Iowa garners an awful lot of attention as the first-in-the-nation caucus state for both parties and 2013 has been no exception. I suppose the only caveat is that politicians are spending a huge amount of time in the Hawkeye State for an election three years away and, in our world of instant gratification, things change in an instant.
Report from the Washington Post:
Blink and you might have missed the start of the 2016 presidential campaign in the first-in-the-nation caucus state.
It will ramp up in the next couple of days with several events featuring the likes of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), Rick Santorum, and Emily’s List, a group that works to elect women who support abortion rights, and has launched a campaign to elect a female president.
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As we’ve written on this blog time and again, no politician goes to Iowa by accident. It just doesn’t happen. So as high-profile pols make the rounds in the Hawkeye State along the way to 2016, it’s worth tuning into who is going and how often they are stopping by.
Cruz and Santorum are both certainly running. Santorum ended up winning the Iowa caucuses in 2012 by literally 34 votes over Mitt Romney so what does he have to lose in trying again? Ted Cruz, on the other hand, seems to have the “heat” as of late on the Republican side. One can only ask whether Cruz could be peaking too early or can he use the current support to begin building a coalition and a long-term campaign.
I’m sure Hillary Clinton will schedule some Iowa visits soon but there certainly isn’t the depth of competition on the Democratic side as there will be among Republican ranks heading into primary season.
