{"id":2142,"date":"2012-02-05T01:39:39","date_gmt":"2012-02-05T06:39:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/?p=2142"},"modified":"2012-02-05T01:39:39","modified_gmt":"2012-02-05T06:39:39","slug":"rural-state-caucuses-very-small-numbers-of-people-making-very-important-decisions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/2012\/02\/05\/rural-state-caucuses-very-small-numbers-of-people-making-very-important-decisions\/","title":{"rendered":"Rural state caucuses: very small numbers of people making very important decisions"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"e26b170012445c56d240655bdd03f7bf\" data-index=\"1\" style=\"float: left; margin: 10px 10px 10px 0;\">\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\r\ngoogle_ad_client = \"ca-pub-5595881567027133\";\r\n\/* Medium Rectangle *\/\r\ngoogle_ad_slot = \"8584504377\";\r\ngoogle_ad_width = 300;\r\ngoogle_ad_height = 250;\r\n\/\/-->\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"\r\nsrc=\"http:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/show_ads.js\">\r\n<\/script>\n<\/div>\n<p>In the 2008 Pennsylvania primary for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton beat Barack Obama 55-45 &#8212; a margin of over 200,000 votes. She picked up 12 delegates on him: 85 to 73. But that was only enough to offset Obama&#8217;s edge in the Idaho caucus, where he racked up a 15-3 delegate edge despite the state&#8217;s dramatically lower population. <\/p>\n<p>And that was a key part of Obama&#8217;s victory, and one of the main reasons that it was clear Obama would win for a couple of months before Clinton conceded. The Obama team understood that the race was for delegates &#8212; not a race for popularity or momentum or press as the convention neared. <\/p>\n<p>Of course, it&#8217;s sort of ridiculous &#8212; isn&#8217;t it? &#8212; that a caucus win in Idaho should offset a significant primary loss in a major swing state like Pennsylvania. But that&#8217;s the way primary politics work in the U.S.<\/p>\n<p>So today Romney won &#8220;big&#8221; in the Nevada caucuses, and with just over 45% of precincts reporting tonight so far, he has a little over 7,000 votes. Really?<\/p>\n<p>Yes, when all of Las Vegas has reported, the vote counts will look a little less absurd, but the system is still deeply problematic.<\/p>\n<p>Take a look at the vote count so far, with about 44% reporting, in Lander County, which has a population density of approximately one person per square mile:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"2143\" data-permalink=\"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/2012\/02\/05\/rural-state-caucuses-very-small-numbers-of-people-making-very-important-decisions\/screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1-22-51-am\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png?fit=452%2C323\" data-orig-size=\"452,323\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"Screen shot 2012-02-05 at 1.22.51 AM\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png?fit=300%2C214\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png?fit=452%2C323\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png?resize=452%2C323\" alt=\"\" title=\"Screen shot 2012-02-05 at 1.22.51 AM\" width=\"452\" height=\"323\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-2143\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png?w=452 452w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png?resize=300%2C214 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 452px) 100vw, 452px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Between Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada, we have four of the first five contests in states with small populations and\/or with election processes that involve very few voters.<\/p>\n<p>Are those voters representative enough of the electorate at large to deserve such an outsized influence? The answer is clearly no, in my opinion.<br \/>\n<div class=\"e26b170012445c56d240655bdd03f7bf\" data-index=\"4\" style=\"float: none; margin:4px 0 4px 0; text-align:center;\">\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\r\ngoogle_ad_client = \"ca-pub-5595881567027133\";\r\n\/* Another large rectangle *\/\r\ngoogle_ad_slot = \"0042810896\";\r\ngoogle_ad_width = 336;\r\ngoogle_ad_height = 280;\r\n\/\/-->\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"\r\nsrc=\"http:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/show_ads.js\">\r\n<\/script>\n<\/div>\n<\/p>\n<!--CusAds0-->\n<div style=\"font-size: 0px; height: 0px; line-height: 0px; margin: 0; padding: 0; clear: both;\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the 2008 Pennsylvania primary for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton beat Barack Obama 55-45 &#8212; a margin of over 200,000 votes. She picked up 12 delegates on him: 85 to 73. But that was only enough to offset Obama&#8217;s&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"more-link-p\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/2012\/02\/05\/rural-state-caucuses-very-small-numbers-of-people-making-very-important-decisions\/\">Read more &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2143,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[62],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Screen-shot-2012-02-05-at-1.22.51-AM.png?fit=452%2C323","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1gN9R-yy","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2142"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.billdawers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}