What Do New Hampshire’s Votes Mean?

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As I write this post, we have 91% of precincts reporting. Sanders leads, with Buttigieg a close second. Klobuchar is third, and Warren is a distant fourth, having less than half of Klobuchar’s support. (These numbers may change a bit as the last 9% of precincts report.)

What can we learn from these facts? As it turns out, not much. New Hampshire, like Iowa, has become a grossly over-emphasized electoral icon for little reason but tradition. It’s a tiny, homogeneous state, in a unique region (New England) with a unique culture. (I’ve described that culture in this essay.) In many ways it’s an attractive, even admirable culture, but only a small minority of Americans shares it.)

So the first and most important lesson from last night’s results is not to read too much into them. At least New Hampshire, unlike Iowa, seems to have gotten the mechanics of voting right.

That said, some interesting results lie buried in the horse race. If you add the votes for the strong progressives, Sanders and Warren, you get 35.2%. But if you add those for the so-called “moderates,” Buttigieg, Klobuchar, and Biden, you get 54.1%. That looks like a pretty good turnout for moderation: more than half again higher.

But it’s wise not to read too much into this, either. New England is a culture in which being seen as extreme is almost as verboten as talking or bragging about yourself. You would expect moderates to do better there. So the really interesting result is Sanders’ narrow win, despite his being generally considered the most extreme candidate, the one who calls for a political “revolution.” Of course, Sanders is from New England, and that may have helped.

One thing that doesn’t show up in the horse race may be the most important factor of all. Election-night reporting suggests a surprising level of indecision and uncertainty among the voters. Large numbers of voters may have decided for whom to vote on the last possible day.

Why might that be? Could it be that no single candidate stands out because every one seems to be missing the big picture?

Trump comes to New Hampshire and fills a stadium as Caesar filled the Roman Coliseum. His Republicans stand united behind him in a phalanx, much like the emperor’s Praetorian guard. Most lick his boots despite his having nicknamed, belittled, insulted and vilified nearly every one, let alone slaughtered their sacred cows of foreign alliances, Russophobia, and deficit reduction.

Meanwhile, the Dems fight among themselves on nuances of health care, while Trump and his guard seek to erase Obamacare as Roman emperors erased their predecessors’ names on statues. They dredge up “gotchas” from each other’s distant past, in our Twitter era when yesterday’s news is “history.” They play these childish games while Trump continues breaking his most substantial promises, and, with absolute dominance of the media, social media, and big in-person rallies, creates a new lie, and new bogus crisis, a new distraction, or a new “enemy of the people” every day.

Now why would this confluence of events create uncertainty and indecision in the electorate?

Might it be that the voters are tired of discussing “electability” in the abstract, as a matter of character or policy? Might it be that “electability” is a matter of action, including running a powerful campaign?

Trump is a master of media and showmanship. He’s a master of Tweeting lies, distortions and insults. He’s a master of innumerable dark arts that we didn’t even know were among us until he came along.

Because he’s the president, and because he obeys no rules, Trump is going to force the Dems to fight this election on his own ground. He may suffer no debates at all. Whether he does or doesn’t, the Dems have to match his media savvy and go him one better, without the crutches of lies, obvious distortions and random insults. If they don’t, they’ll be like a primitive tribe facing a Roman legion. History tells us how that worked out.

Maybe it’s all a bit like the Harry Potter story. Maturity, oration, and even skill at quidditch don’t cut it. You’ve got to have some magic, which today includes media savvy. No Dem yet seems to have it, or at least has the skill to show it, but the fate of our Republic may depend on it.

So I think a lot of people are waiting to see what Bloomberg can show us besides money. He has a reputation for media savvy. At least he has the common sense not to bet a state’s convention delegates on an untested app written by amateur techies when you could hire Amazon or Google to write one for you. If that’s all the Dems can expect of their nominee, they’re in for a world of hurt.

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