Overnight Update

This experience of staying up all night to guard our straw poll tent is actually awesome. I've been monitoring the surroundings with a golf cart, which I'm driving around tomorrow (I mean, later today). Anyway, so far so good. All is quiet:

Well, at least this campaign is making history with new technology -- the first campaign ever to blog a straw poll through the middle of the night.

Comments

[Michelle]

Looks great, Mike! Tom, God bless you! We continue to pray for you! Glory to God!

[T in Colorado]

One more GOOD LUCK!!! and THANK YOU!!! GO! TANCREDO GO!

[Norma]

Mike, THANK YOU! THANK YOU! You have done a great job with this blog. We are getting ready to head to the Straw Poll. Pryaing that Tom does great in this poll.

Norma

[forrest shalom]

atta boy mike!

God Bless you for your dedication.

May the Lord's will be done and hopefully it is that Tom Tancredo wins in Iowa!

i'll be praying and beating my tom tom drum for Tom Tom.

forrest shalom

[M Sirag]

From Washington State, wishing you all the best today in the Straw Poll.

[Stanley Oswald]

Hats off to a great Tancredo Team. My wife and I had a fantastic day riding your bus from Cherokee County. Being met at the bus by a Staff Member and leading us to the voting area. Having a nice lunch in the Tancredo tent and listening to a powerful speech by our next president Tom Tancredo. The line was long getting to talk to Tom and Bay but well worth the time and effort.

Thanks for a great day Team Tancredo.

Stanley and Sally Oswald

[Mary]

I just read on the internet that Tom came in at #4, yet on Fox News his name wasn't even on their list. They left out a couple of other names as well. Are the people who were listed paying Fox?? I'll never watch their poor excuse for a news show ever again!!

[Dave from California]

The 10:00 news had no mention of Tancredo in the results of the Iowa straw poll. all we needed were 232 more votes to finish third. TIME FOR TANCREDOS ARMY TO STEP IT UP! GO TANCREDO !!!!!!!!!

[Thomas Leek]

Mary is right. Most news channels did not even mention Tom. It's becoming crystal clear how elections are being manipulated these days. The outcome has already been decided by the elite media!

[Patrice from AZ]

This is only the beginning of a great thing you've done for our country, Tom! Thanks to you and your family for giving Americans hope for the future! Let your family know that your "support" family will only continue to grow! Thanks, Mike - you've worked extremely hard and you are awesome! Thanks, Luther, for making sure Tom campaigned in Iowa safely! Thanks entire Tancredo support team in Iowa and around the U.S.A. Thanks Bay and Bill, for being such key people in Tom's campaign and for your beliefs and convictions.

Onward, Team Tancredo!

[Thomas]

Everything looked wonderful at the straw poll. Everyone was friendly and excited about being there to support Tom. I, too, rode the bus down and reside in Cherokee County. I had a blast!!!

Even though, A person isn't required to vote for the candidate they supported at the Straw Poll when they vote in the Caucus. However, I will continue to support the Congressman no matter how the national media plays this out. Tom is my candidate and will get my support by me making a speech at the Caucus and by me casting my vote for him.

I enjoyed meeting with Tom in Sheldon, Iowa at the Straw Poll. He's truly a great man.

Thomas "Creampuff" Willems
Marcus, Iowa

[Nick Sluyters]

3rd and 4th were so close....
Too bad Tanc didn't break into the top 3 as it would have put him atop the AP news story.
It was still a good showing. Tanc's the man!

[William Barnett]

If Tom finished 4th, then the second tier finished 2, 3 and 4!

Evidently, Mitt spent 2.5 million dollars on TV ads, and over 2 million on other aspects of his campaign. He bought a lot of support. When Bush ran, he purchased 11k tickets and over 7k people voted him the winner. For Romney to win nationally at his rate of spending, he would literally need tons of money because Iowa has only 3M people. The US is just over 300M, so IA contains just 1% of "we the people." Mitt needs more than 450 million dollars just to get nominated, but his total fortune is only 250M or so. Some strategies do not scale up well.

Then there is the related case of William Jefferson C. Wal Mart is housed in AR. Governor C. helped the state prosper greatly by globalizing. Then he scaled up. By globalizing production for the country though, he sent factories everywhere. This is one of the root causes behind the horrendous BOP, and trillions flowing to foreign workers and factories. Job losses have been enormous. Some strategies do not scale up well.

Like Iowans, Brownback and Huckabee are both mid-westerners. I am too, and I know we sometimes back regional candidates better. A former pastor, Huckabee is probably too religious to get elected President. Undoubtedly, he was backed by the most religious voters.

Brownback was a complete surprise. I had no inkling he would get so much support. Still his state is not just a farm state, it is a great plains farm state like Iowa, with flatter richer farmland, large consistent yields per acre and hence more farm prosperity. This drives Iowa economics. Since he identifies so strongly with every aspect of the business of farming, he would have been seen as the favorite of farmers and their business allies.

So, although Tom finished 4th, that is good. McCain and Giuliani were both given too much time in the debate. Apparently Tom's standing up for the second tier had a big effect overall. Also, hammering away at the trillion dollar I-alien problem had a huge affect nationally.

The House backed him with a unanimous vote. Now the Senate has caved in with supporting legislation. Even the President and Homeland Security are promising more enforcement. These are very visible national changes. McCain flip-flopped, and Giuliani is talking tougher. Having been around for some time, I have never seen major changes like this happen so fast.

To say the least then, Tom's campaign has had spectacular national results. I hope as supporters we will continue to expand our base and tackle the dire issues we all face. Ask friends to join numbersUSA. You get direct links and free faxes sent right to the most important legislators in the country.

