Press Room

AAI in the News

James Zogby Says Iowans Can Shape Debate on Middle East

By Justin Schardin
Politicsiowa.com
Posted on Wednesday September 26, 2007

The subject he was talking about—the problems America faces in the Middle East—last night was complex, but James Zogby’s message on what Iowans can do about it was relatively simple.

“I ask you to ask [presidential candidates] the tough questions” and demand details on what they would do differently, the president of the Arab American Institute told an Iowa State University audience of around 100. “You are more than ethanol in this state.”

Zogby is not the first member of an interest group to speak to an early-state audience about their importance to the presidential electoral process. And that’s because they can have an effect.

“I think consciousness-raising is what he’s doing, and yes, you do have people come [to see candidates] and literally refer back to talks they’ve been to or things they’ve read in the paper,” said Iowa State University political science professor Jim Hutter. “You have an alert public here.”

Hutter said that while most Iowans who attend such talks already agree with the speakers, they come away armed with specific questions. And, media coverage of such events often makes those topics into more general issues of concern to voters.

Many have remarked that Iowa’s demographic makeup isn’t representative enough of America for it to retain its first-in-the-nation status. “The demographics of Iowa are not Manhattan or New York City,” said Zogby after the speech, “but the one thing Iowa has over everyone else is they’ve made an industry of this [electoral] process and they do it well.”

He said there have been a fair number of Arab- and Jewish-Americans in Iowa that have attended his speeches, and they represent an electorally significant constituency.

“He’s absolutely right that Iowa’s certainly not as diverse a population as the rest of the country,” said Hutter. However, he added that voters being of a different demographic don’t necessarily mean different electoral results. And even if it did, he said the current front-loading of the primary and caucus season would likely only accentuate that problem.

“It used to be years ago that there were several weeks between Iowa and New Hampshire, and several weeks between New Hampshire and whoever was left,” he said. ”[Now] you’ve almost got a national primary, and a national primary’s [about] who’s got name recognition and money.”

Jeffrey J. Weiss, spokesperson for Concerned Iowans for Middle East Peace, said the Israel-Palestine issue is “big in many circles in Iowa,” as it relates to many other Middle Eastern issues. He added that the Mideast policy positions of most of the candidates on both sides aren’t very different.

Zogby said he would not talk about his endorsement for president for another few weeks, but that he would be back campaigning for that candidate in Iowa in a month or so. He did make it clear the candidate would be a Democrat.

Asked if any Republican candidate had a good understanding of the issues he discussed, Zogby answered with a flat “no.” He said the main impression he got from the Republican field was “like [Vice President Dick] Cheney without the nuance,” and concern more for toughness than understanding.

Zogby and his brother John, one of the country’s leading pollsters, have also discussed the difficulty of identifying likely caucus-goers. Said Dr. Zogby, “One thing that bothers me about Iowa is the low number of people that participate [in the caucuses].” He added that the unreliability of Iowa polls leads to some unfounded expectations for how candidates will fare in the caucuses.

Zogby said he had spoken to about 1,000 people across Iowa over the course of this week. It is his second speaking trip to the state during this electoral season.