Iowa Caucus Guy’s Presidential Election Blog

The time honored caucus season has its moments and none is a better indicator that things are off and running than a bunch of donors trying to encourage a candidate to run. (Photo credit of Candidate Biden doling out Shoulder rubs to an Iowan voter courtesy of iagreetosee.com) Lest you think, it's too early, Joe Biden already has courters. Two Quad City men lead a group called Time For Biden and expect to have a Headquarters up and running by March 2018 . Now, granted, way more candidates are losers than winners in Presidential Elections. Still, it seems the ones that are courted the most are the biggest failures. Arguably, the heaviest courted candidate before caucus was Chris Christie in 2016. He eventually ended up with less than 2 percent of the vote that year. Remember Scott Walker's Presidential run? No? He was also heavily courted but didn't even make it to the caucus. You can probably line up several heavy hitters: Rick Perry, Fred Thompson,

The question is when is it not campaign season in Iowa. Well, undoubtedly, there is talk right after the election. Even before that, people look 6-8 years out. But a true barometer is the campaign ad, and sure enough, we got out first one. So the answer must be 15 months. 15 months since November 2016. As you might now, the Super Bowl is famous for its ads, but they also save some room for local ads. So, even with all the 5 million dollar ads, you have to make room for the local grocery store and car dealers (and this year, this wonderful Super Bull ad. ) In which case, Presidential candidate John Delaney (and at this point, he is the only candidate) went ahead and bought an ad to air during the Super Bowl. Yes, 1008 days out. The ad ran in most of the major Iowa television markets (Des Moines, Sioux City, Davenport, and Cedar Rapids) and cost $37,000 according to CNN, who also reported we are just barely closer to the 2020 caucuses than we are from the 2016 caucuses.