by Sandy » Sat Jan 16, 2016 11:14 pm
Correct me if I'm wrong, but she didn't really do that well in Iowa last time around, either. She picked up about a third of the Democratic delegates. Timothy can probably shed more light on this, but from what I remember from political science, Iowa is much more than just a flat collection of farmland. The state is reliably Democratic, especially in Presidential election years, and a majority of Iowa Democrats are, like their counterparts in Minnesota, on the left side of the party. Iowa divides politically almost down the middle so to speak, with the Eastern part being majority Democrat, and most of the Western counties majority Republican. The Democrats who come from the west are the more centrist and conservative, those from the east are more numerous, and more liberal. In 2012, in some of those counties, particularly along the Mississippi River, and around places like Iowa City and Ames, Obama gathered more than 60% of the vote. So Sanders has a chance at doing very well in Iowa.
In Pennsylvania, she leads Sanders by more than two to one. But we're later, and in a cluster of several other states. BTW, Trump is running a distant fourth place here, among the GOP, in single digits at 7%.