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Candidates Fire Up In Final Iowa Push

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By PETER SLEVIN and SHAILAGH MURRAY, The Washington Post

Published: December 2, 2007

CARROLL, Iowa - Work hard for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and get an invitation to visit her in the Sac City fire station before a rally.

Commit to former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina and ride his bus to the next stop. Volunteer for Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois and get a ticket to see him with Oprah Winfrey.

Barely a month before Iowa presidential caucuses that are rated a toss-up, Democratic candidates have turned to all kinds of marketing - from starlets making conference calls to musicians playing concerts with contenders - in a tense final push to persuade voters to show up Jan. 3 for the inaugural contest of 2008.

Undecided voters, according to several campaigns, may constitute as much as half of the Democratic electorate, giving fragile hope to underdogs such as New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and Sen. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut and unnerving front-runners Clinton, Obama and Edwards, who have spent millions to woo them only to find they cannot lock voters down.

"I feel like a bridesmaid," said Dodd, who moved his family to Des Moines so he could campaign nonstop but hasn't edged out of low single digits in polls despite 90 staffers, 13 Iowa field offices and 10,000 phone calls his staff makes each week. "A lot of people say to me, 'I'm for you, but you're my second choice.'"

"Iowans are very volatile. They can switch back and forth to you, so you have to have a strong finish," Richardson said.

Veteran political observers say the race is unpredictable, not just because polls show Obama running neck and neck with Clinton, but because Iowa's caucus process allows supporters of second-tier candidates to switch to another contender after the first round.

Front-running campaigns are concerned about the readiness of supporters to navigate the caucus system. The Clinton campaign estimates 60 percent or more of its prospective voters never attended a caucus or haven't done so in a long time. Obama is counting on energized first-timers. Edwards, who finished second here in 2004 but trails in polls, is banking on fresh faces.

Worried about being outflanked, Clinton added 100 to her Iowa staff, raising the total to about 220. Last month, she spent about every second day in Iowa. Her campaign said she will increase the pace this month. But Obama and Edwards have traveled more widely in Iowa than Clinton, and Obama has outspent her on television advertising here.

The goal for all is to win undecided voters. Campaign officials describe voters as typically older, more rural than urban, and more inclined to pick a candidate based on practical issues such as electability rather than on ideology.

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