Open Dialogue

Precinct 21 Johnson County (The Iowa Caucus)

It's the day after the Iowa Caucus and I am still feeling surprised and, well, hopeful. I live in Precinct 21 in Johnson County. The meaning of this is that I am in the most liberal precinct in Iowa City--which means the most liberal precinct in the State of Iowa. The county auditor was sitting in the row behind me and told me that Precinct 21 is so liberal that there were more votes for Ralph Nader than George Bush in 2004.

This year, there were 519 registered attendees for Precinct 21. The venue had been moved to accommodate the influx of people, with that said, there still wasn't enough room in the auditorium for all of us. I arrived early and figured out where I thought the Obama supporters would end up. So, I got to sit for the evening.

If you have never caucused, the best I can say is that it is simple and strange. The more organized your candidate's precinct captains are, the better. With that said, the Obama people could have been better organized. I think they were pleasantly surprised and a bit overwhelmed with how many people turned up for this caucus.

So, here are the statistics that I wrote down:
519 Registered Attendees
242 New voters registered on caucus night

Based on 519 registered attendees, the number of votes for viable preference needed was 78. Precinct 21 would have 9 delegates for the county convention.

For the first vote count, we were given 10 minutes to get to our preferred candidate group to be counted. Here is the rundown of the first count:

Obama - 223
Edwards - 92
Clinton - 59
Kucinich - 45
Biden - 26
Richardson - 25
Dodd - 13
Gravel - 0
Undecided - 36

The only candidates that met the viable preference count were Obama and Edwards. This means that supporters of these candidates were each given 5 minutes to state why their candidate should get your vote. After the speeches, there was a second vote and people were given the opportunity to realign.

The second count was 309 for Obama and 153 for Edwards. This gave 6 delegates to Obama and 3 to Edwards for the county convention.

Most people left after the second vote. Those of us who stayed, voted on platform resolutions and elected County convention committee representatives and precinct committee persons.

This means I am now on the County Convention Committee on Comittees.

posted by Susan @ 11:50 AM 0 Comments

Experience

I live in Iowa, therefore I am caucusing tonight. My neighborhood has a lot of passionate Democrats, so I anticipate a long evening. One good thing, the caucus location was moved to a building that should better accommodate all the Dem's that will show up.

Last night I was snuggly wrapped in a blanket on the couch watching a stupid Hollywood chick-flick on Showtime when a friend who is caucusing for Bill Richardson called. She said he was speaking at The Mill at 8:30 and did I want to go.

My attitude about the Iowa Caucuses was warped several elections ago when the Republicans nominated Pat Robertson. I mean, REALLY. That's when it occured to me that the Iowa Caucus is more about sending a message than nominating an "electable" candidate.

The candidates that are spending any time and attention here are those that have a message. We've seen a lot of Hillary, Obama and Bill (Richardson, though we've seen Clinton quite a bit as well). Chris Dodd moved here to stump, but I really haven't seen or heard much of him. Joe Biden spoke at my sister's coffeehouse.

Hillary spoke at my sister's coffeehouse also, this is where I saw her. But, I have long been disappointed in her choice to vote for the war in Iraq and felt she didn't provide a good enough reason for her vote. So, she is off my radar of consideration. I am not one of those feminists that will vote for Hillary simply because she is a woman.

With the "sending a message" attitude in mind, I have been leaning toward Obama. Recently I was talking with a friend who is a strong Hillary supporter and she said that Hilllary has more experience.

I was thinking of experience when I went to see Richardson speak last night. So, if he is running neck and neck with Hillary, he definitely has more experience than her. What would Hillary say about Richardson?

There are other candidates, some we have heard from and others we haven't. So, I look forward to the caucus tonight and hope that Iowa sends a good message to the country. At least the political commercials will come to an end for a while. I believe most Iowans will agree that this will be a good thing.

posted by Susan @ 11:44 AM 1 Comments