Open Dialogue

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