So Gene and I got our Caucus on tonight! Apparently, I have been caucusing for 20 years now. I found out that my dad has taken me to my first caucus in 1988 since he couldn't find a babysitter and my mom was at a night class working on her Masters. All I remember is being fed cookies by an old lady in someone's living room.
Tonight, we arrived at our precinct, Indianola 2, at about 6:30. I had registered to vote in August, so all I had to do was signin. Gene hadn't registered to vote until early December so he had to sign-up somewhere else. This is the Agenda we got, which kind of explains what was going to happen.
We found our precinct polling place - the audtorium. [Which, as a side note, is really really nice :) huge fly system, back wood room for set construction, prop room, costume rooms...] After signing in, we split up (Mom to Clinton, Bob to Obama, & Gene and I to Richardson).
Our precinct had a record number of Caucusers - 415 people. According to Caucus mathematics...nevermind I don't really know and/or understand Caucus mathematics. All I knew was that each candidate needed at least 68 people to be "viable." Obama, Edwards, and Clinton easily had that at first count. Richardson, for whom Gene and I were caucusing, had the next most viable group with 56 people. Biden was next with 28, then Dodd with 9ish, then bringing up the rear was Kucinich with 5. At this point, the wheeling and dealing began. All the Richardson people began desperately to campaign, beg, and plead with the Kucinich, Dodd, and Biden people to help them gain viability. It was really, really tense, and really, really amazing the way people stood up and told flat out why everyone should like their candidate. Iowans do live up to our reputation for being straight shooters - we tell it like it is - and that was certainly true tonight. My favorite poitn came when a college freshman at Simpson stood up and spoke for Richardson. Up to this point the average age of the caucuser had been between 40 and dead. This guy stands up and appologizes for being the youngest person at the caucus - except for the baby sitting in front of him. Up to this point everyone had talked about viability and energy. This guy talked about the future, the environment, and actual ISSUES! He got the biggest cheer of the night I am happy to say.
At this point, many people surrounding us were talking about decamping to the Edwards campaign if we didn't get enough people to be a viable party. Gene and I were included. I caucused for John Kerry in 2004, but strongly supported Edwards as well, so I was okay with that. After about 10 minutes, the Richardson campaign only needed 4 people to become a viable party - and at the last minute two people defected from Obama (one was Monica Jarvis a wonderful woman I taught with at Mason City and who is now also living in Indianola [obviously]) and two defected from Edwards. So Richardson ended up, with about 1 minute to spare, with 69 of the 68 people needed!! This was an amazing, uplifting experience. We shouted and yelled, and I was as excited about politics as I have ever been in my now 9 years of voting. In the end there were four viable candidates - Obama with 175 people, Edwards with 115 people, Clinton with 95 people, and Richardson with 69 people. This meant that Obama ended up with 10 delegates, Edwards got 6, Clinton got 5, and Richardson got 4!
The biggest upset tonight has been the ousting of Hillary Clinton. We were amazed by the lack of support for her. The only people in her camp were middle aged women - granted a large voting block, but hardly enough to win.
You can see the actual results from the Caucus at http://www.iowacacusresults.com. You can actually look at the results by county and precinct as well. We have to go to bed now - I hope I can sleep!