Timing can mean everything. Results like Tom got, are extremely rare. Supporters in his home district might like to hear about the kind of campaign effects I have listed above. In this regard, e-mailing all news sources in the district might be useful. It would be cool to invite all county chairmen in the district to meet in a convenient place too. If you don't have standing campaign supervisors in each county and important city, now might be the time to line them up.

Enhancing Tom's reputation at home would be a very timely thing. Publicity is expensive and you have been getting a lot of coverage. I mention this because I heard there were threats to attack Tom if he seeks to be reelected. Like standing up for the second tier, organizing your own district better to increase support is real justice. The best part is, because the timing is proper, others will do this for you! Roadwork isn't required. Because of your success they understand you have made their district more important and most will want to help empower your future.

After a vacation well earned, I hope Tom will tell us what he plans next.

[Jeff Mullis]

Email Fox and blast them....they will talk about Newt and Fred Thompson all day, I reminded them, these two were not in the race. I told them they appear to have an agenda against Tom...and the fair and balanced thing is crap.

[Roger]

Keep going Tom, we're behind you!

[Carole from Luther, IA]

Mike, Nice to see you survived and the blog is going again!!!!!!!!! Thanks for all the work you have done so far and for helping out with the straw poll!

Now, Is it OK to blog that the Tancredo voting was sabotaged? It's all over the internet, just google, Tancredo vote sabotaged.
How did I hear about it? I am an avid Tanc supporter and volunteer. I was working the registration booth at the straw poll. 3 elderly folks walked up first thing Sat. morning and demanded to know why TeamTancredo canceled the buses. I wasn't aware any bus changes had been made. I asked for more information. They said they had received an email from Team Tancredo informing them their bus from their city had been canceled.
I checked with my campaign manager. She confirmed it was a HOAX.

I'm sure this cost us hundred of votes and most likely, 2nd place. I am reading the source was BROWNBACK, not surprising since he is running a dirty campaign.

Tanc supporters need to know this info. We had several elderly people who were supporting Tom and with heat index of over 100 degrees that day, I'm sure this caused alot of them to stay home. Plus, think of the promises that were made to them that our buses would get them to Ames if they would sign up, I'm sure they felt their trust in Tom had been broken. I personally would be interested if someone did an analysis on the affect of this hoax, who received this email and did they not show up because of it?????? Just how many votes did we lose because of this? This could have been the difference between 2nd and 4th place, honestly. I don't know about other states but I am an Iowan and since the results were announced on Sat. eve, I am NOT seeing or hearing Tom Tancredo's name in the local or national newscoverage as a result of 4th place. This HOAX infuriates me!

Here is the article:

From ColoradoPols.com - Tancredo Straw Poll Machine Sabotaged?
As the Rocky Mountain News reports:

Rep. Tom Tancredo’s presidential campaign reportedly was the victim of an e-mail hoax on the eve of today’s Republican Party straw poll in Ames, Iowa.
The Des Moines Register reports that a hoax e-mail sent on Friday to almost 500 Tancredo supporters told them ? falsely ? that chartered busses to ferry them to the daylong events had either been cancelled or delayed.

“This is a blatant attempt to derail our efforts for the straw poll,” campaign spokesman Alan Moore told the newspaper. The campaign was trying to contact voters to assure them that straw poll transportation was on track as scheduled…

A whodunnit poll follows.
Read more…

[Carole from Luther, IA]

p.s. I hope AMERICA got to see Tanc's straw poll speech on C-SPAN Saturday. The man is so brilliant! And when Lee's Greenwood's song, Proud to be an American, was playing when Bill Salier came out to the stage, it brought me to tears! That song was perfect for Tom's fight for our country. Gotta love it.

Our fight has just begun. Now America can join us Iowans and continue Tom's race to the WhiteHouse. Go Tanc!

[Mary]

I wonder how many votes Tom lost because of the bogus emails sent out stating that the busses were canceled or that there had been a time change. I bet he could have easily come in at third place. Oh well, he's still number one in my book!!
We're behind you all the way, Tom!

[T in Colorado]

Would it be possible for you to somehow post Mr. Tancredo's speech from Sat. I was unable to watch the first half of the coverage on cspan and I would very much like to hear his speech. I personally don't feel that this poll has any relevancy since it appears that votes were bought by the candidate with the most money. Iowa was only one state, there are 49 others out there who are waiting for Mr. Tancredo to come to their town. GO! TANCREDO GO!
p.s. I heard someone on Fox saying that it probably would'nt be long before Tancredo would give up his campaign. Boy is he wrong. We have just begun to fight

[T in Colorado]

I agree, everyone should join NumbersUSA. They need "numbers" to send faxes to the President and Congressmen so that our voices will be heard. Both me and my husband are members.

[Sharyn]

http://www.thebulletin.us/site/news.cfm?newsid=18692877&BRD=2737&PAG=461&dept_id=576361&rfi=6

Joe Murray: Why The 2008 Election Will Be A Referendum On Immigration
By: Joe Murray, The Bulletin 08/13/2007

This year, though, things are different. With only 626 votes separating second place (Mike Huckabee) from fourth place (Tom Tancredo), the Straw Poll has injected a great deal of energy and momentum into these second-tier campaigns vying for first-tier status, making it evident that the big winner in Ames is Tancredo.

Going into Ames, nobody expected Tancredo to do well. His campaign is underfunded, has a scattered presence in the state and has been dwarfed by the Romney juggernaut. Tancredo, though, did not give up and kept traveling from town to town bringing his message to anyone who would listen.

What is his message? Tancredo is one of the few men running for president who understands both the physical and cultural threat an unsecured border poses to our nation. While Romney was employing illegal aliens and Brownback was signing off on Kennedy-McCain amnesty, Tancredo was a lone voice defending America's right to protect her cultural integrity.

(go to link to read full story)