How will IOWA CAUCUS VOTERS favoring 2nd tier candidates redistribute their votes?

As we all know, per the caucus system in Iowa, only those candidates who have a large enough percentage of support in that caucus will remain viable.

"If a candidate falls short of that threshold, say 15 percent or 20 percent of the total number of people in the room, his or her supporters can redistribute themselves with another candidate. That's when persuasion, hard bargaining, deal-making between candidates' staffs or even chicanery comes in. Inducements are allowed; bribes are not."
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2007/11/12/the_iowa_rules.html

So we are most likely talking about Kucinich, Dodd, Biden and Richardson supporters who may have to choose to support another candidate other then their own.

Although this may bode well for the 1st tier candidates, it is not a sure thing, as it is also very possible that a scenario could emerge in where....say....Richardson and Dodd supporters could unite and go with a Biden (as they are all ideologically similar)....although I don't think it will work out that way.

So how do you think this particularly interesting part of the caucus might pan out, and will it make a difference on the outcome of the current 3 way sorta tie?

which candidate do you think stands to gain from the Redistribution portion of the Caucus process?

I think the possibilities are endless, but here are a few to choose from:

Biden, Dodd closer to Hillary...and Richardson closer to Obama maybe? :shrug:

I don't think that Kucinich will advise his supporters to go for Edwards this time round. Something Kucinich stated about Edwards in the last debate makes me kind of doubt it. Maybe he will let them be free agents or Gobama!

People who don't want to see a specific candidate be successful in the caucuses (and their candidate is not viable) will go with any other candidate just to keep the other from doing well. Look at what happened in 2004 - if Dean supporters wanted to keep the anti-war candidate alive when Dean was tanking they would have gone to Kucinich (and vice-versa) rather than going to Kerry or Edwards (who had both voted for IWR).

For example, I caucused for Wes Clark with 2 other people in my precinct in 2004. We didnt have 15% obviously. The 2 others went with Dean or Edwards or someone and I never saw them at any successive convention. I caucused for Gephardt on caucus night because it helped give him viability (splitting the delegates instead of handing them all to the other candidates - Dean in particular) and I was able to get them to send me to the county convention as a delegate - where I again tried to caucus for Clark. Clark wasn't viable there either, and I ended up with Kerry at the county level and stayed with Kerry through the district and state conventions.

So you see.. I wasn't for Gephardt, and I didn't really consider ideology.... but I did caucus for Gephardt because Wes wasn't viable and I gained 2 things by doing so:

1) I was able to be a delegate at the county level where I could again attempt to caucus for Clark, and
2) I was able to strengthen Gephardt's presence, which gave him an extra delegate that one of the other candidates would have received had I not. I wasn't a big fan of Dean at the time (sorry Debi!), so my strategy was to weaken his delegate count.

Once the writing was on the wall, and I knew I wasn't going to be able to caucus for Clark, I went fully behind Kerry and as a delegate at the district/state conventions I was able to do my small part in influencing our party platform (carrying Clark's ideology forward).

Hope that helps!

In otherwords, a 2nd tier candidate actually has an excellent chance of breaking through.....as a pragmatic strategic move on the part of supporters who aren't truly supporters.....it appears.

In my case, I would prefer not to see Edwards win Iowa. I have 2 candidates that I am considering, one who will surely be viable, the other who may not be. Even if I do decide to support the viable one, I may actually caucus for the other, if by doing so I may be able to help him become viable, preventing his supporters from going to Edwards (if they would, I dunno how it will fall that night). I would eventually change affiliation to whichever candidate I decide upon, but supporting someone else as a strategic move at the precinct level is possible!

ON EDIT: I will now duck and cover for mentioning my lack of support for Edwards - eek!

:mad: Oh, Seth...

However, I just read that Gephardt is planning on coming to Iowa to stump for Clinton - so all the candidates you caucused for will be working together like one happy family... (butthead).

There is no guarantee that Clinton, Obama and Edwards will be viable in all 1,700-someodd precincts so their supporters may become part of the realignment process and there is no guarantee that they'll go to any of The Big Three in the second round (and if history shows us anything ala Dean/Gephardt they'll probably choose to go with Richardson/Biden/Dodd rather than Clinton/Obama/Edwards). A

AND

A person who supports a viable candidate in the first round does have the opportunity to join with a non-viable candidate in the second round to make that candidate viable (which could be used as strategy to keep another candidate from becoming viable or to keep another viable candidate from receiving an additional delegate). (this happens where there are more supporters than delegates to be selected and a person wants to be a delegate to the county convention - say an Obama supporter who is going to be left out may go over to Biden to make him viable and also keep Clinton/Edwards from getting another delegate. The person goes on to county convention as a Biden delegate but if Biden doesn't breech 15% viability at convention can move back to being an Obama supporter - provided he's viable at convention). :crazy:

and interesting! :hi:

In other words, if I assume Kucinich won't be the final candidate, but I want -- desperately -- all the other candidates to move in Kucinich's direction, what kind of 2nd tier redistribution would do that for me.

Maybe redistributing your support to someone like Richardson so that your vote doesn't go to a "high percentage" candidate that you don't want to see win, even if you don't want to see Richardson win either? Cause that action might provide Richardson with leverage against the top tier without you contributing directly to the top tier?

Obviously have not a clue on how it truly works.:shrug:

Trying to understand how the Iowa Caucus actually works in getting to the winners doesn't make this a silly conversation; far from it.