Hillary Clinton campaigns in New Hampshire on Tuesday. Photo: AP
American politics are being transformed during the current presidential contest and it is impossible to say at present just where they will end up – let alone which of the still surviving candidates will win the White House.
One sign of this transformation is the fact that the two second-place getters in Iowa are getting more attention from the political class (including the media) than the winners.
There is no doubt that Sanders' success has pushed Clinton further to the left.
You would never know that Monday saw the first-ever win for a woman in Iowa or that for the first time in American history a Hispanic won a presidential nomination contest.
Voter revolt: A marginal figure six months ago, Bernie Sanders has fought to a stalemate with Hillary Clinton. Photo: AP
What might until very recently have been seen not only as significant milestones but as harbingers for what may come have been largely ignored as pundits and political figures alike try to figure out what on earth is happening with the broader political scene.
It is by now a truism that Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders have changed the politics of their respective parties but what has become fascinating (if you are a mere observer) or terrifying (if you are of the establishment of either party) or thrilling (if you are part of the surge for change) is how they have done it and whether they will continue to, in effect, set the terms for the contest.
Donald Trump has been described by The New Yorker magazine as mounting a "hostile takeover" of the Republican Party. Bernie Sanders could perhaps be seen as launching a utopian invasion of the Democrats. Although neither man won in Iowa, it would be foolhardy to count them out of the race. Each will probably win in New Hampshire next week but even if they do not, their poll numbers and large devoted followings will ensure the Trump and Sanders shows remain part of the presidential process for some time yet, and possibly all the way until November.
Although Trump has so far commanded most of the headlines it is Sanders whose takeover is the more remarkable. Sanders might live in Vermont now but he grew up in Brooklyn, still speaks with a New York accent and in the chutzpah stakes he gives Trump a big run for his money.
When Sanders announced in April last year that he would seek the Democratic Party's nomination for president, he wasn't even a member of the party. He appears not have joined until November. Although he has caucused with the Democrats for most of the 25 years he has been in Congress, he has no organisational affiliations and could not be sure the party would mobilise behind him.
Senior Democrats are already deriding some of his policies. Nancy Pelosi, the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives, said last week that Democrats in Congress would never vote for the tax increases needed to pay for Sanders' Medicare-for-all health plan.
There is consternation in the Democratic establishment that Sanders' popularity, especially with young people, could severely dent the candidacy of Hillary Clinton who had been seen as virtually guaranteed to win the Democratic nomination until the past few weeks.
Sanders garnered an astounding 84 per cent of the votes of people aged 17 to 29 in the Iowa Democratic caucuses. He is attracting massive crowds in states beyond his home base and his fundraising, all of it in small amounts, astonishes the professionals. On Monday night, after his Iowa loss, he raised $3 million.
There is no doubt that Sanders' success has pushed Clinton further to the left. She now places greater stress on income inequality and the rights of disadvantaged groups in her stump speech and has distanced herself from Wall Street.
This should be seen as a net benefit for the Democrats, with Clinton able to demonstrate her responsiveness to the new public mood. She is battling, however. She campaigns in prose. Sanders has the dream. Clinton talks about what can realistically be done (and how she is the person to do it). It's wonky stuff that doesn't tug at the emotions. A lot of voters, especially Millennials, find it frankly boring.
Yet it is Clinton's primary credential. It earned her a surprising early endorsement from The New York Times last week: "Voters have the chance to choose one of the most broadly and deeply qualified presidential candidates in modern history."
The New York Times is not alone in being worried about the consequences of a Sanders candidacy. Those with even mid-term political memories cringe at what happened with Senator George McGovern's presidential bid. McGovern was also extremely popular with young people (including a young Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham who went to Austin, Texas, to work on his campaign) and was well to the left of his party (although not nearly as left as Sanders).
But in the 1972 elections McGovern suffered one of the greatest defeats in US presidential history, winning just one state and giving Richard Nixon a second term. The Democratic establishment is worried it could happen again.
Whether the Republican nominee is Donald Trump or Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio, each agrees on certain core propositions: against abortion, against immigration (despite both Cruz and Rubio being the children of immigrants), against the Affordable Care Act, in favour of a low minimum wage. They will fundamentally change the social fabric of the United States. Perhaps most important of all, the next president could get to replace as many as three Supreme Court judges and hence shape the direction of national law – including of course abortion and voting rights – for a generation.
There is an awful lot at stake.
Anne Summers is the editor and publisher of the free online magazine Anne Summers Reports.
Twitter @SummersAnne
