About 4 years ago, I wrote this post about the 2004 Iowa Caucuses and our experience there as Dean supporters. It was, in effect, what made us leave Washington and move to Ames. It was not the only reason, but it was definitely the straw that broke the camel's back. I'm happy to say that our experience caucusing this time around was nowhere near as stressful and was actually a bit of fun.With the caucuses a thing of the past and the results on every news channel known to man, we all know that Barack Obama won. He was the clear favorite at our caucus site, with fully half the room supporting him. 228 people showed up to our caucus site - we had 10 delegates to divvy up. Obama got 5, Edwards (who Heidi and I were both unswayably supporting) got 3, and Richardson got 2. To my great shock and surprise, the Hillary group was not viable (i.e. did not reach the 15% of caucus goers in the room) so they had to realign with other campaigns. I felt bad for her in a lot of ways, mostly because the Clinton precinct captain is a neighbor of ours who has had her Hillary sign up for a damn long time and was obviously very passionate about it. I think ANY of the Democrats will make a good president, and I was nearly swayed to Obama by an article in The Atlantic that I read a month ago. It was that article alone that made him my strong second choice. But ultimately, it was Edwards, who was my second choice after Dean in 2004 that got my caucus vote this time around.
It's kind of fun - because it's cool to see democracy in action, no matter how antiquated and creaky the caucus version of democracy is. It was fun this year because I was just a body to be counted, and not someone who had to work the floor and try to get people to come stand up for our candidate. I am not cut out for that kind of life.
After all is said and done, any Democratic candidate is better than ANY of the Republican candidates. Huckabee will lead the Republican party to an electoral disaster. Although there is a lot of time between now and Election Day. And if there's one thing I've learned, it's that anything can happen.
1 comment:
I was dreadfully amused by the whole process, especially since this was my first caucus experience. I kept looking around with a goofy smile on my face marveling at the chaos of it all and just enjoying seeing democracy in action.
As for your prior experience, I can hardly imagine being a precinct caption without prior caucus experience. I'm an extrovert, for the most part, and that would have been daunting for me, too. Still, I have to be somewhat grateful that the 2004 caucuses led you guys away from Washington. My world would be less bright without your family in it.
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