Last night as the entrance poll results were made public, and early returns came in, I congratulated the Edwards crew in one of their diaries, and was surprised to find that they don't think it's over. In fact, they seem to believe that Edwards was the "real winner" last night.
They point to a Time Magazine article detailing how Edwards is a real fighter and his campaign will go on. However, that same article points to some serious problems for Edwards in New Hampshire and beyond.
That's all fine and good, but the simple fact of the matter is that the media narrative has been written, and the Edwards campaign is all but over. In fact, Ben Smith at Politico has noted that the Obama and Clinton campaigns, as well as the pundits, say that Edwards is a dead man walking.
The Time Magazine article may say that Edwards is a fighter and is carrying on, but the article is also indicative of every problem in the campaign.
First and foremost, Time's website had five main articles on the Iowa Caucuses. The Edwards article was a piece attached to one of those five - it wasn't even one of the top five stories coming out of the caucus. And now, half a day later, it isn't even on the main page at the Time site anymore. The media narrative is clear, the story coming out of Iowa is Obama victory and Clinton's defeat. John Edwards is an afterthought.
The Time article also mentions that JRE was able to raise $1 Million a day after Iowa in 2004, which allowed him to keep fighting for some time. That simply will not happen this year. He is not a part of the media narrative and he is not getting extra press as he did the last time around. That is only going to highlight one of his biggest weaknesses, which was also raised by Time:
His relative shortage of funds forced him to accept public financing with its $50 million national spending limit in the primaries, a restriction that could severely limit his ability to compete with Obama and Clinton going forward. The problem is not just national; there are state-by-state spending limits for candidates taking federal matching funds. That means that in New Hamsphire, Edwards will be able to spend just $818,000 for the primary.
Sure Edwards can probably count on his union support for some advertising and organizing efforts that will make up for some lack of funds, but he is going to be very very badly outspent. Making matters worse, the remainder of the primary schedule is not at all favorable to him. Let's take a look at the remaining states:
New Hampshire
The candidates have all of five days before the next primary, by far the least amount of time ever. That doesn't give much time to halt momentum - but it also may not give enough time to build up momentum. Current polls show Clinton ahead by around 4%. I take the Suffolk poll to be an outlier because it is just way out of wack with anything we have seen there in months. Ignoring the Suffolk poll, the three most recent polls give an average of:
Clinton 32
Obama 28
Edwards 19
I think it's clear that Obama will get a bump here. In 2004, John Kerry was polling around 20% in New Hampshire when he won the Iowa caucus, while Howard Dean was in the high 20s and John Edwards was just under 10%. The actual results showed a massive jump for Kerry up to 38%, while Dean held steady at 26% and Edwards got a modest bounce up to 12%.
Edwards cannot hope to catch Obama here, and catching Clinton would require a miracle. He's going to get very badly outspent, the media narrative is completely against him and he's already polling well behind the other two frontrunners. Obviously NH cannot be his firewall.
Nevada
This next state is a far bigger crapshoot. Polls are only done once in a blue moon, but they show Clinton with a huge lead. Edwards is consistently miles behind, never being closer than 25 points since August. However, his state is considered to be a huge crapshoot.
The big question is what happens to the SIEU endorsement (they were waiting until after Iowa), and how much the candidates campaign here. Whomever won the endorsement would have a huge advantage, and without knowing that it's really hard to make a prediction. However, one thing that we can say for sure is that a victory here is not going to be a huge momentum changer. If you listened to the media last night, they didn't even mention Nevada when talking about the coming weeks. An Edwards victory here might allow him to keep fighting for a little while longer, but it stop the inevitable from happening.
South Carolina
This is the last kick at the can before Tsunami Tuesday, and the demographics are really favorable for Obama. Twenty-nine percent of the population is african-american, and they make up fifty percent of the likely voters in the primary. To make matters worse, recent polls show Edwards 20 points behind both Obama and Clinton. How he overcomes that with no money, no media attention and no momentum is a complete mystery to me. If Obama takes another state, he will be almost impossible to beat here as the African-American vote will turn out hugely for him.
Tsunami Tuesday
Edwards will have no money at this point, Obama and Clinton will both spend ungodly sums of money for this race. Obama and Clinton have national operations, Edwards does not. His only hope was to build a tidal wave of momentum and win on Feb. 5th based solely on that, and it can't happen. It's as simple as that.
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So Where Does that Leave Us? Pollster Mark Mellman has suggested that if Edwards didn't win Iowa he was finished, Intrade gives him a 3% chance of winning- and I have to agree. I just don't see where he draws his line in the sand, he's too far back everywhere else. Sadly, the behavior of Edwards supporters right now is virtually identical to that of Dean supporters after Iowa in 2004. These were the people who had a tantrum and ranted about how it was "Dean or Green", and who analyzed the audio of the Dean Scream and said it didn't really happen, and stuck by him and tried to dream up scenarios where he could pull off a miracle.
The only thing they accomplished was ensuring that their votes and opinions became meaningless, and the rest of the process occurred without their input.
This is a two horse race and it is time for everybody to pick their pony. If you continue to support another candidate, you render your opinion meaningless, and worse yet risk contributing to the victory of candidate whom you greatly dislike. Perhaps if the Deaniacs had given up on the good doctor when it was obvious that his campaign was finished they could have helped Wes Clark, or Edwards, or somebody defeat John Kerry. Today, these same people are supporting John Edwards, and once again they are acting irrationally, living in a fantasy land where reality is not really happening and their candidate can leap over tall mountains and do the impossible.
John Edwards is finished. Clinton or Obama. Who do you want the nominee to be?
[Update the diary title comes from Ben Smith at Politico. Since that seems to be the only thing any Edwards supporter wants to discuss, take it up with him. It would be nice to see an Edwards supporter actually discuss the situation rather than flame or bring up meaningless things such as him coming in second or it being too soon]