Do you know how to caucus? I didn't until just recently. I knew Iowa was a big deal to presidential candidates and that our caucus was important, but I didn't know how it actually works. So let me enlighten those who may not know. First, you must register as a democrat or republican to participate in their respective caucuses. In our little family, one of us has registered for each - give you one guess as to who's who. And you can't just go cast your vote for someone and leave...no no no. This is an event. It begins at 6:30 and usually lasts somewhere around 2 hours. So you sign in and (after a bunch of hoopla and instruction) basically go stand with the group of people who support the candidate you want. They assign you an area and you go huddle together (word on the street is that there is heckling involved to convert some last minute people to your candidate) where they count you. In the democratic caucus, a candidate has to get at least 15% of the vote to be viable. If they don't, then there's "realignment" where those people have to choose someone else to support (more heckling). And then they count you again. You get delegate votes based on how many are huddled in your corner. Crazy, huh???
I'm sure I didn't do a very good job explaining that, so here are some good, dumbed-down explanations I found online. One good one that describes the democrat caucus (there are stick people and graphics involved) is on the
Obama website. Another one was at
iowacaucus.org. And the Iowa
Republican site had a good explanation, too. How fun to be living in Iowa!! If you live here and aren't going to participate in the caucus, then you are unAmerican and a dork. :) So let's caucus! January 3rd...be here or be square.
