by Mark Silva

One month from the premier Iowa party caucuses and New Hampshire primary elections, the chairmen of the Democratic Parties in both states say the contest for their party’s presidential nomination is wide open.

“I think it’s in flux,’’ Scott Brennan, chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party said today during the taping of CSPAN’s Newsmakers, a program which will air Sunday morning and evening.

“We really mirror each other,’’ Ray Buckley, chairman of New Hampshire’s Democratic Party, said in the same interview. With polls in his state showing that 60 percent of the voters still are open, Buckley said: “I don’t think we’ve ever seen an election where both parties are so fluid.’’

“There’s the old adage of getting hot at the end,’’ Brennan said. “They’re all trying to get hot at the end.’’

The chairmen were in suburban Virginia today for the Democratic National Committee’s meeting and were interviewed by yours truly, of the Chicago Tribune, and Susan Milligan, national political correspondent for the Boston Globe, for a half-hour edition of Newsmakers which CSPAN will broadcast at 10 am EST and 6 pm EST on Sunday. For a preview, here in the Swamp, read more of the interview with Brennan and Buckley:

In Iowa, where polling is notoriously unreliable in predicting the behavior of caucus-goers on a cold caucus night, Brennan notes that his party’s front-runners – Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and former Sen. John Edwards – are “all within the statistical margin of error.’’

With the Iowa caucuses slated for Jan. 3, Brennan said, “A lot of Iowans still haven’t made up their minds.’’

“I think both in Iowa and New Hampshire,’’ Buckley said, “the margin of error is where the movement is going on.’’

Asked what voters are looking for this winter, whether a dominant issue is driving their thinking or whether they are more concerned about identifying a candidate with the potential to win the White House, the chairmen agree that electability will be the motivating factor in January.

“I think it’s electability more than a single issue,’’ Brennan said of his party’s voters. “They’re really looking at the candidates to see who can get into office – and get rid of eight long, Republican years.’’

While a lot of money has been invested in these campaigns ‘commercials and operations, the chairmen maintain, it’s the door-to-door and town-by-town campaigning of Iowa and New Hampshire which will make the difference on caucus day, Jan. 3, and on primary day, Jan. 8.

“By meeting with Iowa voters, that’s the way you continue to convince people in Iowa that you’re electable,’’ Brennan said.

The chairmen, of course, aren’t interested in handicapping their party’s own candidates in these contests, and when asked which of the GOP candidates they’d like to run against next year, they remained just as reticent. “Tancredo,’’ joked Buckley, with a chuckle about the Colorado congressman who has made illegal immigration a cause celebre.

Each of these contests has their own peculiarities, with independents able to vote in either party’s primary in New Hampshire and with caucuses posing a particular challenge for challengers: On caucus night, when the supporters of a particular candidate find that he or she is not going to be a viable choice in the caucus which they are attending, the question suddenly becomes who their No. 2 candidate might be. If your candidate isn’t viable in the first round, Brennan explains, who’s your second choice?

“Being a voter’s second choice is very important,’’ Brennan said of his party’s caucuses. “They’re all looking very hard at No. 2.’’

Asked about the impact of a potential upset in Iowa – such as someone other than the long-favored Clinton carrying the caucuses – on the primaries that will follow so closely in New Hampshire, Buckley said: “Traditionally the persons who come out of Iowa at least one, two or three’’ will run well in New Hampshire as well. “If there is a significant difference between one, two and three, it could’’ have an impact in New Hampshire.

And Brennan is careful to note that the polling positions which candidates in Iowa have today may not be reflected in the outcome of the caucuses in January. “We don’t think polling is very accurate’’ in Iowa,’’ he said, explaining that “you have to go to a caucus position and spend a couple of hours on a cold night,’’ and it’s hard to measure support in that arena. “I think that makes it hard to do accurate polling,’’ he said.

Asked about the traditional yet questionable roles which these two small states with largely homogenous populations play in the presidential nominating contests – a premier position which each fights to maintain with its caucuses and primaries year after year – Buckley said: “Neither Iowa nor New Hampshire wanted to be the determiner of the nominee.’’

But there is a difference between campaigning in states like Iowa and New Hampshire and the bigger states down the road where a campaign stop consists of getting out of an airplane for a tarmac press conference.

“We recognize that our status in this cycle is a privilege,’’ Brennan said, “but it’s also a great responsibility. We take it seriously.

“We want to be part of the process,’’ he said, “but we don’t want to be the ultimate decision-maker.’’