Category: Living in Society

Iowa Democrats did their job at the Feb. 1 first in the nation political caucuses.

The field was winnowed from six candidates (Chafee, Clinton, Lessig, O’Malley, Sanders and Webb) to two (Clinton and Sanders), giving Hillary Clinton a narrow, historic victory.

Our precinct played a role, and not an insignificant one, in producing that victory.

Hillary Clinton was the first woman to win the Iowa caucus — another glass ceiling broken. The caucus results are close. How close? It’s a matter of a couple of delegates with all but one of the state’s 1,683 precincts reporting, according to the Iowa Democratic Party. It is unclear whether the Sanders campaign will request a recount, but I doubt it. There are bigger fish to fry.

Iowa also played a role in setting which issues would be front and center in the 2016 presidential election. Even the anti-billionaire money in politics candidate Bernie Sanders gave an unintended nod to billionaire Tom Steyer’s advocacy to put climate action on the front burner of the contest. While issues aren’t the same as the horse race, they matter and Iowa matters in defining them.

The caucuses will be analyzed in great detail in the next 48 hours, so I have only a couple of things to add.

I begin with the lesson learned while attending the Democracy for America training in elections: winning an election is getting 50 percent of the vote plus one. The DFA method puts what happened in our precinct into higher relief, as through planning and competent execution of the tactical plan, our team for Hillary turned out more voters than expected, and provided Martin O’Malley his only delegate from Johnson County, and one of the few he got in the state. By giving O’Malley a delegate, it was taken from the Bernie Sanders group, giving Clinton a 2-1 victory over Sanders in Big Grove precinct. In a tight race, that one delegate mattered.

Here are the numbers.

Big Grove turned out 165 voters this cycle. We turned out 92 people for Clinton, the same number Obama had in 2008. In 2008, there were 75 Clinton supporters, a tie with John Edwards, and Clinton won the second delegate that year with a coin toss. For perspective, we turned out 242 during the six-way race Obama won in 2008. Our turnout last night was 69.2 percent of 2008’s record. Clinton had 56 percent of people at the caucus last night compared to 38 percent for Obama in 2008.

At the first alignment I reported these numbers to the Clinton campaign:

Clinton – 92
Sanders – 57
O’Malley – 10
Uncommitted – 6

This count would split the delegates two for Clinton and two for Sanders, with O’Malley not being viable. At the second alignment we sent our negotiating team to talk to O’Malley, with the Sanders representatives standing next to ours.

To get a third delegate we had one option. We needed to take people from Sanders and they were holding firm except for three people who moved to O’Malley. I did the analysis, ratified it with our team, and determined that by giving O’Malley 12 people their team would be viable and the delegate would come from Sanders.

I explained our proposal to the Clinton group and it was easy to get 12 volunteers to go to the O’Malley camp, since they understood the logic, if not the byzantine methodology. We executed the tactic, producing the following report to the Clinton campaign.

Clinton – 80
Sanders – 56
O’Malley – 25
Uncommitted – 0

Standing next to my neighbor and caucus chair, he phoned in two delegates for Clinton, one for O’Malley and one for Sanders to the state party system. This was our fourth presidential caucus working together and we were the last to leave the Middle School.

I haven’t digested everything that happened last night, although I was proud of the effort team Hillary put forward in our precinct. We ended up door knocking our entire precinct on Sunday, and that last minute extra effort had to have made a difference in turnout and the final result.

From here, let the pundits, bloggers and news reporters tell their story. The 2016 Iowa caucuses are in the books, and it is up to the remaining 49 states to decide who our Democratic nominee will be.

Whoever that is, I’ll feel comfortable going back to this year’s caucus attendees to ask for help in the general election campaign. No unity party needed here.

There is plenty of time to think about things when door knocking a rural precinct. Houses are spread out, and typically there is a long walk from the road to the dwelling. Sometimes you can’t even find where people live on a farmstead, or the family moved away.

I had a finger wave and waved back.One couple stopped to ask me what I was doing at a friend’s house. Society is palpable even if there aren’t many people around. Politics here is more about the county than the president.

