You were right… I was entertained. I live in house district 2 precinct 8. How complicated. So I went to the house district 2 caucus which was held in a high school cafeteria. 4 years ago, the last caucus, 50 people showed up from house district 2. Last night there must have been at least 500 people there. So the way it works is that you show up and you need to fill out a form that says that you are a member of the democratic national party. You then have 20 people ask you if you filled out the form and if you know what precinct you are in. Then each of them looked up my precinct for me after I told them what precinct I was in. As if I was making up where it was that I lived.

Now this has all happened outside of the school. We have not yet made it to the door yet. After I got passed the ambush of helpful volunteers there was a crowd of people clogging the entrance to the room. I had to stand in the door for 15 min while they apparently shuffled people around inside. I guess the extra 450 people from last time around really confused the volunteers.

Inside of the cafeteria they had tables set up with the precinct numbers and where it is that you vote at that precinct. This, of course upset the hordes of elderly women who were there. They could not comprehend the two numbers and building name on a piece of paper.

I made my way over to my precinct where there was a person trying desperately to get people to volunteer for various positions. We needed a president, a vice president, a second vice president, and a secretary from our precinct. Then we needed 3 representatives to volunteer to go to the county democratic convention and three delegates to go to the state convention. (The state convention is held in Honolulu and the delegate has to pay for the transportation there. That’s a good $300 to volunteer)

Now we had 10 volunteers for the delegates. I am not sure if this was state or county because I could not really hear the person who was trying to explain what he wanted us to do. I did hear that it was required that there is a mix of male and female and since only one woman volunteered she got to be a delegate. Then we got votes to arbitrarily choose two of the other 9ish people who volunteered. Voting based on absolutely no information at all.

Now that our district is properly represented by who knows whom we need to decide that we are all signed in and accounted for. So they made those of us who did not have seats line up against a wall and everyone raised their hands. The MC who is still running the show despite our early votes and signups, ran around touching our hands and counting us.

We had 68 people from our precinct show up (district 2 precinct 1 had 219 people show up) but only 65 had signed in. So now they had to go through and try to figure out who had not yet signed in. No one would admit to it, so they went back through and recounted and found that all 68 people had in fact signed in they just had miscounted the first time.

Now we can finally get down to business. They handed out little pieces of crookedly cut paper with check boxes. Who do you think that you might vote for when we actually do the primaries in a couple of weeks…Pick one.

Then we get to fold up our little pieces of paper and place it in a shoebox reminiscing of grade school class president. The slit in the top of the box was not actually big enough for the ballot so the gentleman who was holding the box for our precinct had to force it open enough for people to get their ballots in.

And that was it. Someone stays and counts the ballots for each precinct and everyone else, including me, left.

The news is reporting that ¾ of the vote went to Obama. I believe it. Everyone had pro Obama stuff all over themselves. I did not see one Hilary anything. I regret not printing out the Hypnobama frog so that I could fit in.

The theory here seems to be that since Obama is from Hawaii he is the person most likely to address the issues of Hawaii directly. While no one else really cares. And sending Chelsea to promote her mom is not the same as actually showing up or acknowledging Hawaii in public.

We’ll see how things turn out.

You’re campaigning in DC and you don’t get your donuts from Krispy Kreme? For shame.

Picture via My Way.

Notice a theme? Even Ron Paul couldn’t get above N/A. Where’s Alan Keyes when you need him?

Now that race has become an issue (which it wasn’t in Iowa), I’m curious how he’s going to play in white America.  Could this sweeping victory actually be Barack Obama’s campaign’s death knell?

Guess which candidate this was: Mayor, 9/11, 9/11, Tough…

Sep 13 2007 5:05 PM

Dear Reader thanks for being a proud member of the Republican Party, your participation through this process in the next election is greatly needed. Please pick a Republican canidate you feel is the best and send us back a comment stating just the canidates name.

thank you,

Your Republican Party

I wish, so badly, that that were the real Republican Party MySpace page.

Here’s Lou Dobbs discussing whether he’ll run for President in 2008. I filmed this with my digital camera so the sound and video quality are poor (turn up your speakers).

Among those likely to take part in the Iowa Republican caucuses, Romney is viewed favorably by 77%, Huckabee by 76%, Giuliani by 68%, and Thompson by 71%…

As for unfavorables, just 20% offer a negative assessment of Huckabee. Twenty-one percent (21%) have an unfavorable opinion of Romney, 24% say the same about Thompson, and 30% have a negative opinion of Giuliani.

McCain’s numbers have fallen since the previous Rasmussen Reports survey. Among Republicans likely to participate in the caucus, 54% have a favorable opinion of the Arizona Senator while 44% have an unfavorable view.

Ron Paul is viewed favorably by 39% and unfavorably by 52%.

Notice that bit at the end there? Ron Paul has an UNFAVORABLE rating above 50% That basically means that no matter what, more than 50% of Iowa Republican caucus voters will not vote for him. Money, media and message can do a lot to fix a public’s lack of knowledge about a candidate, but they can’t do much to fix a public’s established negative perceptions of a candidate.

A hundred November 5ths (or Tea Parties) won’t do Ron Paul any good if his unfavorables stay above 50%. And while those events raise a lot of money, they won’t do a lot to change negative perceptions. Of course, the commercials paid for by that money might help, but it hasn’t done so yet.