Turnout was incredibly high, but Cruz benefited from two things that were not of his doing: 1) Trump hurting his own campaign by skipping the debate. A lot of voters indicated to pollsters that they changed from Trump at the last minute. Late deciders broke to Marco Rubio in big numbers. 2) Marco Rubio making a last minute effort in Iowa and stealing Trump votes. Rubio saw something that the media didn't and that was an opportunity to play for a strong finish. He also benefited apparently from stealing Carson voters at the last second by telling people at the caucus sites that Carson had dropped out of the race. Now, to Cruz's credit, he ran a hell of a campaign in Iowa and worked his tail off. I respect the hustle. He also played better in establishment counties than he should have and that is going to be concerning for Republicans going forward. With all of that said, Iowa was the state that Cruz was always supposed to win. Trump made serious inroads, but the experts had said he shouldn't even bother with the state because it was built for Cruz. This isn't a landmark victory. Huckabee turned out record number of voters as well when he won the state. The real battle is going to be about whether Cruz can dig into the business conservatives in other states or Rubio is going to start absorbing them en mass.
Just checking in to see who watched out last night, fellows, because as you can see, the move was made. Myself and my family were sufficiently cautioned, thanks in no small part to the this thread - I am happy to report, no significant damage done, due to the watching of the out.
Rubio came in third place. Really, there is no reason that Rubio should not have finished stronger in Iowa, or really why he shouldn't have won the state if Cruz is as weak and Rubio is as strong as some people seem to think that they are. Since memories are short, let's remember that Rubio consistently led Cruz in Iowa until the beginning of December 2015. You can see it on the graph linked below: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/2016_republican_presidential_nomination-3823.html Shortly before that, Rubio had started to attack Cruz, and when Cruz returned fire, especially on the amnesty issue, Rubio fell into decline and never recovered. Rubio has a ticket out of Iowa and a chance to make a major run at the presidential nomination this year. But he is very weak on the immigration issue and several other issues as well. He also has left an early impression of being disengaged and not really either willing or able to do what it takes to win this sort of a contest. Further, he sometimes comes across as weak and maybe too young or inexperienced or something. On the other hand, Cruz increasingly appears to be a political cage match fighter and a smart and eager one at that. Criticize that if you like, but Hillary Clinton will pull no punches in the general election and she will laugh at anyone who takes note of her not playing by the rules. For a Republican to win, the key is not going be to find the most bland, inoffensive, milktoast candidate the party can find, as the Republican establishment seems bent on, but rather to find someone who is ready to get a little nasty when the circumstances call for it, as Trump did with Hillary when she tried to 'Play the woman's card'. If Rubio cannot beat Cruz in the political octagon here over the next few months, with all that entails, then he will not be able to beat Hillary either. Cruz beat Rubio in Iowa, when as recently as 60 days ago, that did not appear likely to be the case. There is going to be an actual campaign here among these two (yes, I think it will come down to these two) and we have already seen the gloves come off during this first contest. Rubio is going to have to figure out a way to do better if he wants to beat Cruz. This is not just going to be a bunch of demographic groups mailing their votes in. This is going to be a fight and Rubio is going to have to fight to win. Is Marco Rubio ready to rumble with Ted Cruz? I am not so sure he is.
It is very clear you don't want him to be after that spin fest. Religious conservatives, Cruz's bread and butter, were in high supply in Iowa. College-educated voters broke strongly for Rubio, as did voters deciding within the last day before the caucuses. The establishment will now fully move away from Bush, to someone else. So we'll see how it plays out.
I'm not sure you know how to use the website you linked to? The one you linked to is the national polling data. Here is Iowa only: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...iowa_republican_presidential_caucus-3194.html Rubio never led Cruz in Iowa. Rubio is not built for Iowa. You are correct that he is "weak" on immigration for ultra conservatives. Fortunately for him those voters don't dominate all the states like they do in Iowa.
In fact, in Mid-December Cruz was either tied with or leading Trump and Rubio was in the low teens. The RCP average of Iowa was: Trump 28.6 Cruz 23.9 and Rubio 16.9 The story of Iowa is that both Rubio and Cruz siphoned votes from Trump after he flubbed at the end. It's a good win for Cruz of course, but this is a state he was essentially always 1 or 2 except for a small blip by Carson. Rubio outperforming his polls and essentially getting the same numbers Romney got is more impressive considering he didn't even play in Iowa until the last minute.
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You don't seem to understand that this is how polling works. A poll is a snapshot of opinion at a moment in time, Silver aggregates these to create predicted probabilities as of that moment in time. Of course they're measured on the prediction immediately before the election, that's when they have the most data to go on.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Cruz is first candidate of Hispanic heritage to ever win a US presidential primary <a href="https://t.co/Hv7u9XCfsI">https://t.co/Hv7u9XCfsI</a></p>— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) <a href="https://twitter.com/jaketapper/status/694559559403343872">February 2, 2016</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Yet the liberal media is not focusing on this. Contrast that to Obama...the first bi-racial president
This is a sign of progress...... but I think the fact that he is the first foreigner, son of a pro-Castro revolutionary to win a primary is far more important.
Ted Cruz can't even speak Spanish. George W is more hispanic than Cruz. BTW, Latin Americans HATE Cubans so he's got that going for hm.
Does this resonate with anybody? I think it's more meaningful, though, to point out he's the first Cuban-American to win a primary. I think that's historic in its own right and a good sign for our democracy. But I think it's reaching to try to manufacture some kind of common bond between Cruz and the American hispanics hailing from Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. The heritage and politics of Cuban-Americans is so different.
I'm a little surprised to see MojoMan (not really) freaking out about Cruz's win. This is the state where Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee won caucuses. Things are going to be quite a bit different going forward. I think the obvious big winner is Rubio. Cruz and Trump have a limited ceiling considering a lot of their voters constitute the crazy vote whereas I think Rubio's ceiling, as the moderate, is much higher.
