George Rebane

The clear winners were Bernie Sanders and Marco Rubio. Neither were projected to make much of a showing against the self-adorned leaders of their parties.  Ted Cruz’s nominal victory is going to have a tough time running a successful race on its evangelical legs.  Things became more clarified for The Donald as he experienced the bracing embrace of reality delivered by the real Iowa voters.

The more interesting contest was between Bernie and Hillary. In my lifetime I have never heard a serious candidate, actually make that two serious candidates, for the American presidency sound like throwbacks from the depression era halcyon days of communism.  The Democrat voters are in a schism – the older ones giving a gimlet eye to Bernie the ‘political revolutionary’, and the younger millennials lapping up everything the old firebrand can deliver and asking for more.  That schism is not surprising since the millennials are found to be the most ignorant generation – especially in economics and finance - to date since the Great Society took over our schools.  These are the know-nothings to whom Sanders' socialist economics looks so appealing.  I reported the PriceWaterhouse study on this in the 25jan16 Ruminations.

[update] There is some question on sample size in the comment stream.  Not to worry.  The 140,000 plus Iowa Republicans contained more sample size than any of the ongoing daily polls.  The only weakness of that sample is its evangelical skew, but that tilt will be repeated in most Republican leaning voting cohorts in the coming months.  Those same arguments will also be welcome on the receptive ears of many religious Hispanics and blacks.  The only Dems that will turn their tin ears to the message of liberty and personal responsibility will be the secular humanist white progressives.  The Dems’ ace in the hole will remain the dumbth of the large millennial horde; Hillary and Bernie and Liz and Joe have got to keep convincing these people that what they learned in school really works in the real world.