Michele Bachmann won the 2011 Ames Straw Poll, but with less than a 1% margin. The final tally of the over 16,000 votes cast gave Bachmann a victory with 28.6% over runner-up Ron “The Idiot” Paul, who had 27.7%. While I’m sure Bachmann and her supporters are cheering this as a victory, I would argue that it proves how inept the Bachmann campaign is.
The fact that Ron Paul got so close to Michele Bachmann indicates the Minnesota Representative’s true strength (or lack-there-of). Bachmann and Paul both get their support from the TEA Party activists. There’s nothing wrong with that. The problem is that the TEA Party activists will flock to a straw poll like salmon going up stream. The purpose of the Ames Straw Poll is to test your get-out-the-vote machine. If Michele Bachmann finished in a virtual tie with Ron Paul, it means that her machine is virtually non-existent. Allow me to explain this another way. As things are now, Bachmann and Paul split the TEA Party vote pretty evenly. Ron Paul does not have any appeal outside of the most ardent TEA Party supporters (if you don’t like the TEA Party, you don’t like Ron Paul). So, with this being established, if Michele Bachmann’s campaign sit back and did nothing for the Ames Straw Poll, they would have placed evenly with Ron Paul at the top because of TEA Party activists. Well, that’s what happened.
There are three possible explanations for this.
First, the entire political world over-estimated Bachmann’s support within the TEA Party.
Second, that Bachmann’s campaign team is completely inept. Or, at the very least, is relying on the Huckabee strategy of creating a cult of personality (something she’s failed to create so-far).
Third, and perhaps most disturbing, that Michele Bachmann simply does not appeal to voters outside of the TEA Party movement.
The reason that third reason should be so troubling (at least for Bachmann supporters) is because it means that Bachmann is as un-electable in a general election as Ron Paul. The question her supporters must ask themselves is whether or not they want to be responsible for nominating a candidate that will ensure four more years of Barack Obama. Ron Paul’s supporters are fanatics who already blame everyone but themselves for all the problems in the world today. Bachmann’s supporters, from what I can tell, are a bit more sincere about ousting Barack Obama and they fit the conservative mold a bit better than Ron Paul’s French-Anarchists.
So what does this mean for Bachmann? Well, for starters, it means that she’s lucky. Lucky that none of the serious candidates got close enough to the TEA Party movement in Iowa and made a serious run for victory in the Ames Straw Poll.
It also means that Bachmann’s blood is in the water. The two people who are going to take notice of that are Rick Perry and Sarah Palin.
Rick Perry is in the formative stages of his 2012 campaign and, in my opinion, is the most electable candidate in the general election. If he were to go into Iowa and directly inject himself into the TEA Party movement there, he could win quite a few votes away from Bachmann who, in my opinion, has come across as the most incompetent candidate I’ve seen in a long time. I’m sure I’m not the only conservative who sees that. Furthermore, Perry’s appeal in the evangelical community is already greater than Bachmann’s, and that’s going to have huge dividends in the Iowa Caucuses. Plus, since Romney appears to have abandoned Iowa after his embarrassing loss there in January 2008, Perry will enjoy support from ex-Romney backers.
Sarah Palin also took notice of Bachmann’s weak performance in the Ames Straw Poll. Even though it baffles me, Sarah Palin has that cross-party appeal that Bachmann proved unable to attain during the straw poll. She brings the TEA Party, national security, and evangelical conservatives together under one banner. Plus, she has the infrastructure in place to get them out to vote. Don’t misunderstand me, I don’t think Sarah Palin is smart enough to run this country. However, she is an incredible unifying force in the GOP. Personally, I wish she would become the Republican Party Chairwoman. She’s great at staying true to a message and bringing conservatives together under a common cause. However, that’s not what I want or expect out of a President.
Will Palin run? Well, last week, I would have said “no.” Today, because of all the blood Bachmann left in the water, I’m back to “maybe.” Palin’s own staffers now are telling the media that Sarah Palin has such incredible appeal that she believes she can hold out until Labor Day before making an announcement.
By the way, Palin is back in Iowa on another bus tour and stealing attention from all the declared candidates and Bachmann’s Ames “victory.” That seems a bit too convenient for it to be coincidence.
In my opinion, Rick Perry is probably the best candidate of the bunch right now. I’m not ready to support him, though. I’ll explain why later.
