Is Iowa winnowing the 2016 GOP field?

Last week, former Texas Gov. and GOP presidential contender Rick Perry stopped paying his professional campaign staff.

That's a really bad thing this far into the campaign season.

When you start having financial problems, all sorts of questions pop up in people's minds and none of them are helpful to the candidate.

Most obvious is whether the moneyed donors know something the rest of us don't and they are just not opening their wallets directly to the Perry campaign. In a time of unprecedented money flowing into campaigns, that can be a bad omen.

Remember that the rich and powerful, according to Donald Trump, who should know, give money to politicians to get favors from them.

That means if they are not giving, they don't think the candidate will be in any position to do them any favor.

The second very troubling problem is the one my focus group identified.

The 16 other Republican contenders for the nomination are going to go for Perry's throat if he stays in the race. Their question to him is basically going to be this: 'Gov. Perry, if you can't manage your own campaign finances, how are you going to manage the finances of the United States?”

Another problem that's already erupted is the question of why he had to fly on private jets and not commercial like the rest of us.

An offshoot from that, which a snarky former student of mine and prominent Republican asked me, was, 'How come Perry, former governor of Texas, didn't have at least three major oil companies offering to fly him on their corporate jets wherever and whenever he needed transportation?”

Also Perry had been stuck in the lower tier of candidates in the polls and ended up in the 'Miss Congeniality” FOX debate in the afternoon before the 'Big Boy” debate. Even there, it was Carly Fiorina who got the big buzz and was propelled forward, while the others, including Perry, languished in a sad oblivion. He was at 3 percent in the last poll I saw.

In Iowa, Donald Trump is in first place with 17 percent, followed by Ohio Gov. John Kasich at 12 percent, Marco Rubio in third place at 10 percent, Ben Carson at 9 percent, Carly Fiorina and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz tied for fifth at 7 percent each.

In New Hampshire, Trump is also in the lead at 18 percent, followed by Jeb Bush at 13 percent, and Kasich at 12 percent. No Perry to be seen anywhere.

I hear that the Super PAC's supporting him plan to step in and offer cash. That's fine, but it seems odd that they'd pour cash into a campaign that doesn't seem to be moving anywhere.

Finally, there is what I said to an eager beaver, young reporter from the East Coast who asked me, 'Who does Perry 2016 remind you of?”

The answer is former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who withdrew from the race in 2011 after he came in third in the Ames Straw Poll - a decent showing by anyone's expectations. He dropped out because he had overspent and had no money left to continue the race for the White House.

So, I do accept the explanation of some of Gov. Perry's staffers that, 'He has some very difficult decisions to make.” The most difficult, I think, is when to announce that he's pulling the plug on his White House dream.

' Steffen Schmidt is professor of political science at Iowa State University. Comments: steffenschmidt2005@gmail.com