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Ladies and gentlemen, it’s on! Tomorrow will be the start of the most intensive presidential election in American history. Primary season is upon us, and in just over a month, by “Super Duper Tuesday“, we will with near certainty know who the two nominees are. And where does it all begin? In the Tall Corn State, Iowa.

Yes, the state that has a smaller population than Berlin will set the stage for one month of heated campaigning and may just decide the race. In the last three elections, whoever won Iowa went on to get the nomination of his party. But what exactly makes this 95% White state poised for the top spot? Senator Tom Harkin, IA knows the reason:

Nobody does it better! The marathon campaign leading up to the Caucuses is an extended interview for the most powerful job in the world. Iowans approach this responsibility with a unique thoughtfulness that has won the respect of pundits and politicians alike.

And candidates are careful not throw Iowans from their high horse. When Ohio Governor Ted Strickland, a Democrat who has endorsed Hillary Clinton, dared to suggest that it made “no sense” that the “hugely undemocratic” caucus is first in the nation, Clinton’s campaign put out this statement:

Senator Clinton has worked her heart out campaigning in Iowa because she knows it plays a unique and special role in the nominating process and that process must be protected. As she has said many times she is glad Iowans are entrusted with this responsibility because they take it so seriously. On this issue Hillary and Gov. Strickland strongly disagree.

Strickland referred to the special nature of the Iowa caucus. As the name suggests, this isn’t a simple ballot election like the other primaries. In Iowa, party members gather in person to select candidates. The exact process varies from party to party. It’s certainly a fine example of grassroots democracy, unless you’re an Iowan who is away to college, abroad, on military deployment, incarcerated, taking care of kids or just at work, in which cases you’re out of luck.

Supporters of the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary, which will take place five days later, argue that it will be much easier for candidates with little cash on hand to succeed there than in the big states like New York or Illinois. Says Democratic dark horse candidate Joe Biden in defense of the current system:

Thank God for Iowa. [...] Can you imagine my being able to do this in Florida or California or Texas or Pennsylvania?

But the high influence Iowa has in selecting the nominees often takes candidates to unlikely positions. Small government Republicans turn into raving supporters of farm subsidies, of which Iowa gets in excess of $2 billion a year, when campaigning in the state. Democrats tout Ethanol fuel derived from corn as the solution to Global Warming, even though its effectiveness in that regard is dubious at best.

Republican John McCain is one of the few bucking the trend, speaking out against subsidies in general. That might be because he never thought he had a chance among conservative Republicans there, and until very recently he polled in the single digits in Iowa. But now he’s picked up the endorsement of the state’s biggest paper, the Des Moines Register, and is coming in third in the polls.

So maybe Iowans are little more susceptive to criticism than the candidates think. We will know tomorrow, when the 2008 presidential election finally gets under way. Stay with us, it’s gonna be exciting!

By Dirk Jacquemien