Thursday, January 10, 2008

What she said.

Please read this post by Frances Kissling. It's exactly why I don't support Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination.

Frances Kissling at CommonDreams.org

Monday, January 7, 2008

Caucus... over and out.

This year was the second time I've caucused, and my emotions about the experience are mixed.

1. The turnout was amazing! Almost every precinct at least doubled its attendance from the previous caucus in 2004. We had over 400 people at our location.

2. I started out caucusing for Dodd. I was pumped. I had a button. I had stickers. I had signs.... I also had two other supporters. Not a good sign when I needed 37 to be viable.

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3. I switched to my second choice of Edwards when it became readily apparent that Dodd didn't have a chance at wrangling in 34 more people. I like Edwards and was happy to support him.

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4. The Richardson and Biden people joined with several Kucinich supporters to form an "Uncommitted" group. They then tried to sway 3 Clinton supporters and 6 Edwards supporters to their group to make them viable. No way. And it especially doesn't help if you yell at people to try to convince them. The 25 of them ended up not counting. Well, that's what you get.

5. Our Drinking Liberally party afterward was amazing. I'm guessing we had 75-100 people turn out to the event. We watched the returns on the big screen, and cheered and booed as different candidates came on the screen.

6. Obama's speech following the caucus was incredibly inspiring. The man is a great orator. I just hope he has the walk to back up the talk.

In all, the caucus was a good time, but it was great to hear the planes take off overhead on Friday morning. Iowa is lucky to get this kind of opportunity once every four years - and if this ends up our last year as "first in the nation," at least we went out with a bang.