The unpredictability of the Iowa caucuses

Jay Cost has a good column explaining how we really have not idea what is going to happen at the Iowa caucuses. First of all, the polling we're already seeing on Iowa is more inexact than most polls because pollsters have a hard time determining who the likely participants are in the caucuses. Since participation involves a heavy commitment of time for that one evening, many who tell pollsters that they will turn out, may decide to stay home on that particular evening. And then the caucuses are conducted totally unlike regular voting. Participants move into the corner to show support for their chosen candidate. Then they spend a half hour playing Red Rover trying to convince others to join them in their corner. Who knows how strong any candidate's supporters may be as they try to withstand the peer pressure and arguments coming from others in the room with them. Then there is the fact that only those candidates with 15% support in that room get votes in the caucus. So, all those who were supporting nonviable candidates for that room have to choose another candidate. Pollsters have a hard time figuring out whom people's second choice is. And, as Cost points out, it may be that a candidate may be viable in one location and not viable in another. So polls of people across the state won't capture that.

In short, it's near impossible to capture in polls what will happen on that January evening.

And so, we are left with what I think is a relatively unpredictable event. We can be sure that Clinton, Obama, or Edwards will win the Iowa caucus. And maybe if the polls come to show a large and consistent break toward one candidate or the other - we might be able to say more than this. But, at this point, with the differences between these three candidates in the RCP average being only about 10%, I do not think we can say more than the victor in Iowa will be one of these three.

And of course, there is a similar phenomenon in the GOP race. And it must drive pundits crazy to not have some handy-dandy poll telling them that exactly what will happen. But the real truth is that we just don't know who is going to win. And then to pile uncertainty on top of uncertainty, we don't know what impact Iowa's results will have on the rest of the races. Sometimes it gives a big boost to the winner. Yet, sometimes it doesn't. Ask George H.W. Bush in 1980 or Richard Gephardt in 1988.