{"id":4602,"date":"2011-08-15T09:39:15","date_gmt":"2011-08-15T13:39:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/?p=4602"},"modified":"2011-08-17T10:02:00","modified_gmt":"2011-08-17T14:02:00","slug":"once-again-rural-white-america-gets-first-presidential-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/2011\/08\/15\/once-again-rural-white-america-gets-first-presidential-say\/","title":{"rendered":"Once again, rural white America gets first presidential say"},"content":{"rendered":"

In an essay published last May, the Washington Post asked<\/a> whether it made sense for 200,000 mostly white, older, and rural people in Iowa to hold the kind of kingmaker power that they currently wield.<\/p>\n

When the rest of the country is focusing on the economy, will Republicans in other states take their lead from the outcome of an eccentric process that has been dominated by social conservatives?<\/p>\n

And as the GOP looks to defeat an African American president who mobilized record numbers of young and minority voters four years ago, how relevant are the preferences of 200,000 or so caucusgoers in a rural state that is overwhelmingly white and significantly older than average?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But once again, Iowa got to make the first cull of presidential candidates.\u00a0 By rejecting former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty — passed over in favor of House member Michele Bachman<\/a> — the state toppled one politician and elevated another.<\/p>\n

It is a matter of fact that small town voters have different sensibilities, different even from other Republican voters around the country.<\/p>\n

How different would these early political tests if they occurred in a part of the country that included a significant percentage of suburban or even urban voters?<\/p>\n

Even if early caucuses occurred in places like Rep. Bachman’s own home state, politicians would be forced to balance their appeal, reaching out to small town activists but also to people in places like Minneapolis and St. Paul.<\/p>\n

So what do you think?\u00a0 Should our early politics take a detour from places like Iowa and New Hampshire, maybe even showing up in places like the Bronx and LA?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In an essay published last May, the Washington Post asked whether it made sense for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[20],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4602"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4602"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4605,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4602\/revisions\/4605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}