On the night of the Iowa Caucuses, Huckabee received 34% of the Republican vote, making him the winning of the Republican Caucus. This win affirmed previous pools that predicted Huckabee to be the frontrunner of the Republican party in Iowa. Huckabee defeated his fellow Republican candidates due to his strong Christian beliefs and values. In addition, Huckabee received great support from evangelical Christians who attended the caucus. In fact, according to entrance polls, 60% of the attendees were evangelical Christians and Huckabee received 46% of their votes. In addition, 45% of individuals who attended the caucus identified themselves as “very conservative,” and 35% of them supported Huckabee. Huckabee also received great support from women, as well as Republican voters under 45. Ecstatic at winning Iowa, Huckabee greatly thanked his supporters asserting, "I wasn't sure I would ever be able to love a state as much as I love my home state of Arkansas, but tonight, I love Iowa."
After winning in Iowa, Huckabee flew to New Hampshire Friday to focus on the January 8th New Hampshire primary. It is predicted that Huckabee will have a difficult time receiving Republican votes in New Hampshire. In fact, Romney is favored in New Hampshire and some recent polls have named McCain (won NH in 2000) the New Hampshire frontrunner. In addition, New Hampshire is comprised of less evangelical Christians and has a great(er) amount of Republicans identifying themselves as libertarians (most are pro-choice). Commenting on the absence of a great number of evangelical Christians, Huckabee joked "We're going to have to go convert a lot of people in New Hampshire in the next five days,” "A big tent revival out on the grounds of the Concord State Capitol. We'll get 'em all converted to the evangelical faith and then we'll win.” However, Huckabee acknowledged his win in Iowa was due to many voters who were not evangelicals. Although Huckabee will be in New Hampshire for the following 4 days with Chuck Norris right by his side, Huckabee’s campaign is focusing greatly on the January 19th South Carolina primary. The majority of Huckabee’s staff plans to set up in South Carolina soon, where he has a much greater chance to win the primary. In addition, Huckabee has made recent appearances on “Good Morning America,” “The Early Show,” “Today Show,” “Fox and Friends,” and the “International Report” (to name a few). The extra press Huckabee has gained after his win in Iowa while probably increase his support among voters.
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It will be exciting to see how New Hampshire turns out, One quest that come to mind is "Does Huckabee's Iowa win indicate a sure nomination in the GOP?" as well as "How will the Iowa win affect the New Hampshire race?" In days past winning the Iowa was something on an anathema to being nominated as the candidate, much like how New Hampshire was an indicator of presidency; but in recent years that trend has been broken n New Hampshire, so the question there is "Will it be broken in Iowa as well?"
Huckabee's post Iowa "victory" speech was one of the most awful speeches I have ever heard. It was the perfect example of a political speech which essentially offered nothing more than rhetoric. The sum of the entire speech was a big zero, as Huckabee did not supplement his message with any specific examples of what he plans to do in office. Also, the crux of his speech, the "it is not about me, it's about we" statement, contains a flagrant grammatical error. Though intentional grammar misuse can often be valuable in politics (as it humanizes the candidate), Huckabee's error was both awkward and foolish.
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