Mitt Romney's new television ad may rally some more folks to turn out for him at Saturday's Iowa Republican Party straw poll.

But even for those who can't make it this weekend, it's a reminder to them he's chosen to play here.

Arizona Sen. John McCain and former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani have chosen not to take part in the straw poll -- traditionally a key early test of each campaign's organizing ability in this state, which always goes first in the series of nominating contests.

Earlier this week Mr. Romney said they will regret their decision.

"The process which we have used to select our nominee in the Republican Party has included the Iowa straw poll. I want to participate in the Iowa process. I believe in this process," he told reporters after a town hall in Madrid.

Iowans are very protective of their first-in-the-nation status and take it as an affront to their state when candidates don't spend the time or the money it takes to compete here.

"You do not get to the White House by bypassing Iowa. That's the message we need to send to these guys," said a staffer for Sen. Charles E. Grassley, Iowa's senior Republican national officeholder and state Republicans' most sought-after endorsement, at a forum in Hull, in the far northwest corner of the state.

Can it really hurt a candidate? Just ask Howard Dean.

Days before Iowa's Democratic caucuses in 2004, someone uncovered an interview from four years earlier on Canadian television in which Mr. Dean said the caucuses "are dominated by the special interests on both sides and both parties."

He finished third in the caucuses.

--Stephen Dinan, national political reporter, The Washington Times, in Iowa