Elizabeth Warren Has a Movement. You Just Don't See It Yet.

[BlueMTexpat]

Nobody knows who won the Iowa caucuses—but Warren’s support was powered by the feminist spirit of 2018.

https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/iowa-caucus-democrats-elizabeth-warren/

This Joan Walsh column is from yesterday. We may know the "winners" by now. But the column is still an interesting read.

...
Nevertheless, Elizabeth Warren persisted Monday night. She took selfies past midnight at a high-energy “victory” party, where staffers, volunteers and national surrogates said they felt very good about what the campaign had achieved. (Here’s her speech.) Not that Warren declared victory: A thirsty Mayor Pete Buttigieg audaciously did that, while Senator Bernie Sanders’s campaign released internal results showing him ahead of both Buttigieg and Warren—with only 40 percent of precincts reporting. After midnight, Warren senior strategist Joe Rospars calmly tweeted, “It’s a very close race among the top three candidates (Warren, Sanders, Buttigieg) and Biden came a distant fourth.” Calm energy is the trademark of Warren’s campaign.
...
Even if Warren finishes third, her vaunted ground game proved itself. And it’s not just a bloodless game of turf-cutting (campaign-speak for identifying potential supporters and getting them out) and door-knocking. Warren has been quietly building a movement, and in the closing days it became apparent that it’s a women’s movement. Whatever happened, she clarified her campaign’s rationale in this state’s grueling Thunderdome.

On Monday afternoon, at one of dozens of small rallies to get people out to caucus, an excited young volunteer named Jackie Sayers, who used to work for Senator Kamala Harris, proudly introduced top Warren surrogate Representative Katie Porter as “part of the blue wave of women who organized and ran and won in 2018.” Porter took that baton, shouting out her class of 2018 “sister surrogates,” Representatives Ayanna Pressley and Deb Haaland, also traveling Iowa for Warren, noting that the Massachusetts senator’s campaign is the only one whose cochairs are all women. Pressley sounded the same notes at a Warren rally on Saturday. Women have made up the majority of Warren’s donors. And women made up the majority of her volunteers I met along the way—women who’ve fallen hard for Warren.
...
Mary Kahl was undecided when I met her at a Warren event in Oskaloosa in late May. Now she was hosting this Warren GOTC event in Des Moines. She came over to Warren because she’s a medical professional and she believes in Medicare for All. “I see people die. I see people unable to afford their medicine,” she tells me emotionally. I ask: What about the charges Warren’s plan isn’t truly Medicare for All, because of its longer phase-in time than Sanders’s? She cuts me off, exasperated. “Please. She’s got a great plan. It’s been vetted by economists. It’s because she’s a woman. Men don’t have to answer a damn thing about details!” [emphasis mine]
...
At the Warren “victory” event, I stood in a corner with some veteran Iowa politicos who did not want to be named. Warren supporters, they were nonetheless sad for Biden. The best information I have is that he will play this out at least through South Carolina, where he hopes black voters will get him through. But I met one of Warren’s South Carolina surrogates at a Des Moines GOTC event Monday afternoon, her spiritual adviser, Reverend Miniard Culpepper of Pleasant Hill Missionary Baptist Church in Boston. He says Warren will do better than expected with black voters in the Palmetto State.
...

*************
Much more at the link. Walsh provides an excellent description of her experience in Iowa.

[brooklynite]

1. "Nobody knows who won the Iowa caucuses"...True, but we know who didn't...

...and who probably won't win NH.

I like Warren and I'm impressed with her energy, but I'm not seeing her turn that into votes.

[BlueMTexpat]

2. Did you read the article?

She was doing just that, per this article.

[bluewater]

3. Well, Warren will get more delegates out of Iowa than Biden.

That's a start.

I am waiting to see if the primary collapses into a two person race, if that happens, I don't expect Warren to be one of those two.

But if it stays a multi-candidate contest past Super Tuesday I can easily see Warren finishing with at least the third most delegates heading into the convention.

Time will tell.

[squirecam]

4. Pete declared victory

And he was right. He is projected to win 80% by the NYT based on the results.

Making Pete wait a week to give a victory speech is absurd.

[BlueMTexpat]

5. Did the article say otherwise?

[squirecam]

6. I'm tired of the fake outrage

Because Pete claimed victory. Every campaign had #’s. His were correct.

Iowa is about momentum. He earned the win. Not insults/slur of being called “thirsty”.

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Thirsty

[BlueMTexpat]

8. Where have I declared "fake outrage?"

[bluewater]

9. lol ikr

Would you call that a form of gas lighting? Or is it just an over the top form of strawman rhetoric?

I suppose it was the latter.

Thanks for the post, Blue.

[BlueMTexpat]

15. You're welcome, bluewater! eom

[squirecam]

11. You asked whether the article

Slammed Pete for claiming victory. It certainly did. Calling him audacious and thirsty.

Was he supposed to wait a week? No.

And this is fake outrage. People are just mad because he won. In the same position, they woul$ try to claim victory. Which is exactly what JEFF WEAVER did too.

But Pete is the thirsty one.....

[bluewater]

12. Pete still hasn't won Iowa yet.

The latest count has Pete and Bernie tied at 11 delegates each.

And they declare the Iowa winner based on delegates assigned. So right now it's a tie.

Did Bernie declare victory? Um, no, he did not.

So maybe, just maybe, Pete was a teensy bit "thirsty"?

Seems so.

[LanternWaste]

14. Chicago Tribune wished it waited before printing 'Dewey Defeats Truman"

"Was he supposed to wait a week? No..."

Chicago Tribune wished it waited before printing 'Dewey Defeats Truman" one late afternoon in early November of 1948.

Premature claims of victory can bite a candidate in the butt and wind up being the only thing they're remembered for.

The primary will run its own course in its own time, regardless of the impatient fellows righteously yelling at the rain to stop falling on them.

Pete probably did win. And great for him! But 'probably' just ain't accurate enough to take to the bank.

[BlueMTexpat]

16. If you're getting your knickers

in a twist over "thirsty" and "audacious," you're going to have a VERY tough time when GOPer homophobes start in.

And that's hardly "fake outrage." The words were descriptive. Pete may have been thirsty indeed, given all the hard campaigning that he's done.

And, no matter what, it is audacious to announce oneself the winner before the official results are in, even if it looks very likely to be true. In fact, "audacious" is one of the kinder words one can use.

That was literally a throwaway sentence in a long article. And THAT's ALL that you retained from it? Sheesh! I'm disappointed in you.

[bluewater]

7. not win 80% but have an 80% chance of winning.

There's a significant difference between the two.


Pete will not be getting 80% of the delegates out of Iowa.

That said, Pete had a great Iowa caucus and was robbed of the spotlight he deserved on caucus night.

Good luck to you and your candidate moving forward!

[squirecam]

10. My candidate will not win NH

So I’m realistic.

[LanternWaste]

13. My guess is Warren's keeping her hand close and not providing any tells.

As we get closer to Super Tuesday, she'll begin to throw her cards down and placing bets.

She's a wise and cool-headed player-- not really engaging in the petulant factionalism the rest of us are obsessing over, and she's studiously avoiding the idiotic, back-and-forth bumper-sticker debates.

[BlueMTexpat]

17. This is true.

Thanks for your take!