NRA & Iowa straw poll politics, photos....

[SatanzBountyHunter]

Too bad that whackjob Tancredo is ahead of Paul - doesn't make sense.

Anyone that doesn't want to legalize drugs must be crazy.

'End Illegal Immigration, secure our borders, No amnesty, pro 2nd Amendment, pro-life' I do declare, what is he thinking?..showing up at a Republican event like that.

 

[Rembrandt]

The Iowa Straw Poll showed who has the best organization to win the Iowa caucuses in six months.

Romney....Campaign was by far the best organized and professionally well tuned. Providing bus transportation for the entire state to those who wouldn't make the drive normally. They used a shotgun approach to pull in voters from all demographic groups. Reports are that his campaign spent around 2 million on this event, or an average of about $450 per vote.

Huckabee.....Made the best showing of second tier candidates without spending lots of money. He has been working small towns and churchs all over the state. Appears to have paid off by getting the best bang for the buck. A good showing here translates into $5-10 million in free media publicity in the next few weeks.

Brownbeck....Spent a lot of time working Iowa small towns, made a good showing to keep him in the game. He too worked churches and local events. Only candidate to appear at a gun range shooting an AR15 for the cameras.

Tancredo.....He too worked churches and small towns for the vote. Many liked his stance on border control and national security. Had a very loyal following that view the border control as the most important issue.

Ron Paul.....Worked the Iowa media circuit well, but didn't have a strong Iowa base. Most of his supporters at the Straw Poll were from out of state and viewed by many as rude and obnoxious. They would march around in a snake line chanting "Ron Paul", going through other campaign tents and food courts. They would also put campaign literature on other candidates rented areas....offended a lot of voters.

Duncan Hunter.....Poor showing, didn't have the financial backing or ground support of Iowa voters. Will probably pull out in the next few weeks.

Tommy Thompson....Worked the state hard visiting every county, just couldn't get the support. Will no doubt fold up and call it quits.

 

[mountainclmbr]

It seems that everyone expected Romney to win the straw poll due to money spent, busses and organizational effort that was concentrated on the state.

I was very surprised at Huckabee's showing. I admit that I had not paid much attention to him until just lately. I thought he did a fairly good job in the last debate.

It would have been an interesting event to attend even if I could not vote.

 

[ConfuseUs]

Of course Romney was going to win. He had a well financed effort to suck in his supporters from all over the state. The problem with that strategy is that free buses and event tickets for Romney supporters just show that Romney has a lot of fair weather friends, not grass-roots support. It was a cinch to "support" Romney, just take a day off, hop on a bus, and eat free barbecue.

The Iowa Republican rank and file may very well think Romney is rank and vile. Certainly a hefty portion of Republicans elsewhere think so.

I guess time will tell if this was the hollow victory I think it was.

 

[Pat H]

Ron Paul.....Worked the Iowa media circuit well, but didn't have a strong Iowa base. Most of his supporters at the Straw Poll were from out of state and viewed by many as rude and obnoxious. They would march around in a snake line chanting "Ron Paul", going through other campaign tents and food courts. They would also put campaign literature on other candidates rented areas....offended a lot of voters.

I suspect it mostly irritated campaign workers in the Romney tent.

The video of Ron Paul activists in Ames, Iowa.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emEF0ZPs1wc

 

[xnavy]

Ron Paul.....Worked the Iowa media circuit well, but didn't have a strong Iowa base. Most of his supporters at the Straw Poll were from out of state and viewed by many as rude and obnoxious. They would march around in a snake line chanting "Ron Paul", going through other campaign tents and food courts. They would also put campaign literature on other candidates rented areas....offended a lot of voters.

Does this really surprise anyone. It is the same thing as most people are complaining about on the internet. They make a nuisance of themselves and again is another reason that Ron Paul is a lost cause.

 

[Bruxley]

The line between enthusiastic and overbearing may have been crossed by the Paul supporters in Iowa as it has been extensively here.

Enthusiasm is contagious, overbearing is repellent. It hurts a cause to be overbearing. Reasonable people will look no further.

