On February 9th, the Washington State Democratic Party held its caucuses. The turnout was amazing. I didn’t get to participate because I was working; we had our annual International New Year that day. It happened to be at a community center, which was possibly a little overbooked.
They officially expected 100-200 people for 8 precincts. They got easily 600. I spent the vast majority of the afternoon directing traffic. “The bathrooms are that way, the gym is around the corner, no, this isn’t a caucus in this room.” Caucus participants lined up all the way down the street, took over our event spaces, moved precincts outside, and cast longing looks at the multipurpose room we were still using for our party. I got to see most of the caucus because one precinct was caucusing in the lobby in front of our room. It was energizing to see the turnout, the passion, and the process. It was exciting to watch so many people there, involved in politics and their neighborhood and the party. It was, basically, a hell of a thing to see.It still sucked.
See, the Washington Democrats choose their delegates exclusively via caucus, in spite of the fact that the State holds a primary for both parties. The Republicans caucus too, but they use both the caucus and the primary to choose delegates. If you’re a Dem, though, and you can’t take three hours on a Saturday afternoon, you’re out of luck. If you’re working, if you can’t stand up for that long, if you’re uncomfortable declaring your vote out loud and having to deal with someone trying to talk you out of it, if you didn’t understand that the primary is meaningless, if you’re out of the country, if your English isn’t that good, well, you’re out of luck. You can cast your ballot on February 19th, but it’s just a beauty pageant. A popularity contest.
I vote absentee. I’ve spent a lot of time in the past month thinking what I might do with my ballot. It has people on it who aren’t even running anymore. Should I do something strategic with it? Will it even be counted since it’s absentee? Hard to say. I decided in the end to not play games. It might be a popularity contest, but that’s no reason to not win it. I was sad to be denied the opportunity to stand up for my candidate earlier this month, and so I’m taking the chance now, no matter how meaningless it may be. I have the opportunity I’ve never had, to cast a vote for someone I was proud to support. I’m taking it. I’m casting my vote for Barack Obama.
The caucus may have been a powerful, energizing thing for us at this time. But with its record turnout it didn’t come close to the numbers a primary would have. I could look around the room, in a neighborhood I serve daily, and see quite clearly that only a limited demographic was there. I saw lots of people I work with. I saw no one who we serve. Even though I’m happy my guy won, it wasn’t representative. I hope the party puts due consideration into this in the next four years.
