caucus circus

Well, it's over and it was a blast. For those of you who don't know, my husband and I are co-committee-chairs of La Plata County's Precinct 3 (Colorado) for the Democratic Party. We started at the 2004 caucus, at which there were 12 people. At the 2006 caucus, we had 6. Last night, we had 39.

( I belong to no organized political party: I'm a Democrat. )

Then, a bunch of us went out to one of the local brewpubs and drank beer and watched CNN reporting the results on the TV over the bar. Woo! Next time, I'm going to suggest we hold the caucus in the bar.

some additional caucus thoughts

The Electoral Vote site (which is syndicated at electoralvote) has some interesting analysis of the Super Tuesday results. In particular, the Votemaster (Andy Tanenbaum) sorted the Democratic popular vote percentages and came up with the interesting tidbit that the most overwhelming majorities for Obama were in caucus states:

Obama did extremely well in caucus states and Clinton did very badly in them. How come? Turnout in caucus states is always low, usually about 10-20% of the electorate. Only highly motivated people bother to show up, especially the Democratic caucuses, which go on for hours and people haveto publicly defend their choice. Obama has a smaller, but extremely active and loyal following, especially among younger voters. These are precisely the people who can swing a caucus state by showing up in droves and working hard to convince the other voters that Obama would make a great President. In primary states, the media, especially TV ads have a much bigger influence.

This was certainly the case at our caucus, where we had a lot of people who had never before come to a caucus, and all but one were Obama supporters. (They were not all young, by any stretch of the imagination.)

One anomaly in the table of percentages is New Mexico, which is listed as a caucus state but split nearly 50-50 between the candidates. Since Durango's only half an hour from the NM state line, we get New Mexico news in our daily newspaper.  When I read the coverage of the caucus, I immediately thought: hmm, that sounds more like a primary than a caucus.  I did a little Googling and found out that yep, the New Mexico "caucus" is basically a primary. There is no discussion, no open voting.  Voters cast ballots at the caucus site and then leave, and they can even cast absentee ballots in advance. 

I think Obama's success in caucus states says a lot about his appeal. He inspires people. And I think that's important.