Well, Kucinich did hold a hearing in Fallbrook, but one guesses it earned him few votes (there or elsewhere). It certainly did not shape the race.

“Arrogant foreign policy
We need 400,000 troops
Don’t let politicians get involved
Leave it to military with blood on their boots.”

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/6/25723/26527/751/431492

Now, if he – or some Dem – had really wanted to do some shaping work, last year in Spring they should have taken a leaf from RFK’s book, and Ron Dellums, and use the power to hold hearings ELSEWHERE THAN D.C. RFK used hearings he held in South Mississippi on poverty to publicize the issue in 65 or 66, I can’t remember which; Dellums held extensive hearing in a number of cities across the U.S. on the Vietnam war. If the brain of the Dem party hadn’t been eaten by consultants in 1996, the no brainer thing to do, in Spring of last year, would have been to break out of D.C. and hold exactly those kinds of hearings about Iraq in a number of major U.S. cities.

Now, that would be wonderful shaping work – but you wonder whether the Democratic establishment would like it.

I would be curious to know how Roger (or anyone else) would understand his claim that “Kucinich has given up trying to be shaper.” Given the media environment Roger describes, the electoral rules, the campaign finance system, and other limitations on American “democracy,” what could Kucinich do to be a “shaper”?

Is anyone who is not focused single-mindedly on winning, and thus raising issues outside the mainstream, doing any better at shaping, given the constraints?

Mike Gravel, for example, by making fundamental political reform his signature issue for anyone who will pay attention? Ron Paul, by being more outspokenly anti-imperialist than even Kucinich would dare?

Kerry was taller than Bush.

McCain ticked off the money with all the campaign finance reform crap that make it more cumbersome for the biggest money to have the biggest influence.

Romney can stay in the game with his own (and other Mormon’s) money.

Guiliani will still get votes in the big states FL and NY.

The key to Huckabee is the South. The South has the most realpolitic voters in the USA. They vote to win, period. Bible thumpers in the South are different from elsewhere because they are the majority they don’t need to vote for them every time out. If the South thinks Huckabee can win it all, he’ll win the South, if not he won’t.

Don’t forget, in the last several elections, the tallest candidate wins.

However, Kucinich has given up trying to be shaper.

“…downgraded Huckabee’s chance of getting the actual nomination on the grounds that in your average GOP primary, evangelicals comprise only 40% of the GOP vote (vs. their 60% share of it in Iowa).”

Where does this 40% of the GOP vote as evangelicals come from?

“If you take a look at CNN’s Iowas exit poll, however, if evangelicals had made up only 40% of the turnout Huckabee would still have run even with Romney (27% each).”

This gets at several of the problems with the media gloss on the Iowa returns. Let’s look at the CNN framing.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/01/03/iowa.issues/index.html

Headline: “Democrats voted for change, GOP for faith and values”

The headline implies, of course, that the Democrats did not vote for faith and values. But if you look at the marginals on the same site, it seems that the faith and values questions were not asked of the Democratic caucus goers. An alternative explanation is that the questions were asked but not presented by CNN, MSNBC, etc. Let’s call that doubtful. And if the questions weren’t asked of Democrats, we have no basis for making any claims about the relative importance of religion on turnout and/or vote choice for Republicans vs. Democrats.

On the same CNN page, if you click through to the GOP entrance poll results, the marginals on the “evangelical” question indicate “Born-Again or Evangelical Christian?” That suggests that the entrance poll question was something like “Do you consider yourself to be a Born-Again or Evangelical Christian?” That’s speculation on my part; I don’t know the answer. My guess, though, is that if one had a national sample, you wouldn’t be too far from 50% answering yes to such a question.

I find it interesting that the two current front-runners, Huckabee and Obama, as well as John Edwards, are from fairly modest backgrounds. No silver spoons (or feet) in mouths here. IMO this is part of their appeal. People want someone who they think is “one of them” and self-made rather than a scion of a corporate or political dynasty.