Polling on the Iowa Caucus
I had a brief look at the race for the Republican nomination in the US Presidential election in November - back then it had been something of a series of Conservatives emerging as the "not-Romney" before fading away again to be replaced by a new "not-Romney". At the time we'd seen Bachmann surge and fade to be replaced by Perry, who surged and faded to be replaced by Cain, who was at the time fading and being replaced by Gingrich. Since then Gingrich has faded under an assault of attacks on his political baggage, and recent polls have seen advances for the liberatarian Ron Paul and, then, in the last few days Rick Santorum.
Tonight we have the first proper votes cast in the Iowa Caucus. The final few polls of the state are:
PPP (31st Dec - 1st Jan): Paul 20%, Romney 19%, Santorum 18%, Gingrich 14%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 8%, Huntsman 4% Insider Advantage (1st Jan): Romney 23%, Paul 22%, Santorum 18%, Gingrich 16%, Perry 10%, Bachmann 6%, Huntsman 2% American Research Group (29th Dec-1st Jan): Romney 22%, Paul 17%, Santorum 16%, Gingrich 15%. Perry 9%, Bachmann 8%, Huntsman 4% Selzer & Co (27th Dec - 30th Jan): Romney 24%, Paul 22%, Santorum 15%, Gingrich 12%, Perry 11%, Bachmann 7%, Huntsman 2%
Overall we have Romney and Ron Paul competing closely with Santorum in third place, but making strong advances from his position a few weeks ago. The Selzer & Co poll for the Des Moines Register has the oldest fieldwork of those above, but is the most respected and has a reputation for having the best record of predicting the Iowa caucus. When releasing their findings they also noted that in the last two days of their fieldwork they were showing Rick Santorum overtaking Ron Paul to take second place.
Averages from 538 and RealClearPolitics both have Romney leading Paul with Santorum in third... but with only a few percentage points between them. The expectation seems to be that with Santorum enjoying a late surge any of the three could win. Gingrich is expected to come fourth, ahead of Perry and Bachmann. Jon Huntsman is not actively contesting the caucus and concentrating on New Hampshire, he'll almost certainly come last. Caucuses are hard to predict because they are low turnout events that require people to attend meetings in local halls in the middle of winter and listen to prepared speeches before casting a ballot - here Selzer runs through some different scenarios depending on who actually turns up to caucas tonight.
The results today matter more for their effect on campaign momentum and weeding out no-hopers than it does for actual delegates (Iowa has only a small number of delegates and technically no delegates are elected today anyway, only delegates to county conventions who in turn elect delegates to an Iowa State Convention).
Romney wasn't expected to win in Iowa, so a victory will be a nice plus and could put him on track for tying up the nomination quickly, but isn't essential. It will be embarrassing for him if he comes third or worse (and would be a boost for Huntsman, the other moderate candidate remaining in the race) but Romney is off to New Hampshire expecting an easy win there anyway. More important is how it weeds out the race to be the Conservative alternative to Romney - whether it will lead to some of the weaker Conservative candidates dropping out and whether it will give any of them the momentum to be clearly identified as the "not-Romney".
