I am still gathering my thoughts on Obama's win. In all likelihood, his vote count is lower than actual turnout for his candidacy due to the excessive weighting of rural precincts that went for Edwards. And while Obama performed fantastically, Clinton and Edwards did better than any Democrat has ever done in Iowa... except Obama. This is very very good news, and continues the trend of huge infrastructure gains for Democrats. Obama's coalition was also extremely liberal and Democratic, with 41% of self-identified very liberal Democrats going his way. Edwards actually walloped Obama among conservatives, beating him 42-21 among that group.
I'm going to have more on turnout, but exit poll comparisons between 2004 and 2008 show that this was a Democratic primary with increased turnout from Democrats. Lots of Obama staffers and media types want this to be a show of independents and Republicans coming over to Barack, but the reality is actually better. In the 17-29 age bracket, Obama took 57% of the voters; in the 30-44 age bracket, he took 42% of the vote. He took 41% of new caucus goers, while Edwards led with prior caucus goers. This was a liberal, Democratic, young group that went for Obama. In other words, Obama is in fact capitalizing on or creating new Democrats. And demographically, this generation is as large as the baby boomers, and if they vote as Democrats, which it looks like they will, that's huge.
In terms of share of the vote, the 17-29 year old demographic made 11% of the Republican vote versus 22% of the Democratic vote. Young people are coming out, they are Democrats, and they like Barack Obama. The crowds I saw at various Obama events last night and over the past two days were really remarkable. Normally, political events are mostly segregated, and it's a big deal to build multiracial crowds. Obama is doing that, and it's genuinely a beautiful thing. I saw plenty of biracial couples coming out and standing with their kids admiring this man, and a huge multiracial staff and activist core can provide a new nucleus to rejuvenate politics.
I think two things drove turnout. One is far superior field tools deployed over the last five years, including the Voter Activation Network (VAN) and Catalist, as well networks of field staffers who know how to use them and a commitment to invest in field from all the major campaigns. This was a field battle, for once, and finally, the tools were great. That means that more voters were touched earlier and more often than ever before with sophisticated chunks of information. And they turned out. Voting is kind of hard, and the campaigns made it easier. And two is the internet and young people. I was talking to a Rock the Vote staffer last night who told me that they hit 40,000 caucus-eligable high school seniors in Iowa on Facebook with messaging, and 7500 were responsive. More than that, they were arguing with each other on Facebook walls and debating issues. It's a dream of civic engagement experts, and there's no reason to think that both trends won't continue.
The race goes on, and Obama will now face real negative attacks. We'll see how he handles that; the internet is set up well for such a candidacy, as it allows supporters to respond directly and goes around the media directly to supporters and detractors. I have deep reservations about Obama, as readers of this site know. I spent time discussing with exuberant Obama supporters and staffers some of these reservations (including his abandonment of Ned Lamont and his failure to fight the Military Commissions Act), and they just couldn't understand how anyone could possibly doubt his commitment to progressive values. I loved his speech and the phrase the 'tyranny of oil', though I must confess that the theme of unity and America coming together to promote Obama struck me as weird at a victory speech for a Democratic caucus. It's not like the Republicans didn't also have a caucus. But on another level, there really is a multiracial emergence here, a new generation of activists taking over the party.
The electorate really is changing in dramatic ways, and Obama is a key part of that shift. This country is turning far to the left, and while I don't expect media pundits to talk about pandering to youth the way they do values voters, they should.
