Iowa Caucus Guy’s Presidential Election Blog

As we get under 45 days until the Caucus, all systems are go! Elizabeth Warren looks like she may have a head-to-head battle with Pete Buttigieg, so she's changing up her strategy. Essentially going from a planned stump speech of 45 minutes to a quick 8 minute intro and open up for questions . It has its risks, but the major advantage is getting to talk to people, and that is really how the Caucus gets won. Similarly, Klobuchar's endgame is to interact with Iowas. For years, Senator Charles Grassley famously makes a stop in every county in Iowa, to the point, that it has become called "The Full Grassley" and Amy is going to do it . The news isn't that she is going to do it (she planned to do it before the caucus), but will do it by year end. John Delaney, to date, is the only candidate in this cycle to accomplish that. Indeed, this is shaping up to be a campaign coming down to a close finish to the wire. I must make mention of some of the sparring betw...

One of the most memorable moments of this Election Cycle is a video of a bunch of awkward Bloomberg supporters shuffling back and forth in a gymnasium to a parody of Maroon 5's "Moves Like Jagger". Surely, you have seen it. If not, you can watch it here (It's short): The thing, of course, is that it's completely fake. I mean, you knew it had to be right?   Sure enough all roads led back to Nick Ciarelli, who has writing credits for Comedy Bang Bang, Funny or Die, Clickhole and Onion News Network. There's a reason why we believe it, though, right?  Overenthusiastic and overworked campaign volunteers, matched with out-of-touch suits trying to capture the next viral moment.  Reminiscent of those Wal-Mart pre-shift team chants . The news, of course, to me isn't that the video of Pete Buttigeig fans dancing to High Hopes went viral, it's that something else didn't beat it out. The September Steak Fry in Des Moines was just filled with ...

Awhile back, I wrote about an October news story in Florida covered by the Free Thought Project, about a High Schooler who had gotten in trouble for handing out flyers and wearing "Taxation is Theft" gear. The IowaCaucusGuy blog was contacted by the Behrman 2020 campaign to share some of Dan's thoughts.  As this blog is set by the tenets of interesting election-related content and having constructive dialogue, we have decided to share that letter here - Iowa Caucus Guy An Open Letter to Schools by Dan "Taxation is Theft" Behrman Dear Public Schools of America, I am running a presidential campaign, focused on freedom from oppression and tyranny. I am promoting the ideas of freedom on which this country was founded. Many young people are reaching out to my campaign and asking if they can help. They are young adults, often 15 to 18 who want to learn more about politics and freedom. They want to be free. They are screaming it, fighting for it - and yet...

Per the wikipedia article on the 2020 Primaries, there are 19 Democrats who are running for President and are on at least one State Ballot. Today's post features one of those- Robby Wells. Wells is a name recognizable in Election circles. In 2012, he ran for the nomination of the Constitution Party, and 2016 as an Independent in the General Election. For 2020, he has ramped up his campaign. He was actually the first Democrat to announce his candidacy, announcing even before John Delaney. He will be on the ballot for the early primaries (New Hampshire, South Carolina, Colorado, California, Texas).  He was at the Jim Clyburn Fish Fry in June (where the Washington Post reported "Robby Wells who has appeared at some state party functions, was given the same time onstage as Biden, Sanders and the rest" and as part of The University of South Carolina's Presidential Town Hall series (appearing the same weekend as Bill DiBlasio, Julian Castro, and Pete Buttigie...

With a week like this, the Joe Biden campaign looks to be in trouble. I won't say that I am terribly surprised, as many of the local Democrats that I talk to have been reflecting that as well. Later in this post, I can get into those whys. Biden still leads the National polls. It can be said fairly confidently that even in the last month, he has had up to 35% of National Democrats. Not only that, for the most part, he is comfortably ahead of second place which is either Sanders or Warren, depending on the poll. Yet, we know, it's not a National vote. We may also agree that winning Iowa does not guarantee anything, but we do agree that with the early states, momentum shifts. I can't help but think of 2008.  At this exact time, Rudy Guillani led National polls with similar numbers. He would spend the next month neck and neck with Mike Huckabee nationally, and then quite suddenly, faded. I thought of 2004, too, but that's a bit longer back, so I had to go back ...

In my last post, I talked about my #VoteYerMusic project. I have been lucky to have heard from many Libertarian Presidential candidates- Dan Taxation is Theft Behrman, Ken Armstrong, and Max Abramson, as well as former candidate,  Democrat,  Joe Sestak. Today, we feature another Libertarian, Sam Robb. In an April posting on  Pittsburgh News Wire , Robb, a former naval officer and software developer for several Pittsburgh-area start-up companies said " “My intent is to seek the Libertarian Party nomination for President in 2020. We have two major parties that each want to increase government control. Both consider personal liberty a secondary issue – if they consider it at all. In contrast, The Libertarian Party embodies the freedom-loving, independent spirit of our Founders. If we are to succeed as a nation, we must once again embrace these core ideas of freedom and liberty.” Robb participated in the Olean, NY Debate in November and is starting to make inroads towar...

I do a thing here that I came up with many years ago, and I call it "voteyermusic". You can read about it more in some earlier posts, but the main gist is that I ask Presidential candidates what music they like. The answer isn't important. It's the question, and there are two reasons why.  First, it is about how accessible the candidate is, and if they really care about the public they will be serving. Over time, I have noticed that division between candidate and public has widened. Go to Cory Booker's site and see if you can even find a way to get that question to him. You can't; and it's the easiest question a candidate will ever be able to answer. The other is that music is a great uniter. Some of my best, longest lasting friendships started with conversations about music. If you know me, you just know that is how I am. In fact, I had ten minutes one-on-one this summer with a (now former) Democratic candidate here in Iowa. I knew his policy plan...