 

[MrApathy]

Ron Paul.....Worked the Iowa media circuit well, but didn't have a strong Iowa base. Most of his supporters at the Straw Poll were from out of state and viewed by many as rude and obnoxious. They would march around in a snake line chanting "Ron Paul", going through other campaign tents and food courts. They would also put campaign literature on other candidates rented areas....offended a lot of voters.

wow what a pack of lies. they went around chanting because Ron Paul was giving his speech every candidate had supporters chanting on the way they never went through another candidates tent or fenced off area its not like they were the only ones doing that Mitt Romney paid staffers in staff shirts did that as well no one in the Ron Paul campaign was paid or told to do that it was grass roots supporters. yes alot of them were from out of state but good portion of 1300 of them was not.

Ron worked the local media circuit? Ron Paul had lots of local Iowa meetup groups doing grass roots campaigning was some volunteers that wrote and phoned Iowans outside that Ron Paul only campaigned for 8 days in Iowa the others spent good amount more time.

putting literature on other campaigns areas was strictly forbidden and enforced.
of voters most offended it seemed to be people with Romney shirts that voted and then heard Romneys speech and found out his position on guns and other stuff. people will be upset with about anything specially those that dont think and just go with the herd
and get asked to think.

as far as Rude and Obnoxious sure they were deemed quite rude by people that dont love freedom,guns,rights,liberty and the constitution the Ron Paul volunteers are people passionate about there guns,rights,life,liberty and the main document that supports it the Constitution of the United States of America they are sick of the erosion say one thing and do another and not live up to what they say. the Ron Paul volunteers were met with alot more rudeness than they dished. what is freedom if you cannot express it.

if only we lived in dictatorship we could skip the whole process second thought I will pass I dont mind other people expressing themselves even if I differ with it

 

[GoSlash27]

^ What he said. I was there, and the reaction to our enthusiasm was overwhelmingly positive except for the Romney staff (who actually threw stuff at us).
I am not aware of any Paul supporters taking materials into anybody else's areas, but I won't claim it didn't happen. After all, I couldn't be everywhere at once and it is a grassroots effort.
1,300 votes is a pretty spectacular showing considering that they didn't bus anybody in (even the staff had to drive themselves), didn't buy any tickets, didn't provide air conditioning or big-ticket entertainment....didn't really do much of anything. All of this after spending less time on the ground in Iowa than Fred Thompson.
Somebody up-thread asked about a cost-benefit analysis, and IowaGOP provides that. The Paul campaign paid $200 per vote, while Romney paid $2,000. Paul's grassroots supporters pooled their money for 850 tickets and got 1,300 votes. Romney bought 10,000 tickets for 4,500 votes.
A win wasn't in the cards, but we did what we needed to do. And you detractors won't be blathering on about "under 2% real world results" anymore

Even though Romney got the vote, I'd say he's the big loser in the straw poll. He gambled his entire 2nd quarter war chest on a positive news cycle and lost. I think the big winner was Huckabee.

 

[Silver Bullet]

By my calculations, Ron Paul scored over 9% in the figures given earlier in this thread. Does that have anything to do with nobody making ignorant remarks about “1%” ?

I'm still trying to figure out why the Iowa Republican Party let one or two Ron Paul supporters vote 1300 times?

I can’t figure that out, either. But, I’ll bet there’s somebody here who can tell us !

It is the same thing as most people are complaining about on the internet. They make a nuisance of themselves and again is another reason that Ron Paul is a lost cause.

That’s why I’m glad you post on these threads. You make us Ron Paul supporters look good by comparison.

 

[GoSlash27]

Rembrandt,
I might have met you while you were working the NRA tent. We spent hours there and the Iowa gun owners tent.
Question: If the NRA has a rating system for the candidates, why wouldn't you guys tell the voters what the candidates' ratings were? I heard time and time again people asking you guys about candidates and you (collectively) refused to point out the gun grabbers or allies.

 

[Manedwolf]

Enthusiasm is contagious, overbearing is repellent. It hurts a cause to be overbearing. Reasonable people will look no further.

