The Iowa Caucuses

The Iowa Republican caucuses are a weird political event. Actually, they’re not a political event so much as a media event. They’re little more than a non-binding straw poll of preferences among a minority of registered Republicans. The “votes” mean nothing politically. The caucus attendees, meeting in groups of several to dozens to maybe scores in homes and schools and churches, after hearing last-minute speeches on behalf of the candidates, write down their preferences on blank sheets of paper or raise their hands, the results counted on site, and then the results are phoned in to the Iowa Republican Committee who collate and release them to the media. There are delegates elected at the caucuses to attend county conventions, but they are uncommitted, not bound by any of the preference “votes.” At the county conventions, delegates, also uncommitted, are elected to the state convention where delegates are elected, uncommitted, to the national convention. So among the candidates in the caucuses, there are no winners or losers in terms of delegate count, as there are no pledged delegates to be won or loss. It’s the media’s (self-compelled) job to determine who won and loss, and that is based entirely on the expectation built up over the weeks leading to the caucuses by . . . the media.

So in this year’s caucuses, there could conceivably be four winners: Romney (if he finishes first), Paul (if he finishes at least second), Santorum (if he finishes at least third), and Gingrich (if he finishes fourth). Perry and Bachmann could also be winners if they finish fourth or better, but that would mean at least one of the other four would have to drop down, making them losers. Romney would be a loser if he comes in third or lower, Paul if he comes in third or lower, Santorum if he comes in fourth or lower, and Gingrich if he doesn’t make it to fourth. The defense of the caucuses is that they “winnow the field”: if you can’t mount a grass roots campaign that puts you in the top three or four in Iowa, you can’t make it anywhere, and you would do us all a favor by dropping out now. Which is why there are always three or four winners and two or three losers. It’s the ultimate in media-driven horse-race politics. And it’s no surprise that the importance of the Iowa caucuses emerged in the late 1970s and through the 1980s, as the 24/7 cable news megaphones were born. The caucuses are regularly touted (by the media) as pure grass-roots, knock-on-doors, campaign-over-coffee democracy. But they are nothing of the sort. They are a media created and media sustained (money making) circus. They don’t deserve to be “first in the nation” – they don’t deserve to continue as is at all.