Thompson focused all his efforts to the Iowa straw poll hoping for at least a second place finish.  Thompson placed 6th, after visiting every one of Iowa’s counties. This is old news, yes but I wanted to point out that determination had nothing to do with 1st place finishes. Mitt Romney bought the Iowa Straw Poll… Just like George Bush did his election campaign. The sadest part about Mitts 1st place finish is that he only garnered a little more than 1/4 of the votes. Spending as much money as he did, while buying so many tickets… He could only muster 31% of the votes. Giuliani and McCain did the smart thing by not entering… They would have showed that they are also weak candidates. I would have loved to see all the candidates battle it out and waste their money. The only one that will benifit from the poll at all will be Huckabee. Huckabee has been a candidate that has support but not enough to raise money, maybe this 2nd place finish will help for the long term… So far it has according to the Huckabee campaign.  For those who don’t know Brownback placed a close3rd. Ron Paul not fair behind that. It says a lot about the republican party that the poll only brought in 14,000 people…