caucus circus

[ilanarama]

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.


Things started out in total zoo mode, as we had two precincts holding caucuses in the same large room, with a divider between. Problem was that 1) a lot of people showed up even before we did (haha, we thought half an hour early would be FINE) and 2) a lot of people didn't know which precinct they were in. So we whipped out the laptop and brought up the database and sorted the room. Interestingly, several people showed up who were not even remotely in the right precinct; we found out where they needed to go, and sent them there, but I'm angry that they got such incorrect advice from our (Republican, la la la) county clerk.

Also, a tall, twenty-something guy in dreadlocks showed up, and asked if this was the Republican caucus. I thought he was joking, and said, "we're all Democrats here," and he frowned and asked if I knew where the Republican caucus was. (I did - it was across the street.) I'm guessing he was a Ron Paul Libertarian who'd registered as a Republican in order to have a caucus voice, but hey, who knows?

We had media present, and a nonvoting observer. And lots of people we'd never seen before, which was awesome, really. Obama has a very strong organizational presence here (both statewide and regionally) and his supporters turned out in force. The one thing that worries me is: if he doesn't win the nomination, will his supporters work for Clinton? (This was a problem two years ago with the Senate race, in which Mike Miles, a progressive and inspiring candidate, lost the primary to the more centrist Ken Salazar. Many of Miles's supporters lost interest in the race after that, and those of us who were working on get-out-the-vote efforts had a harder time. It was a much closer election than we had hoped.)

We have a lot of older women in our precinct, and Britt had thought that Clinton would make a strong showing, but during our straw poll she only drew 5 votes. We had two uncommitted voters, including myself :-) and 32 for Obama (including Britt). I moved to Obama and the other uncommitted voter moved to Clinton, but the percentages worked out such that all three of our delegates went to Obama. (I'm one of them. Britt wanted to be, also, but he's an alternate, and I screwed things up there by moving that the Senate slate the same as the Presidential slate - that would have given him the chance to go.)

Countywide, Obama cleaned up. I had expected him to win both the county and the state, as he did, but I was stunned at how big his margin was. We called in our results to the county as soon as we had them, and they passed them up to the state, so Colorado's results came out pretty quickly.

The Senate preference poll was a bit of a joke as Mark Udall has been unopposed until just a few weeks ago, and as all we know about his opponent is his name, it was a sweep.

Then we did resolutions, and I was really happy that almost half of the attendees stayed for this part. Our first year, there were all sorts of bizarre resolutions proposed, but this time, it was pretty cool - people came up with ideas and issues that interested them, and talked about what they thought was important, and then I formulated their ideas into a statement of resolution. Then there was a bit more discussion, and then a vote. We had five resolutions, on health care, the Electoral College, the state constitution, the primary/caucus structure, and on affordable housing, and I think they were all compact, easily-understood, and reasonable.

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.

Comments

[wordplay.livejournal.com]

Damn, that sounds really amazing! It's exciting to read about people coming together and being actually participatory - thanks for sharing that!

[aubrem.livejournal.com]

Very interesting - thank you!

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

It was amazing - there is this sense of being part of the civic machinery, of being part of a community with common interests working together toward self-government that works. It was also really cool to see how organized and fervent the Obama supporters were - and how impassioned the few Clinton supporters were.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

You're welcome! Most states don't do this - Colorado's the first I've lived in that does, and going to my first caucus 4 years ago was what started my deep involvement with politics.