Is Iowa a Swinger, Too?

 

by Pa Rock

Voter

I live in a very red, rural county that gave Donald Trump right at  80% of its votes during the last two presidential elections, and my state, which is also red, gave Trump just over 56% of its votes during those same two elections.  I'm not proud of any of that, it's just the way it is.  Because my state, and especially my portion of the state, is not competitive, national candidates never bother to campaign here,  They solicit our donations but really don't give a rat's ass whether we even bother to vote or not.

Missouri will cast our ten electoral votes for the elderly, convicted felon, Donald John Trump.  Any third-grader with access to a laptop and wifi could have safely predicted that a year ago.  The deed is done, the die is cast.  Save that campaign cash for the battleground states of Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Georgia.  They are the chosen ones who will select our President for us - just as other chosen ones like Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and a handful of others sort through all of the candidates who would like to be President and let us know which ones will actually be on the ballot.

Easy peasy.

People who live in certain states, like Missouri, can go suck eggs because we have no say in the process whatsoever.  God's favorite states and the electoral college will present us with a new President in January, and then we can all sit back and prattle on about the triumph of democracy, even if it excluded us.

With my negativism in how this "democracy" selects its President firmly entrenched, imagine my utter joy upon hearing just a couple of evenings ago that a crack has developed in the system and a rural state just to the immediate north of Missouri has a new poll result circulating which says that the Democrat, Kamala Harris, is leading in that state by three points.  The state is Iowa, and it has a long, solid history of voting for Republicans for President.  Iowa, like my own state of Missouri, is routinely taken for granted in  the general elections where Presidents are chosen, so candidates do not spend money or waste their valuable time there.

Candidates go to the seven swing states, over and over and over again, and Iowa is not on the list.

But now Iowa has a highly regarded poll from a well respected polling firm of Selzer and Company and which was conducted for the Des Moines Register and Mediacom which shows Harris in the lead by three points - in a non-swinging, supposedly red state.   WTAF!   Nate Silver, another highly respected national pollster, says that Ann Selzer, who heads Selzer and Company, "has a long history of bucking conventional wisdom and being right."

National Republicans responded by calling the poll "fake," (one of their favorite four-letter words), and Trump reacted with indignation (one of his favorite moods).

So if this new poll is for real, and I, for one, certainly hope that it is, then what gives?  Why is a reliably red state suddenly developing a noticeably blue blush?  One speculation that seems to be soaking up a lot of printer's ink is that Iowa farmers, the primary economic engine of the state, are still pissed about the Trump tariffs from his last term that crippled their sales abroad.  The other major speculation is that Iowa women are angered by the Trump Court's Dobbs' decision which overturned their right to an abortion that had been in effect for nearly half-a-century, and that they are also turned off by Trump's constant denigration of women.

If the poll is right, and if those reasonings are too, that can only be good news for the Democratic Party as those same motivators play out across other midwestern farm states - including the one I live in.

It's a damned shame that the national Democratic Party did not think enough of us to spend a few dollars out in the sticks during this election cycle.  It could have been the smartest investment they ever made.

Give 'em hell, Iowa!