Hillary Rallies Iowans, But Will They Rally to Her?

ByABC News
January 27, 2007, 6:13 PM

Jan. 27, 2007 — -- As the political analyst Yogi Berra once said about the shadows at Yankee Stadium, "It gets late early out there."

It is chronologically too early in the cycle to pick the next president of the United States, but in Iowa -- whose caucuses this time next year will help define the contours of the 2008 race -- it is starting to feel late.

For Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., it has gotten late awfully early in Iowa, a state in which her comparatively weak political standing does not match her front-running national status.

It is no accident that Clinton's first trip as a presidential candidate is to Iowa. Amid all the uncertainly of the rapidly accelerating contest to replace George W. Bush in the White House, strategists in both parties agree that Iowa's caucuses are going to play a crucial role in determining the next president.

The leading Republican candidates in terms of national fundraising and political strength -- Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., former Gov. Mitt Romney, R-Mass., and the Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani -- all have real question marks when it comes to Iowa, in part because they are relative newcomers to the state, and in part because of the mistrust many of the conservative activists who dominate the caucuses feel towards all three men.

In contrast, Clinton right away faces three formidable human obstacles -- former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who most everyone concedes has, in the past year, effectively built on his impressive second place finish in the 2004 caucuses; the political meteorite that is Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.; and Iowa's former governor, Tom Vilsack, who is basing much of his overall presidential effort on winning in his home state (and then, somehow, getting credit from the expectation-setting national media, which nevertheless might discount such a victory).

If it seems certain that all the candidates will devote substantial time and resources to the difficult task of organizing in Iowa's 99 counties for the labor-intensive caucus process and wooing the state's notoriously picky voters, it is less clear what issues will dominate both parties' contests. Right now, in Iowa, as in the rest of the country, the war in Iraq tops the lists of voter concerns, and every candidate passing through the state knows it.