One woman saw me coming from the street  and said to the elderly man sitting on the front porch, “tell him you can’t hear.” Turned out I’d bought straw from this farm several years ago and we had more in common than expected. We had a good chat although I never got to speak to my target, the octogenarian mother inside. “We’re not caucusers,” one said. They dislike the party business part of the caucus and would likely vote in a primary if there were one.

Everyone has made up their mind on this walk list. I’m glad I went out. What I thought about most is how personal politics was to most of the people I met today. It’s like fresh cut firewood one person was burning in an open pit, the smell permeating my clothing and getting into my lungs. It would be a mistake to say we aren’t all connected. And that’s a hope we should share for getting through these turbulent times.

Stuff is getting real as we enter the last days before the first in the nation Iowa caucuses on Feb. 1.

The Democratic race has been somewhat dull and uninspiring. Set aside the hubris-imbued early drop-outs (Lincoln Chafee and Jim Webb), those in the race, Hillary Clinton, Martin O’Malley and Bernie Sanders, bring little we don’t already know to the political discussion.

Although there are differences between the candidates, the 2016 election is about one thing: retaining a Democrat in the office of president. Err… two things… funding the Democratic campaign effort with cash in donor poor states like Iowa being the other. People tend to forget the latter because by and large few engage in party work other than during the final days before elections.

The good news is recent analysis showing Iowa is expected to retain four congressional seats after the 2020 census. The other news is our races for congress will continue to be competitive. With three of four seats being held by Republicans, 2016 will be pivotal in determining whether Democrats can retain the second district and maybe pick up first and third if the planets align, we recognize the opportunity, and execute upon it. Democratic chances to pick up a seat or two diminish outside the presidential election years. We will have to work smart and hard to keep what we have and maybe add one or two Democratic congress members in 2016.

The U.S. Senate? Unless incumbent candidate Chuck Grassley does something radically different for him, he holds the upper hand before the November general election. A well financed insurgent campaign could end his too long run. State Senator Rob Hogg offers the best hope for doing that among the three current contenders in the June 7 Democratic primary. Retreads Bob Krause and Tom Fiegen are also running with little change since they were last defeated in their primary with Democrat Roxanne Conlin. Fiegen has gone all in trying to grab the coattails of Bernie Sanders. Whether that will work, whether more detailed positions than appear on his website, especially his position regarding a woman’s right to choose, would gain traction among voters in the general election is an open question.

Eight days from the Iowa Caucus, the Democratic presidential race is too close to call.

This is a season of pollsters, and clouds have risen above the two leading Democratic candidates for president. Like with our warming planet, the political atmosphere absorbs more moisture because it is warmer, and when turbulence and precipitation come, it may be a gully-washer, clearing the field.

I don’t want to be dismissive of O’Malley, but what else is there to do? The gent has no chance of winning the Democratic nomination for president. I expect him to drop out on or before Super Tuesday. Prove me wrong on that, maybe say a prayer to Our Lady of Guadalupe for a miracle.

Hillary Clinton’s main challenge is whether or not voters find her trustworthy. Along with that is the unspoken (at least in public) issue of her female gender.

As the Des Moines Register pointed out in yesterday’s endorsement of Clinton, “no other candidate can match the depth or breadth of her knowledge and experience.” This harkens back to September when I decided to support Clinton for president, in part because of her knowledge and experience. Along with her global advocacy for women and children, and the potential to appoint multiple Supreme Court Justices, my decision was practical: pick the candidate with the best qualifications for the job. As others have pointed out, the practical vs. idealistic discussion is one voters are having. Based on people I talk with, the number of realists and idealists seems about even today.

We won’t hear so much about the fact Clinton is female, but opposition to a female president runs deep, not only near where I live, but across Iowa and the country. Expect this to come up during the general election, but whispering has already begun.

As far as being trustworthy, WYSIWYG with Clinton. She is unlike the Republican field in the Greek Drama politics has become in the corporate and social media. She wears a complex wardrobe of masks asserting her policy positions. If one looks behind the masks, at her core she is a Democrat, and likely a better pick than her husband was back in 1992.

What about Bernie Sanders? When I met him at a Johnson County Democrats event in 2014 I liked everything I heard. The Des Moines Register endorsement of Hillary Clinton lays out the case against Sanders — the unanswered question of how he might gain traction for his policy ideas in the stalemated political partner that is the U.S. Congress. He has had no answers to this criticism other than the need for a political revolution.

