How Iowa became the place where it all begins

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People in 49 states should be wondering by now: What's so special about Barb Livingston?For starters, she's a smart 54-year-old with a snappy wit.She has one of those occupations that the job counselors never told you about -- a spot in the educational services department at a firm that makes valves for oil fields and pipelines."It's not a very glamorous product, but it's a big deal," she says.The same might be said of her office zip code: 50518.Those five little digits explain a lot.They explain why, after a long, amusing year, Livingston can barely remember all the big, powerful people who have called to say hello, invited her to private receptions, scheduled one- on-one lunches or otherwise tried to become her best friend.She's an Iowan -- and the Marshall County Republican Central Committee chair, too."I've been kissed and hugged a lot," she said, recalling meetings with seven Republican presidential contenders -- and seeing a few others from afar. "They've said goofy things to entice me."It hasn't quite worked. No candidate has yet earned Livingston's endorsement going into Thursday's precinct caucuses.Still, the candidates keep trying to stay on her good side. They figure she acts as a conduit for would-be Republican caucus participants in one of the more closely-watched counties in the most closely-watched state in the White House race: the first one."It's fun," she said, dropping names.Former New York Gov. George Pataki requested a private luncheon. Arizona Sen. John McCain has pulled her aside for special chats. Former Sen. Fred Thompson singled her out of a crowd to say nice things about her son -- a campaign worker. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has sought her out several times and sometimes asks her to introduce him.The attention Livingston gets is a bit over the top. But other average Iowans, especially the most faithful participants in past Republican or Democratic caucuses, are showered with so much special treatment that folks in more forgotten states often wonder: Why Iowa?Who gave it all this magic power? Is it really representative of the rest of the United States? Are the caucuses all they're cracked up to be?And, for crying out loud, is this any way to pick the leader of the free world?Folks in the Hawkeye State defend their first-in-the-nation status like a birthright.And they answer critics with a question of their own.What's the alternative? A mega-money, coast-to-coast, television-driven contest dominated by the rich and famous?"Unless we have a regional primary or some other way of doing it, which is unlikely, Iowa or some state is going to be first," said lawyer Glenn Smith, who had a role in the 1976 contest that made this the quadrennial center of the political universe."Iowa is a small enough state where you can do retail politicking, meet people one on one," Smith said. "It allows candidates who might not have as much money or name recognition to get that recognition."That worked in 1976, when Smith was legal counsel to a southern governor folks called "Jimmy Who?"As the top candidate in the Iowa caucuses, Jimmy Carter gained the momentum to go all the way to the White House.Since then, many an anonymous, under-funded underdog has had corny dreams about this place. Is this heaven? No. It's Iowa.It was a sunny Friday in July when a red, white and blue bus and a conga line of mostly rented cars made an unannounced stop in a place called Webster City.Sen. Chris Dodd and his chase crew filled most of the good parking spots on the sleepy, downtown drag.The senator hopped off the bus, made a little small talk with out-of-town reporters and then slipped inside a darkened diner where a handful of area farmers were waiting to give him the third degree.Dodd's traveling companion for the day, music legend Paul Simon, glanced inside the storefront but then walked off to look for America, taking some of the journalists with him on an unguided walking tour to check out the local architecture.By the time the little gaggle got back to the diner, the conversation had turned to the economy.Inside, Simon found the farmers were telling the Connecticut senator about increasing corporate control of agriculture and the alternative energy programs they hoped would help them make ends meet.Chats like that represent small-town Iowa's royalty from "retail" politicking.As candidates travel across the state shopping for votes literally one at a time, they have to listen. They have to respond.This is the way representative democracy is supposed to work. Politicians are supposed to listen to people's needs. And they do.In Iowa, at least, the people can demand to be heard.The state has 3 million people, sure. But on caucus night, all that counts are the roughly 200,000 active party members -- Democrats and Republicans -- who typically turn out.With the right lists of names, a grueling travel schedule for a year or two, and a whole lot of hand sanitizer, it's theoretically possible for a candidate to reach out and touch every single one of them.Conventional wisdom -- repeated by experts innumerable times since Jimmy Carter's 1976 victory -- is that expensive television ads are mostly wasted here.They reach millions of people (both inside Iowa and in adjoining states) who will not be caucusing for anyone on Thursday night.What's more, Iowans say, they're so accustomed to one-on-one attention that they'd never caucus for anyone they hadn't looked in the eyeball a few times at least.But that hasn't stopped an unprecedented "air war" this cycle. And there's evidence that the television bombardment has had at least momentary effects.In early 2007, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney began a nonstop bombardment of ads to establish his credentials as a business-minded Washington outsider who really couldn't wait to use his veto pen against anything the Democratic-controlled congress threw at him.The result: he vaulted into the lead in the polls and took such a commanding lead that big national names, including former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Arizona Sen. John McCain, practically conceded the state in July.On the Democratic side, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson