Iowa's Relevance Questioned

A gusty nor'easter is pushing Iowa Republicans to defend the relevance of next year's presidential caucuses.

This is hardly new. Defending the caucuses is instinctive for many Iowans, like knowing how to spin sweet corn to get an even coating of butter. Second nature, this relevance-insisting business.

The latest gust came from Fergus Cullen, a former New Hampshire GOP chairman and columnist, took to the pages of The Des Moines Register to argue that Iowa's once-proud caucuses are being marginalized by overzealous evangelicals and birthers in “tinfoil hats.” He also panned the Iowa GOP's Ames straw poll, the August money grab and political beauty pageant. Mainstream candidates will skip Iowa, Cullen argues, and the caucuses' outcome will have less impact.

Gov. Terry Branstad strongly disagrees with Cullen, arguing that Iowa will be wide open, exciting  and competitive on caucus night. He left out frigid.

This isn't the first or the last attack along these same lines. There also are a few GOP poobahs around Iowa echoing Cullen's concerns about being too focused on social issues. Former candidate for Governor Doug Gross said Iowa has become “Camp Christian.”

It's true Americans care most about the economy right now. I think that's also true of most Iowa Republicans.

But here's the problem. A very large segment of Americans in the middle of the electorate aren't burning to ban same-sex marriage or reinstitute “don't ask, don't tell” or vaporize Medicare.

They want the parties to get along, get something done and solve problems. They think climate change is a real threat, but socialism isn't. They don't like abortions, but they're also uncomfortable with government intervention. They're sure the president is from America - a country that's on the wrong track.

But many of the most vocal and active Iowa Republicans believe that any candidate with views even remotely like those is not only unqualified to be president, but unqualified to be a Republican. Rigid litmus tests litter the landscape like land mines. Even calling for a truce on such issues will buy you a razor-sharp "RINO" rebuke.

Often, the issue here isn't what candidates say, it's what they had better not say. Or else.

That doesn't mean a so-called mainstream candidate can't win here. But it does mean he or she will have to shape-shift and contort in ways that make that critical pivot to the general election much harder. Perhaps impossible. That makes it much tougher to build  the kind of broad coalition needed to unseat an incumbent president.

But skipping Iowa isn't a solution. This is not a tinfoil-capped anomaly. This is your party. And the struggle for its identity is highly relevant, not only to Republicans, but to the country.

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