Raucous at the Caucus, Part Deux

There were two nearly simultaneous experiences at the caucus that I forgot to mention. Both experiences seemed perfect analogies for this political season, so I thought I'd share them. At the head of the line, when you are finally at a point to be directed to your district location, there are a few volunteers. As my apartment building was on the borderline of two separate districts, there was some initial confusion as to where I should be. The volunteer, a man in his forties, held a crudely divided and hard to read map of the local precinct areas in his hand. The map was no help. The volunteer was about to disappear to get some extra help when an older gentleman, probably in his late sixties, early seventies, asked loudly, "Where's the Republican Caucus?" The volunteer was flummoxed. "I have no idea, sir," he responded. He offered to get someone in a more senior position to give him directions and walked away. Meanwhile, a young man who I can only guess was the volunteer's son, took his place. The boy was no more than twelve years old, wearing an Obama t-shirt.

At first glance, this doesn't seem like much. But to me, the older gentleman seemed a perfect analogy for the Republican party. He was confused, disoriented, brash, uninformed and invaded the wrong place. And by the time he actually did get an answer as to where he was supposed to be, it was too late. Isn't that just like a Republican, I thought, lost and in trouble and needing a bunch of Democrats to bail him out.

The boy, on the other hand, was directing voters more quickly and efficiently than his father. He didn't need a map or a guide. "Do you know your precinct?" he asked every voter as they reached the top of the stairs. If they did, he gave them easy to follow directions. If they did not, he asked them where they lived and then told them their precinct number, without the use of a map, and then guided them. Again, he was no more than twelve years old. I know that Obama was energizing the youth vote, but this was more than I expected. To me, this boy was an analogy for the 'new' Democrats. He was smart, informed, decisive, unafraid, and knew exactly what he was supposed to be doing, when, and in the best interests of the people in front of him. On top of all that, he listened and stepped in when needed. He took over for his father, who was being helpful in his own way, and this boy knew that he needed to step in for the betterment of the party and his community. The line moved faster and more efficiently under his direction. I was incredibly impressed. The boy was a born leader. If there are more young people out there like this boy, I feel better about the future of this country.

Raucous at the Caucus

This is a picture from my corner vantage point of my Eastlake precint's Presidential Caucus. This is the first caucus I've ever attended and it was an experience not to be forgotten.

I tried to gather information on the caucus before I arrived, only to find very spotty information. There was, however, a short video about the process showing some kindly citizens, maybe ten total, sitting in a library and having a nice informal chat.

When I arrived at the caucus location, there was a lineup of about 150 people. Of course, those were just the people outside the building waiting to get in. Inside, you could have easily multiplied that number by five. At least. The room pictured above is where I was guided. This picture was taken a few minutes before three entire precincts were moved out of the room because there just wasn't enough space for this kind of turnout!

Just before we were ushered outside in to the forty degree weather, we all signed in and chose a preferred candidate. A tally was taken and read to the group. In my precinct of 58 people, the original tally turned out to be 48 for Barack Obama, 7 for Hillary Clinton, and 3 undecideds. They then allowed time for two short speeches, one from each side of the candidates, in an attempt to sway not only the undecideds, but also anybody committed who wanted to change their opinion. After the speeches, which were disjointed and haphazard, but personal and from the heart, the three undecideds changed their preference and the final tally was taken. It ended up to be 49 for Obama and 9 for Clinton. This translated into 4 delegates for Obama and one for Clinton. Then, quite a bit of time was taken for choosing members of our precinct to become the delegates that would then go on to the next level.

All in all, the whole thing was an hour and a half's worth of time in which about five minutes of action took place. In that way, I think that the caucus was a perfect example of the democratic process. It was disorganized and messy, but the voices of the people were heard. How this information gets passed up and turned into results is still unclear to me, but it seems primitive and with huge possibilities of miscalculation. However, I'd prefer this method than the alternative, easily manipulated voting machines. What the caucus does is show people's true opinions in front of their neighbors who also act as witnesses to the process.

Oddly, Washington also has a primary scheduled for February 19th, which has been declared 'meaningless' (at least as far as the Presidential delegation assignment goes) as all delegates are assigned through the caucus. I don't know how the results from the other precincts went, but I know that the Eastlake neighborhoods were heavily favoring Obama. Because of what I saw, I would imagine that Obama should easily take the majority of delegates in Washington state. He spoke at Key Arena and they had to turn people away. This venue holds approximately 17,000 people, and over 3000 people had to wait outside. Luckily, Obama actually went to them, giving them a second impassioned speech. This is opposed to the 5000 people who saw Hillary speak earlier in the week.

As I stated earlier, this was my first caucus, and although it had its faults, it was an incredible experience, and a humbling display of patriotism, civic duty and responsibility. Walking to the school in which the caucus took place, it looked as if the entire neighborhood had emptied out, all trickling their way to demonstrate their determination to make this country, their community, and their government a better place and entity, and it was an awe-inspiring site to behold. I've never seen this many people at a polling place (granted, that is open all day) and I think that has a lot to do with both a disgust with the current administration and a belief that one of the two leading Democratic candidates could make a change.