by WonkoKevin

Here are the latest odds for Democrat VP: Richardson, B 3… Sebelius, K 6… Clinton, H 8… Obama, B 8… Webb, J 8… Bayh, E 12… Bloomberg, M 14… McCaskill, C 14… Clarke, W 16… Gore, A 16… Kaine, T 16 … Nunn, S 16… Warner, M 16… Napolitano, J 20… Zinni, A 20… Casey, B 25… Edwards, J 25… Harold Ford Jnr 25… Nelson, B 25… Strickland, T 25… Biden, J 33… Daschle, T 33… Dodd, C 33… Doyle, J 33… Feinstein, D 33… Hamilton, L 33… Pelosi, N 33… Rendell, E 33… Powell, C 50… Sanford Bishop 66

by WonkoKevin

Iowa and New Hampshire were key. Always have been. Until they were over, and then South Carolina was the turning point. And then Tsunami Tuesday was the non-turning point. I think somewhere along the way Maine and Wyoming were important. What can we make of this campaign season that continues to refuse to conform? In Politics 1.0, averages and totals were the key stats–how many votes, how many delegates, etc. In Politics 2.0, it’s not the averages that define where things are going but rather the extremes. In old politics, the center wagged the extremes; in new politics, the extremes wag the average. When it comes to extremes this campaign season, one place in the U.S. dominates–the Inner West. Maybe we should look to the Inner West for where the body politic is heading.

The Inner West of the U.S. handed many of the candidates their best results of the season. In Utah, Mitt Romney won an astonishing 90%. Ron Paul had his best showing in Montana, at 25%. Barack Obama loves Iowa, which handed him a 79% victory. Fred Thompson and Mike Huckabee were big shots in the South, but it was the central plains where they brought it home–Thompson with 25% in Wyoming and Huckaee with 60% in Kansas (equalling what he got in Arkansas, his home state). Even Duncan Hunter had his best outing in the Inner West with 2% in Nevada.

There were several other patterns I observed. First, the South gave two of the three remaining candidates their biggest wins. Hillary Clinton pulled down 70% in Arkansas, and John McCain’s biggest victory to date came in Mississippi (79%). Delaware awarded hometome boy Joe Biden his best showing (3%); Michigan’s shortened list resulted in best outings for Chris Dodd (1%), Mike Gravel (0.5%), and and Dennis Kucinich (4%); John Edwards (30% in Iowa) and Bill Richardson (5% in New Hampshire) faded early; and Rudy Giuliani really did do his best in Florida, just like he had planned (15%). Alan Keyes, Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo, and Tommy Thompson didn’t register above 0.5%.

by WonkoKevin

Here are my picks for the New Hampshire primary. With the Democrats, I am mostly data-driven with a fudging of 1-2 percentage points, based on the fact that liberal buzz share in Wonkosphere seems to be tracking NH poll numbers pretty well. With the Republicans, I am going by current poll numbers plus changes in buzz share over the last 5 days, which heavily favors McCain and disfavors Huckabee.

Dems: Obama 42, Clinton 33, Edwards 19, Richardson 5, Kucinich 1

Reps: McCain 35, Romney 31, Huckabee 12, Paul 10, Giuliani 10, Thompson 2

by WonkoKevin

Our two Iowa winners have a lot in common.  Obama and Huckabee are the youngest candidate in their parties; both are considered relative outsiders; both are considered candid; both set themselves apart from the current and previous administrations; both are probably not the first pick of their party’s command center; both are (or at least, were) not the darling of their wing’s Wonkosphere; both have little foreign policy experience; and both are considered likeable, trustworthy, and idealistic.  But to me, the Numero Uno reason that both won yesterday is that they are the best communicators within their respective parties.  When you combine the retail politics of Politics 1.0 with the real-time nature of Politics 2.0, there is one skill that branches both–communication.  Obama and Huckabee won because they can talk to people the best. (more…)

