and and possibly New Hampshire will help Obama with his national fundraising, but this a national election for the first time in a long time. Clinton has advantages over Obama in New York and Florida. Obama needs California and Michigan to remain competitive past March. If Clinton wins either of those states, Obama will be playing for second place.

Huckabee appears the guy for the Republicans, but he doesn't appear to have much money of his own.

Romney was a decent second and is somewhat better positioned than Huckabee to run a national campaign.

Giuliani will also be a major factor if he can win in New York, New Jersey, and Florida.

I find the reported voting pattern of the few GOPers who caucused with the Dems very interesting. You'd think that a GOPer willing to cross party lines would be more open to Hillary. But she did very badly among those crossover caucusers while Obama did fantastic with them.

Obama is the man!

The other thing I find even more fascinating is how poorly Edwards' message seems to have done among the poor. As you go up in income brackets so too did his percentage increase. I expected his message to resonate among the lower income classes much better than it seems to have.

Obama needs California and Michigan to remain competitive past March.

WTF are you talking about, Sal? Obama's not on the ballot in Michigan. Neither is Edwards. Or Richardson. It's just Hillary, Kucinich, and Gravel in Michigan. Why? Because their primary is breaking the DNC's rules - and their delegate count has been zeroed out.

You'd think that a GOPer willing to cross party lines would be more open to Hillary.

Actually, all the GOPers that I've talked to who are considering voting Dem are either voting for Obama or Edwards. They all hate Hillary. And they're unhappy with their choices from their own party.

Obama has done remarkably well across the board & congrats to him. If Jeff and others are right on the other thread & this ends up putting paid to Edwards' candidacy, I'll be supporting Obama.

It is interesting to note however that Clinton did nearly as well among independents as Obama (41% vs. Obama's 43%), and her I% is much higher than her overall, compared to Obama's which is higher but much closer. This suggests that the I turnout in D caucuses may have partly had a dynamic like that Jenni describes for disaffected Rs & can't be attributed purely to Obama's draw for Is.

Posted by: Chris Lowe | Jan 4, 2008 1:06:19 AM It is interesting to note however that Clinton did nearly as well among independents as Obama (41% vs. Obama's 43%)

I am not sure what numbers you are referring to (nor what Blue Oregon is either for that matter). The ones posted here are Obama beating Clinton for the independent vote 41% - 37%, but those numbers do not jive with the linked CNN page. The actual CNN data shown on their site at the link shows Obama destroying Clinton on the independent breakdown, garnering 41% vs. 17%. In fact Obama beats both Clinton and Edwards combined in his percentage of the independent vote (Clinton 17%, Edwards 23%).

the number that jumps out is turnout: 220,000. that's 100k more than 2004, the "most important election of our lifetime" when anti-Bush feeling was so strong. this time, the campaigns had trained their people relentlessly on how to do caucus -- getting there, getting sorted, getting results. and they focused like frikkin' laser beams on turnout (both Hillary & Obama suspended campaigning so their people could work on gotv, and, i suspect, to get a good long sleep in).

i heard, but have not seen, that Obama got 25% of all votes cast, and Edwards & Hillary got 20%. if this is true, it bodes very well for the Dems. we may be seeing a turning point, not just the desire for change, for a people-oriented politics & govt (that desire was there 4 years ago for Dean) but the understanding that to make it happen — to prevent future Bush's — people will actually have to get off their butts and vote. 4 years ago, they really wanted change. too many people didn't do anything about it, and they now understand the share of the blame that belongs to them. this year, at least last night, they got up and went out to vote.

and given the number of young voters who did so, and who went for Obama, this can only be seen as a very good thing — um, unless you're a Republican.

g'Obama!

The ones posted here are Obama beating Clinton for the independent vote 41% - 37%, but those numbers do not jive with the linked CNN page. The actual CNN data shown on their site at the link shows Obama destroying Clinton on the independent breakdown, garnering 41% vs. 17%.

That was input-er error. I've corrected it.

t.a., I'd like to believe what you say, but the financial numbers undercut a claim that this represents "people" politics.

80 million dollars. 212,000 voters.

$377 per Democratic caucus goer.

Damn straight they had high turnout, given those expenditures.

Feb 5th will let us know what the country really thinks.

Paul, don't you think that's a little simplistic? Money is definitely in politics and you'll always be able to attach a high value to the cost per vote. But the reason its so high in Iowa is because the caucus system is geared toward involved participants. Democracy seems more safe in the hands of people who have personal contact with the candidates and then spend an evening with their peers discussing it. Isn't that the heart of "people" politics, at least compared to the system whereby extremely casual voters gather their information only from Jon Stewart and ads?