On the Campaign Trail with Ed Tibbetts

Rep. Bruce Braley’s scored quite the coup. The Waterloo Democrat’s office announced today that presidential hopeful Barack Obama will be the special guest at his Nov. 18 ”Bruce, Blues and Barbecue” fundraiser.

Already, John Edwards and Hillary Clinton have agreed to be at separate installments of the freshman congressman’s fete.

This will be the 3rd such event (or the 3th, 4th and 5th, depending on how you’re counting).

Clinton will be in Davenport on Nov. 4. Edwards will be in Dubuque on Nov. 11. Obama will be in Waterloo on the 18th.

Naturally, all three presidential hopefuls would like to get Braley’s endorsement. He’s a pretty popular guy with the same Democrats who will go to the caucuses.

So far, though, he’s holding off.

Jeff Giertz, a spokesman, said Friday that Braley hasn’t even decided whether he’ll make an endorsement.

Throwing in with one candidate or another has its risks. But it has rewards, too. Someday, if Braley wants to run for Senate (Tom Harkin has to retire someday), then getting behind a future president could be a big help.

There will be a redistricting in a few years, too, which has the potential of throwing two Democrats into the same district.

The risk, of course, is backing the wrong person or angering consituents whose horse doesn’t get the nod.

To date, all four of the Democrats in Congress are holding the endorsement card pretty close to the vest. Neither Harkin, Braley nor Reps. Dave Loebsack or Leonard Boswell have played it yet.

Congressional endorsements are a mixed bag. Howard Dean got Harkin’s backing three years ago but still finished third. And, eight years ago, the entire Republican delegation in Iowa backed George W. Bush.

Bush won Iowa, but there’s some question how much the endorsements really pushed him over the line.

I would expect the congressionals will play or fold the endorsement card fairly close to the caucus date.

In the meantime, they’ll benefit from a heaping helping of presidential competitiveness in Iowa.

Braley’s having thirds.

Have I mentioned he doesn’t even have an opponent yet?

This entry was posted on Friday, October 19th, 2007 at 9:10 am and is filed under On The Campaign Trail. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.