2 days in Iowa: 2 parties, 2 big events, 15 candidates

Iowans have pretty much lost count of how many GOP "cattle calls" we've had this presidential election cycle, but this weekend will be the first time all five Democratic contenders will appear on stage for side-by-side comparison.

Democratic activists are psyched up because Iowa is hosting the first showdown between their party's two leading contenders — Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders — at the state party's Hall of Fame Celebration Friday night in Cedar Rapids.

Republicans will have their fun, too, as they audition 10 presidential candidates during Christian conservative activist Bob Vander Plaats' 8 ½-hour Family Leadership Summit on Saturday in Ames.

"Fifteen candidates in a state of 3 million in one weekend? It's absolutely a terrific opportunity for this state to shine," Iowa GOP Chairman Jeff Kaufmann told The Des Moines Register.

"Every time we have a concentration of candidates like this — and I know my Democratic counterpart agrees — we have to make the case that we deserve this honor of being the first to weigh in on the presidential race, and that we can handle these huge decisions with these incredibly controversial issues. I think we do that with our presence and with our civility."

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Spirituality will be at the heart of the GOP conference.

"Don't be surprised if you hear a lot about 'revival.' Evangelical Christians and conservatives are increasingly realizing the solutions they seek to America's ills are not political, but spiritual," said Drew Zahn, communications director for the Family Leader. "Heart change, not policy change. Just winning elections isn't going to cut it. It will take a cultural transformation."

Among likely GOP caucusgoers, 41 percent are self-described born-again or evangelical Christians, a late May Des Moines Register/Bloomberg Politics Iowa Poll found. Just 14 percent of Democratic likely caucusgoers describe themselves that way.

The buzz phrase of the Democratic event will be "income inequality."

"That's the No. 1 issue for Democratic activists," said Iowa political strategist Brad Anderson. "Everyone will be doing a side-by-side comparison of their messages."

While the five Democrats (Jim Webb, Sanders, Martin O'Malley, Clinton and Lincoln Chafee) and 10 Republicans (Scott Walker, Donald Trump, Rick Santorum, Marco Rubio, Rick Perry, Bobby Jindal, Mike Huckabee, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz and Ben Carson) are in the state, they will do the campaign equivalent of kissing voters' hands at 34 other separate events scheduled so far for Friday, Saturday and Sunday.