Like with Clinton, a whisper campaign about Sanders has begun, and can be expected to increase should he win the Democratic nomination. There are two things: “he’s a socialist,” and “he’s a Jew.”

Sanders describes himself as a “Democratic socialist,” but expect this to get morphed into “socialist” or the more disparaging “communist” in the general election. This is less whisper campaign than a reflection of Sanders unwillingness to embrace conventional politics. I believe we can weather the storm on this one should Sanders be the nominee. I’d like it more if he signed up for the Democratic party other than as its potential nominee, but elections are about compromise. I’ll let go of that one.

What has been written about less than I am hearing is American antisemitism that has been problematic since the nation’s inception. Wikipedia characterizes the current issue as follows:

An ABC News report in 2007 recounted that about six percent of Americans reported some feelings of prejudice against Jews. According to surveys by the Anti-Defamation League, antisemitism is rejected by clear majorities of Americans, with 64 percent of them lauding Jews’ cultural contributions to the nation in 2011, but a minority holding hateful views of Jews remain, with 19 percent of Americans supporting the antisemitic canard that Jews co-control Wall Street in 2011.

Wall Street and campaign finance reform have already become a topic among Democrats, and is expected to remain through the November election. Canard or no, if 19 percent believe Jews co-control Wall Street, the question is what percentage is in play regarding a specific vote for president. Antisemitism is real, and may be a factor if Sanders is the nominee. I’m already hearing talk about it.

As recent polls have indicated, Sanders, like Clinton, is electable against a Republican opponent. What those of us who can remember know is the margin of victory will be close in the 2016 presidential race. If the Anti-Defamation League’s analysis is accurate, Sander’s religion may come into play enough to swing the election. For me, it’s not an issue in the caucus, but then politically active Iowans are more open minded than in other states, especially in the electorate for the general election. Democrats are already talking about Sanders’ religion as a liability.

I’ve been fighting the good fight for Hillary Clinton and will until the tally is made at our caucus. I’ll support the Democratic candidate nominated July 25 in Philadelphia. Some questions will be answered Feb. 1 and eight days out which ones they are is obscured by noise in the corporate and social media.

BIG GROVE TOWNSHIP, Iowa — The ambient temperature dipped below zero degrees overnight, signaling the arrival of the polar vortex. Soon it will be time to prune the apple trees — most likely next weekend.

I worked a door knocking shift for the Hillary Clinton campaign on Saturday. While a lot of people weren’t home, those who were are ready for the 2016 general election campaign.

It was unanimous the Democratic party must work together to elect the person nominated for president at the Democratic National Convention the week of July 25, 2016.

At three weeks until the Feb. 1 Iowa political caucuses the tenor of this year’s build up has been much different from past cycles.

One person professed to be in throes of existential questions about the future of our country. He was an outlier. Everyone else was confident about for whom they would caucus and why. My targeted walk list identified Hillary supporters and some Bernie leaners. To a person they recognized a need to prevent Republicans from winning the White House. I invited Hillary supporters to seek me out at the caucus, and encouraged the rest to participate and then unify behind our candidate for the fall campaign. It was a much easier sell than in previous cycles.

My interactions with campaign staff and volunteers for the three remaining Democratic campaigns has been professional at a much higher level than in previous cycles. Partly there is a professional class of political consultants, activists, fund raisers, corporate media correspondents, bloggers and supporters that has matured. These folks have stepped up their game with systematization of the process of identifying and building supporter networks. The rest of the change is that with money in politics, each of the campaigns has effectively reached out to voters, and mostly in a professional manner which is the result of specific training. This cycle’s presidential primary campaign has been like the roll out of a new project by a giant corporation, and that includes the Bernie Sanders campaign which eschews corporate influence. The end result has been a modern democratization of national politics.

With the increased use and maturity of social media in politics, I’m finding commonalities between people that no one specifically engineered or engendered but will influence the fall campaign and the next presidency. Much of what I’m seeing is good news for Democrats, and better news for our country.

I told the outlier he’d better stick with the Democrats if he wants any of his priorities to get worked on in Washington. He smiled at the prospect of that.