Monday 1 February 2016

Iowa state republican election is the real start of a USA election campaign which Trump will not win

Every four years, when the race for the White House begins, Iowa - a place with six times more pigs than people - is thrust into the global spotlight. The voters decide today in Iowa. Their opinions will matter, but this is merely one event in a long campaign. 
Why do presidential candidates - and the world's media - descend on Des Moines in the middle of a bitterly cold winter? It's all because Iowa holds the first contest in the months-long nomination battle. 
What is this election like? It's like sending all our politicians to any British county, for months in mid winter to try and persuade only 20% of the voters (or less than that number who turn out in the republican primary) to vote in dozens of caucuses. By all accounts Trump seems likely to beat Cruz, who has worked the state hardest, but the likely long term winner is Rubio. I certainly do not subscribe to the view that Trump will win the republican nomination.