The Iowa Death Spiral

Ken Smukler is a former political consultant. He is currently residing in a federally gated community. He is now writing for Smerconish.com under the tagline #sincerely76315-066

Ken Smukler is a former political consultant. He is currently residing in a federally gated community. He is now writing for Smerconish.com under the tagline #sincerely76315-066

Just weeks to go before the official kickoff of the presidential contest - the Iowa Caucus. I look back to the weeks just before the 2004 Iowa Caucus - a time when Democratic candidates were frantically scrambling to grab the mantle of frontrunner for the opportunity to take on one widely perceived to be vulnerable incumbent Republican president, George W. Bush.  Sound familiar?

Look deeper through the lens of identity politics in a multi-candidate primary and the similarities between '04 and '20 may provide insight into how Iowans will figure out the field in the coming days.

2004 saw the rise of a left-wing governor from a small New England state who parlayed his first-in-the-nation same sex marriage law into a first-in-modern-political-era internet fundraising phenomenon (read Joe Trippi's This Revolution Will Not Be Televised for a good primer on the rise of Howard Dean) and, just weeks before the '04 Iowa Caucus, into Iowa '04 frontrunner status.

Howard Dean carried most of the international union support, a huge financial advantage, and a national campaign footprint. What he also carried was a daily cash-burn rate that was only sustainable beyond Iowa if his campaign met expectation: win the Iowa Caucus and Dean closes out the primary before Super Tuesday and turn his growing national infrastructure against Bush three months before the Democratic nominating convention. Come in second and the burn-rate becomes self-immolation.

The only candidate who could trigger the dismantling of the Dean dream was Dick Gephardt - the boy scout Midwestern congressman, a Speaker of the House, and poster-boy for institutional big D Democrats.

While Deans' cash-flow desperation to meet or beat frontrunner expectations was a closely-kept secret, Gephardt's desperation to win Iowa was telegraphed from the outset. As the Midwesterner, he laid down the Hawkeye gauntlet from the outset of his campaign - he vowed to leave the race if he did not win the Iowa Caucus.

So let's connect the 2004 -2020 dots. The '04 liberal, left-wing candidacy of a small New England state governor becomes the '20 socialist candidacies of Bernie Sanders (another Vermonter) and Elizabeth Warren (MA). Both have prodigious online fundraising capacity, both share front-runner status in most Iowa polls and both desperately need to meet or beat expectations on Caucus night or face a very difficult uphill climb through New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.

What was the '04 institutional candidacy of a former Dick Gephardt is now the institutional candidacy of Joe Biden. Nothing screams Gephardt '04 more than Biden '20. Gephardt's presidential run was to be the capstone of decades-long Democratic leadership - the steady hand that would steer the party back to the Clinton triangulated White House - sans the girl with the black beret and the little blue dress. The Biden '20 campaign is nothing if not the call to no drama Obama - the somewhat steady septuagenarian hand of the man on a first name basis with most world leaders.

Meanwhile back in '04 there sat John Kerry - yes another liberal senator from a small New England state but not one riding on a progressive litmus test candidacy. No, this senator was riding on a personal story - the war hero cum war activist speaking truth to power. In the weeks leading up to the Iowa Caucus Kerry was sucking wind both in the polls and in his campaign bank account. The story goes that Kerry took a $600,000 second mortgage on his Beacon Hill mansion, then used the cash to hire a helicopter and barnstorm Iowa county-by-county up to Caucus day.

Welcome Mayor Pete. The South Bend sensation, Buttigieg is running on a personal story of political accomplishment (youngest mayor of the midwest town) and war veteran enlisting after 9.11. While the activism of a Vietnam War veteran is lacking, there is the de facto activism of being one of the first openly gay candidates for the highest office in the land. He doesn't have to testify before Congress (as Kerry did) to check the activist box, he wears it on his wedding-ring finger. And Buttigieg, like Kerry, plays the higher-end game like a pro. Listen to him at the last presidential debate schooling the field on millennials, and what they did and did not know after 9/11.

So in both '04 and '20 we have frontrunning candidates each who desperately need to beat the other. The difference - in '04 the liberal and the institutional candidates go into the the campaign death spiral; in '20 it is the two socialist candidates now beginning the death spiral dance.
In '04, Gephardt goes negative on Dean driven by his won-or-done campaign pledge. Dean responds going negative on Gephardt seeking the swift kill shot driven by his campaign's fiscal imperative. The '04 death spiral drives Dean's and Geparhdt's Iowa numbers low enough on Caucus night to give John Kerry the victory and, ultimately, the nomination.
In '20 Warren and Sanders each can afford to lose to Biden confident that, in defeating the other socialist frontrunner in the field, the socialist bloc of voters will coalesce around them in the subsequent primaries to defeat Biden. What they cannot afford is to lose to the other socialist candidate. Sanders can lose to Biden in Iowa, Warren can lose to Biden in Iowa, so Biden is spared the death spiral. Warren and Sanders can each afford to lose to Buttigieg using the same math. So he too is spared.
The launch of the '20 death spiral, if it is real, can be pinpointed to one moment in time: the moment Warren accused Sanders of telling her a woman could not win in 2020. Make no mistake this was a calculated play on Warren's part to defeat Sanders in Iowa regardless of its impact on the Biden and Buttigieg voters. Warren was equally as calculated when she pounces on Sanders post-debate using the hot mic to tell Sanders she thought he called her a liar on national television. 

This death spiral will, however, be different than the '04 spiral. In '04, Gephardt and Dean went negative on television. In '20 you will not see this death spiral televised. Rather, it will be propelled through social media in ways only a Russian troll could dream up.
And on the sideline in Iowa sits the war hero. For those who think Biden will be the unintended beneficiary of this death spiral, I beg to differ. (I find it hard to believe there are many Warren 1, Biden 2 voters or Sanders 1, Biden 2 voters).  Mayor Pete and his personal Kerryesque backstory, telegenic moxie, and same sex husband comes shining through. If Mayor Pete makes it through to victory on Caucus night it will be the affirmation that one goes negative in Iowa at his/her peril; that in a multi-candidate primary field the death spiral is real and you can die like Icarus if you engage in it.

Oh, and I have not forgotten Senator Klobuchar. She is the '04 John Edwards. A contender whose strong performance in Iowa goes on to become the Democrat Veep candidate.