used humor to introduce himself to Iowa television viewers. His mock "job interview" ads were so popular that when Richardson would hit the stump, he sometimes started speeches by asking crowds, "Have you seen my ads?"And Richardson gained momentum, reached the edge of double digits in the polls and secured a long-term spot in the "top four."Romney and Richardson both invested shoe leather in Iowa to back up their advertisements. But their ads also erased some of the folklore behind the state's supposed aversion to letting an electronic box tell them whom to like.The counterpoint: former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, whose face had only appeared in an anti-tax group's ads vilifying him before his stock began rising in the late autumn. Remember, however, that by then he had made quite an impression as the funny, folksy fellow in the never-ending series of debates -- on television.According to an authoritative history by the Des Moines Register's venerable political columnist David Yepsen, the modern caucuses evolved as a reaction to the Democratic Party's tumultuous convention in Chicago in 1968.The convention, marred by violent anti-Vietnam War protests, left a bitter, not-so-democratic impression of decisions being made by secret cabals in smoke-filled rooms."The Democrats adopted a series of rules requiring that plenty of notice be given about county, district and state conventions -- and that party members be given plenty of time to file and debate platform resolutions," Yepsen wrote.Iowa Democrats decided to hold precinct caucuses in late January so there'd be time to winnow down decisions through the counties before the state convention in June.Few noticed that the precinct caucuses would happen before New Hampshire's traditional, first-in-the-nation presidential primaries.One person who did was Gary Hart, the future U.S. senator from Colorado, who was running the long-shot presidential campaign of Sen. George McGovern.Hart spearheaded an aggressive -- and unprecedented -- ground campaign in Iowa, which borders McGovern's home state of South Dakota. On caucus night, McGovern couldn't beat the national front-runner, Sen. Edmund Muskie. But his second-place finish was a major surprise that drew the attention of the few national reporters paying attention.McGovern gained momentum, went on to win his party's nomination, and an Iowa springboard strategy was born.The same thing happens today, but it's tougher for anyone to sneak up on Democratic front-runners like Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton or Sen. Barack Obama when they've already opened more than 30 offices apiece from Council Bluffs to Davenport.And by the spring of 2007, there was hardly a basketball gymnasium or hotel ballroom in the state that hadn't had its rafters shaken by some candidate's amplified stump speech.National issue-advocacy groups have figured out that Iowans have a pretty good deal. Iowans get more attention than most Americans. So these groups have become "Iowan," with full-time outposts and well-organized efforts to make their presence known at every town hall style meeting.In Jimmy Carter's Iowa barnstorming days, it might have been hard to imagine the sort of scene that unfolded this month at a convention hall the size of several airplane hangars.An estimated 18,000 people stood elbow-to-elbow inside the Hy-Vee Center in Des Moines to hear Oprah Winfrey make her first-ever political speech for Obama.Paid and unpaid campaign workers tried to make sure nobody gets in or out of the event without filling out a card with their name, address, phone number and e-mail address -- especially the e-mail address.The concept is old-school. It's just that in past generations, it was done on note-cards.But now, there's no escaping the bombardment of campaign mail -- sometimes personalized to match a person's issue interests. There's no escaping the steady flow of e-mail updates.And there is no escaping the robo-calls, the calls from pollsters, and calls from journalists, too.As of October -- before the regular press corps exploded from a few dozen die-hards to several hundred journalistic tourists -- a poll found that 7 of every 100 likely caucus-goers said they had been interviewed about the presidential race.All this special attention can feel like a burden at times, says Livingston, the Marshall County Republican chair."People say they get two or three phone calls per evening -- a variety of things related to the caucus," she said. "It is kind of too much sometimes in that regard. . . . And I hear people say, 'We'll be glad in two weeks when the (television) commercials are over.' "So, is it worth the trouble?"The candidates apparently feel Iowa is worth the trouble," she said.Before the race for 2008 began, some political experts figured Iowa had been rendered irrelevant.The number of delegates at stake pales compared to the massive haul just a month later, on Feb. 5, aka "Super-Duper Tuesday," when California and New York lead a coast-to-coast mini-primary.After complaints that Iowa -- though changing -- still isn't racially, ethnically or socially diverse enough to be representative of the country, the major parties added early contests in places like Nevada and South Carolina. Other states, like Michigan and Florida, moved up their dates, hoping to steal Iowa's thunder.But still, with the hours ticking down, Iowa is like one big square convention center hosting every major Democratic candidate, most of the Republican candidates, and an international media mob expected to reach well past 2,000 by caucus night.Could this be the last time the Hawkeye State gets this sort of attention?It might take another generation for both the Democratic and Republican party contests to be this wide-open. The last time the race for the White House began without an incumbent president or vice president in the competition was 1952.Surely, by the time it happens again the "other 49" states will revolt against Iowa's first- in-the-nation status.Smith, 63, has heard this talk before -- ever since his "Peanut Brigade" days in '76.So he laughs at an out- of-town reporter covering only his second caucus night."There will be excitement on one side or the other," he said."You'll be back."(Contact M.E. Sprengelmeyer at sprengelmeyerm(at)shns.com)