Smith and Martin:
Rick Perry came to Michele Bachmann?s home town Sunday evening and schooled the newly-minted Iowa frontrunner in her native state?s demanding retail political culture.
The day after Perry announced his candidacy and Bachmann won the Ames straw poll, the two candidates spoke to the Black Hawk County Republican Party?s Lincoln Day dinner, the sort of endless regional event that is a staple of the long Iowa campaign.
(snip)
But the contrast that may lift Perry, and undermine Bachmann in their high stakes battle for Iowa had less to do with what they said than how they said it ? and what they did before and after speaking.
Continue ReadingPerry arrived early, as did former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum. The Texas governor let a media throng grow and dissolve before working his way across the room to sit at table after table, shake hand after hand, pose for photographs and listen politely to a windy Abraham Lincoln impersonator, paying respect to a state that expects candidates, no matter their fame, to be accessible.
But Bachmann campaigned like a celebrity. And the event highlighted the brittle, presidential-style cocoon that has become her campaign?s signature: a routine of late entries, unexplained absences, quick exits, sharp-elbowed handlers, and pre-selected questioners.
She camped out in her bus, parked on the street in front of a nearby Ramada Hotel, until it was time to take the stage. Even after a local official?s introduction, Bachmann was nowhere to be found. It was not until a second staffer assured her that the lighting had been changed and a second introduction piped over the loudspeakers that she entered the former dance hall here. By the time she made her big entrance to bright lights and blaring music, the crowd seemed puzzled.
Perry, as I reported earlier from New Hampshire, repeatedly exhibited in his initial weekend on the stump his agility as a retail campaigner. Bachmann, who's still new to the bigger stage, is transitioning from winning the important but non-binding straw poll to solidifying her standing with caucus-goers, and from Smith and Martin's story, it may not, in retrospect, made sense to go to Waterloo to defend her turf.
?
?
rolling stone dodgers crude oil prices the cars kendall jenner metrolink the help
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.