More thoughts on the Iowa results in a bit.  I think today’s Wonkosphere buzz share graph, comprising conservative and liberal blogs posts from 9PM EST Thursday January 3 to 9AM EST Friday January 4, pretty well sums up the post-Iowa spin, numbers-wise.

by WonkoKevin

Joe Biden was only mentioned in 82 liberal blogs yesterday, compared to the 290 liberal blog posts which mentioned Hillary Clinton. Yet Clinton’s overall Wonkosphere liberal buzz share (23%) was not even twice Biden’s (12%). How could Biden’s buzz share be so much relatively higher, per post? It’s because of the way we calculate buzz share, and it demonstrates that Biden is being talked about much more substantively in the posts that do mention him, whereas Clinton is being mentioned (relatively) more in passing. The same perspective is also positive to Romney, Thompson, Edwards, and Obama, and negative to Giuliani and Paul.

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by WonkoKevin

On November 20 I wrote a blog “Do conservative bloggers even care who is running?” The premise was based on the fact that in that day’s current Wonkosphere buzz (which is an automatically-generated set of the most representative posts made that day), all twenty posts–every single one–was about Hillary Clinton. Many were from Against Hillary, and Below the Beltway had a prescient post (Will Iowa be Hillary’s Stumbling Block?). Today for the first time in memory the conservative buzz contains no posts about Clinton. It’s all about Huckabee and Romney and McCain, with a dash of Thompson (Rudy who?). The assassination of Bhutto, which was predicted to be favorable to McCain, has also been favorable to Romney, both gaining from Huckabee’s curious comments on illegal Pakastani immigrants. While national sentiment continues to swing to Huckabee, it lags by several weeks the sentiment in the blogs, and that doesn’t look good for Huck–the tone about him from conservative blogs has hit another low point. We continue to move to Minneapolis in “prefect storm” conditions. On the Democratic side, the polls and the buzz share data continue to predict Iowa as tied, with the mo on the side of Edwards. Jerome Armstrong at MyDD has some great data on how the three candidates have invested in an Iowa win.

by WonkoKevin

In previous posts we’ve discussed how changes in Wonkosphere buzz share are predictive of changes in national poll numbers 2-3 weeks hence.  With Iowa less than one week away, however, a 2-3 week-ahead prediction doesn’t do much good.  And because of the impending January 3 date, everything is in hyperspeed now.  So we need to look for other clues in the data.  What we find is that the buzz share numbers in the conservative blogosphere largely mimic the current national polling numbers, while the buzz share numbers in the liberal blogosphere largely mimic the current poll numbers coming out of New Hampshire. (more…)

Wonkosphere.com reports that Mike Huckabee and John Edwards were the most likable presidential candidates amongst their constituents in the month of November, followed closely by Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, Barack Obama, and Chris Dodd. Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton were the two leading candidates who had the most negative buzz from conservative and liberal bloggers, respectively.

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by WonkoKevin

IAAI.  It’s all about Iowa.  So what’s the recent buzz in our bellweather state?

The Des Moines Register is oft-cited as a key influencer.  The Register acts as a multiplier to a candidate’s grassroots efforts.  If they pay attention to you, so will others, including national MSM.  In order to get a hint as to who might be hot–and not–in Iowa, Wonkosphere counted up the number of candidate-focused stories in the Register from 10/27/2007 to 11/9/2007.  Here are the results:

1. Barack Obama, 11

2. Chris Dodd, 10

3. Bill Richardson, 9

4. John McCain, 7

4. Hillary Clinton, 7

4. John Edwards, 7

7. Mike Huckabee, 5

8. Mitt Romney, 4

9. Ron Paul, 4

9. Rudy Giuliani, 4

11. Joe Biden, 1

Not mentioned: Mike Gravel, Duncan Hunter, Alan Keyes, Dennis Kucinich, Tom Tancredo, and Fred Thompson.