If you study that postcard map of New Hampshire, you’ll realize pretty quick that there’s something missing: there’s no cute drawing of presidential hopefuls shaking hands or of the citizenry casting ballots. There is, oddly, an elephant down at the bottom of the state, just right of the Cathedral of the Pines–or is that Dimes?–but the fine print indicates it’s a roadside attraction not a political statement. There is also a lobster breathing fire, some bears, a zebra, and a chicken laying eggs. None of those images seem particularly political either, but some may be running for President. This is important, because forget all those notions of pastoral beauty and winter sports and mountains and trout, what New Hampshire does best is hold the first presidential primary every four years. The windup for February 2020 is going on as we speak, and driving through New Hampshire Kris and I will likely face traffic jams of Democratic wannabes vying for the nomination.
That can be both a good and bad thing. It will surely slow traffic, but if we have a flat we’ll likely have two or three senators and Beto O’Rourke available to help us change it. You can’t get that kind of service back home.
It’s true that Iowa comes before New Hampshire, but Iowa’s caucuses are a decidedly quirkier affair, and the results can be a bit off-kilter. Particularly on the Republican side caucusers tend to be both more conservative and more evangelical than the rest of the country. Who can forget that Iowa’s 2016 caucuses chose Ted Cruz as their candidate of choice? Ok, everybody has forgotten that, but really, what kind of state would elect Ted Cruz to anything? You might as well tell me that the Republican Party was going to nominate Donald Trump! What? Oh.
But perverse as it seems in retrospect that New Hampshire got the Trump part right, they did get it right. In 2016 New Hampshire gave Donald Trump more than 35% of the Republican primary vote. Trump’s win in the 2016 presidential primary effectively destroyed the campaigns of John Kasich, Jeb Bush, Lindsay Graham, Marco Rubio, Carly Fiorino, Ted Cruz, and flat-earther Ben Carson. President Trump really didn’t have any serious challengers after New Hampshire, even though the other candidates hung on. Ted Cruz hung on long enough to win 45% of the primary caucus vote in Texas, but I’m living proof that Texans are crazy.
Back to Iowa, the Democrats there seemed to be a bit more prescient than their Republican neighbors. In 2008 Barrack Obama’s Iowa win proved that he could be a serious candidate, and in 2016 her extremely narrow Iowa victory over Bernie Senders might have warned the Democratic Party that support for Senator Clinton was shallow. It didn’t. At least it’s satisfying now to Monday-morning quarterback. The point of all this is that sure, Iowa has its place, but it’s not New Hampshire.
Likely there are slovenly, lazy, and ignorant New Hampshineers who don’t vote and who can’t snowshoe. In New Hampshire there are likely badly constructed fences that make for bad neighbors, and there are possibly New Hampshters who might trade just a bit of freedom, like obeying speed limits and washing their hands before returning to work, rather than dying. Ok, so they might not be all they’re cracked up to be, but the winnowing of presidential hopefuls has to start someplace, and even for their long list of failures and after validating Trump in 2016 New Hampshire seems both small enough and engaged enough to carry on. You gotta start somewhere, and I’m just as glad it doesn’t start with me. February 2020 here we come.
Just one other thing about that postcard. There sure are a lot of New Hampshire women who wear bathing suits. Do you think that’s year-round? I’d better warn Kris. She probably wouldn’t think to take a swimsuit.