Let the Games Begin (But It’s a Long Season)

Tonight, the Iowa Caucuses officially kicked off the 2008 Presidential Election. After the longest pre-primary campaign season in American history, we now have results.

Democrats (97% reporting):

1. Barack Obama 38%

2. John Edwards 30%

3. Hilary Clinton 29%

Everyone Else 3% (and Chris Dodd and Joe Biden just withdrew from the race)

Republicans (85% reporting):

1. Mike Huckabee (w/ Chuck Norris) 34%

2. Mitt Romney 25%

3. Fred Thompson 13%

4. John McCain 13%

5. Ron Paul 10%

6. Rudy Giuliani 3%

7. Duncan Hunter 0%

Now sure, I love seeing the unqualified Giuliani at 3%, and the Ron Paul Revolution at 10%. The democratic results do not surprise.

Please understand. None of this matters. It’s Iowa. Prepare for the media to run with Huckabee and Obama craze, and make it seem like everyone else has lost the presidency. Here’s what really happened: one state down, 49 to go. When your primary comes around, do not be fooled. Vote for who you believe to be the best candidate, because as of tonight, no candidate is what Iowa democrats like to call “unviable.” Roughly half of the time, in both parties, the person who wins Iowa loses the nomination. If you ignore unopposed candidates, the number is more like 2/3 of the time.

Want to know another reason the Iowa Caucuses should not affect your vote? Just look at how it is run. From “Iowa caucus” on Wikipedia (yeah, I know):

Republican Party process

For the Republicans, the Iowa caucus follows (and should not be confused with) the Ames Straw Pollin August of the preceding year. Out of the five Ames Straw Poll iterations, 1987 is the only year in which the winner of the Ames Straw Poll has not gone on to win the Iowa caucus.

In the Republican caucuses, each voter casts his or her vote by secret ballot. Voters are presented blank sheets of paper with no candidate names on them. After listening to some campaigning for each candidate by caucus participants, they write their choices down and the Republican Party of Iowa tabulates the results at each precinct and transmits them to the media.^[6] The non-binding results are tabulated and reported to the state party which releases the results to the media. Delegates from the precinct caucuses go on to the County Convention, which chooses delegates to the District Convention, which in turn selects delegates to the State Convention. Thus it is the Republican State Convention, not the precinct caucuses, which select the ultimate delegates to the Republican National Convention in Iowa.

Democratic Party process

The process used by the Democrats is more complex than the Republican Party caucus process. Each precinct divides its delegate seats among the candidates in proportion to caucus goers’ votes.

Participants indicate their support for a particular candidate by standing in a designated area of the caucus site (forming a “preference group”). An area may also be designated for undecided participants. Then, for roughly 30 minutes, participants try to convince their neighbors to support their candidates. Each preference group might informally deputize a few members to recruit supporters from the other groups and, in particular, from among those undecided. Undecided participants might visit each preference group to ask its members about their candidate.

After 30 minutes, the electioneering is temporarily halted and the supporters for each candidate are counted. At this point, the caucus officials determine which candidates are “viable”. Depending on the number of county delegates to be elected, the “viability threshold” can be anywhere from 15% to 25% of attendees. For a candidate to receive any delegates from a particular precinct, he or she must have the support of at least the percentage of participants required by the viability threshold. Once viability is determined, participants have roughly another 30 minutes to “realign”: the supporters of inviable candidates may find a viable candidate to support, join together with supporters of another inviable candidate to secure a delegate for one of the two, or choose to abstain. This “realignment” is a crucial distinction of caucuses in that (unlike a primary) being a voter’s “second candidate of choice” can help a candidate.

When the voting is closed, a final head count is conducted, and each precinct apportions delegates to the county convention. These numbers are reported to the state party, which counts the total number of delegates for each candidate and reports the results to the media. Most of the participants go home, leaving a few to finish the business of the caucus: each preference group elects its delegates, and then the groups reconvene to elect local party officers and discuss the platform.

The delegates chosen by the precinct then go to a later caucus, the county convention, to choose delegates to the district convention and state convention. Most of the delegates to the Democratic National Convention are selected at the district convention, with the remaining ones selected at the state convention. Delegates to each level of convention are initially bound to support their chosen candidate but can later switch in a process very similar to what goes on at the precinct level; however, as major shifts in delegate support are rare, the media declares the candidate with the most delegates on the precinct caucus night the winner, and relatively little attention is paid to the later caucuses.

To reiterate. One state down, 49 states to go. That one state was Iowa, not California or Texas. Don’t get swept up in the hype – vote who you know to be the best, not who you are told is the best. Listen critically, not blindly, whether it be to Sean Hannity, to Keith Olbermann, or to a small percentage of the already small population of Iowa.