Yes. The ad nauseum mentioning and re-mentioning of his name as the solution to every plague of mankind has now begun to make me actually physically nauseous and angry when I hear it.

It's THAT overbearing and obnoxious, at this point. It's like those HEAD-ON commercials.

"RON PAUL! Apply directly to the forehead! RON PAUL! Apply directly to the forehead!"

:barf:

His supporters are making people change the channel.

 

[GoSlash27]

His supporters are making people change the channel.

Oh, please. As if you were ever "on channel" in the first place.
We must be doing one heck of a job turning people off. The grassroots volunteer corps is now up to 30,000.

 

[Rembrandt]

....Question: If the NRA has a rating system for the candidates, why wouldn't you guys tell the voters what the candidates' ratings were? I heard time and time again people asking you guys about candidates and you (collectively) refused to point out the gun grabbers or allies.

Past grades for candidates are no secret, we are glad to provide those to anyone who asked. Some of the volunteers working the booth may not have known the grades for each candidate. Our primary purpose was to promote membership.

NRA "grades" or ratings are revised and updated just before an election. To keep an "on going" grade is hard to do because of current gun legislation may be in the pipeline, one vote could effect it either positive or negative prior to the next election. A candidates public statements could also change the grade. Campaigns are sent questionaires just prior to the next election, this too plays a key part in the grading.

The one question we refused to answer was "Which candidate does the NRA endorse?" Most of the candidates currently running will be gone in a few months. There are too many unknowns between now and the election to make that call. It is possible the NRA may or may not endorse any Presidential candidate....time will tell.

.....wow what a pack of lies.

Just relating what I heard from straw poll attendees. Came from supporters of every candidate. RP supporters were at nearly every building entrance shouting and yelling, many thought it was intimidating and in poor taste. Got nothing against campaign enthusiasm for your candidate, but I'm afraid it drove off a lot of potential voters. Pat Buchanan's campaign did similar things eight years ago...it too put off a lot of voters. There is more, but I'll send it to you in a PM.

 

[Fremmer]

At least he didn't have weird teenagers running around in orange hats.

The good folks in Iowa don't care for rude and intimidating. RP needs to get a handle on that, quick.

 

[GoSlash27]

Fremmer,
There is no "getting a handle on that". The meme has now swung from "the grassroots support is a hoax" to "the grassroots support is overbearing".
The simple fact is that the grassroots, by definition, cannot be controlled. They will do their own thing, for better or for worse.

The one fact that keeps me thinking that the overall response was positive (beyond the people I talked to): The Paul contingent was the only one to garner more votes than tickets. We were also the only ones to run out of tickets and have to take up a collection to buy more.

 

[Fremmer]

So someone explain to me how this poll worked: you had to buy a ticket to get in and participate, and then you voted for your candidate of choice, correct?

 

[johnbt]

According to the Sunday paper you had to buy a $35 ticket to vote.

IOW, the results of the poll are meaningless.

John

 

[Rembrandt]

So someone explain to me how this poll worked: you had to buy a ticket to get in and participate, and then you voted for your candidate of choice, correct?

In almost all cases the attendee does not pay for a ticket...it's paid for by the candidates. There may be a few cases where people paid for their own ticket out of pocket, but that would be rare. Proceeds from each ticket purchased by a campaign goes to the Iowa GOP. In addition to that the campaign pays the University for rental of tent space, tents, food, shirts, hats, and signs. The true cost is never known till after the bills come in days later.

The candidate is offering to pay for your ticket in exchange for a vote. They will also throw in access to the candidate, entertainment, BBQ meal, t-shirt, and other goodies. The more voters you can attract the more tickets the candidate must buy and the more the Iowa GOP makes for future campaigns.

What this measures is the candidates organizational skills and the amount of support they're able to drum up.

In the end candidates who do well get millions of dollars in free media coverage for weeks following the Straw Poll. Estimates are 15-20 million worth of publicity and news coverage. This then translates into more campaign contibutions for those who did well.

 

[Manedwolf]

According to the Sunday paper you had to buy a $35 ticket to vote.

IOW, the results of the poll are meaningless.

And Romney bought the voting cards for a lot of people.