Over the weekend, Dana Goldstein posted a thoughtul piece on the American Prospect site about the disorganized and arguably unfair conduct of the Iowa Caucus site she monitered. Though I didn’t much convey it during my hurried live-blogging of Des Moines Precinct 19 on Caucus night (in part because I was typing with my laptop wedged at a crazy angle in a fire extinguisher alcove at the margins of the room, and was constantly moving to avoid obstructing the actual participants), my own experience paralleled hers.
Precinct 19 shared the site with Precinct 43, but there was virtually no signage indicating who should go where, and the party had not provided maps to indicate precinct lines (fortunately, one Biden and one Obama supporter had maps, if you lucked into encountering them in the midst of the chaotic crowd shuffling into the school). The room set aside for Precinct 19 was totally inadequate, with participants spilling into the corridor and beyond, where some could not have possibly heard the precinct chairman’s explanation of the process. The doors obviously had to remain open throughout the proceedings, and there was no monitoring of comings and goings, or indeed, whether participants had formally registered.
Since there was no space for separating preference groups, at least two (Kucinich and Clinton) were sent out into the adjoining lobby. This seriously handicapped the HRC effort when “realignment” began, since they couldn’t personally persuade supporters of non-viable candidates without luring them out of the room. And the entire preference group process underlined the most obvious difference between Caucuses and primaries: the absence of a secret ballot.
Candidate precinct captains for each campaign were allowed to conduct counts of their supporters without any official verification (at one point, the precinct chairman patiently explained to one captain how to efficiently conduct a hand count). And there were definite disparties in the quality of campaign preparation. I overheard one of the three HRC supporters who appeared to be in charge of her precinct operation ask a bystander at one point: “What happens next?” And the Biden captain convinced about half of his group to refuse to realign behind a second choice, on the dubious theory that this stubborn fidelity would be reflected in the “raw counts.”
Maybe my and Dana’s concerns are irrelevant in terms of the actual outcome, but given the consequences of Edwards’ razor-thin delegate margin over Clinton, a lot of small mistakes and accidents could have easily added up to a big effect on the presidential nominating process. I’m sure that there will be another debate after the nomination is decided about the caucus and primary calendar and Iowa’s iron grip on a highly disproportionate role. But however that turns out, if Iowa is still “first in the nation” in 2012, I hope both parties pay more attention to the need for sufficient space and direction to enable Iowans to know what they are doing for or to the rest of us.

NH polls are pouring in at a fast clip, and a good place to crunch the numbers and keep up is Pollster.com, where Eric Dienstfrey and Mark Blumenthal are on the case. For those who want to look ahead, Chris Kromm has an interesting take at Facing South on the January 19th Primary in South Carolina. And, John Harwood’s New York Times post “After New Hampshire, a Rapidly Changing Race” is a good place to begin thinking ahead. Likening the campaign that begins tomorrow to the TV series “Survivor,” Harwood has some insights about the candidates’ efforts to connect with complex constituencies after IA and NH :

After courting mostly white electorates in Iowa and New Hampshire, Democratic candidates will compete for Latinos in Nevada and blacks in South Carolina and the rest of the South. That heralds an increased focus on bread-and-butter economics and decreased attention to more esoteric discussions of political reform.
“More church visits, more plant visits,” says Donna Brazile, an African-American strategist who managed Al Gore’s 2000 campaign.
The black vote represents an appreciating asset for Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, so long as his campaign appears robust. A question facing Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, in Nevada and in the Western states that vote Feb. 5, is whether she can hold the formidable Hispanic support that she has marshaled so far. In California, Asian-Americans represent another wild card.
The Republican primary electorate grows more variegated as well, with the Irish, Italian and Polish “Reagan Democrats” of major cities like Detroit; Arab-Americans in Dearborn, Mich.; and Cuban immigrants in Miami.
More than the campaign’s opening chapter, this phase rewards nimble candidates and magnifies mistakes.

The scope of the campaign ahead is also vastly enhanced, as Harwood explains:

The scale of the new battlefield represents an immense logistical, financial and management challenge. Not even the best-financed campaign has the time or the money to visit or advertise in the scores of media markets involved in the contest through Feb. 5; there are 35 markets alone in California, Florida and Michigan.

Another major factor coming post-NH is an increasing possibility of a recession, and almost certainly a “troubled economy,” according to Paul Krugman’s op-ed column in today’s Times.
Although much of the media buzz is centered around the Obama-Clinton poll numbers, remember that Edwards came in 2nd in Iowa and he has made it clear that he is in it for the long haul. In that regard, Seema Mehta and James Rainey have an L.A. Times update on the Edwards campaign strategy in light of recent polling and primary numbers.

Kate Gibson has a Marketwatch report on a pair of NH polls that have pundits buzzing about an Obama Vs. McCain race:

Iowa caucus winner Obama and Clinton are backed by 33% of Democratic primary voters in the poll conducted by CNN and WMUR by the University of New Hampshire. A separate survey conducted for the Concord Monitor by Research 2000 had 34% of likely Democratic primary voters opting for Sen. Obama, D-IL, and 33% favoring Sen. Clinton, D-N.Y. Former North Carolina Senator John Edwards netted 20% in the CNN/WMUR poll, while the Concord Monitor poll had Edwards garnering 23% of likely Democratic voters.
On the GOP side, Sen. McCain was backed by 35% of likely Republican voters, while Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, was backed by 29% in the Concord Monitor survey, with Iowa caucus winner Mike Huckabee selected by 13%, and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani at 8%. The CNN/WMUR survey offered similar results, with 33% backing Sen. McCain of Arizona, and 27% supporting Romney. Huckabee was backed by 11%, with the former Arkansas governor trailing former mayor Giuliani, who garnered 14%.

Even though Obama and Clinton are in a statistical tie in both polls, such “polling numbers are like a snapshot of a moving train” as GOP pundit/consultant Michael Murphy ventured on Meet the Press. Open Left‘s Chris Bowers has post-Iowa poll averages for NH showing Obama with a 4.2 percent lead over Clinton. Says Bowers:

Obama is clearly ahead in New Hampshire right now. With only two days left and the momentum overwhelmingly on his side in the state, it is very, very hard to see how he doesn’t win New Hampshire.

In more good news for Obama, The Chris Matthews Show panel of a dozen pundits “Matthews Meter” is unanimous that Obama will be the nominee (as were Murphy and Democratic consultant Steve McMahon on MTP). So we have 14 pundits predicting Obama wins the Democratic nomination, and the two who ventured an opinion agree that McCain wins the GOP nomination. Not a bad Sunday before NH for Obama and McCain, who also got the MTP interview (as did Obama and Huckabee the Sunday before their Iowa victories).
Bowers cautions, however, that Clinton could still be ahead in delegate counts after Super Tuesday if she wins both Florida and California. Bowers explains:

Collectively, Clinton’s advantage in Super Delegates, Michigan, and February 5th home states provides her with roughly a 500 delegate advantage on Obama. If she were to also win Florida and California, which combine for 555 pledged delegates, it would be impossible for Obama to be ahead on delegates after February 5th. He could win every other state between now and February 6th, and never make up that sort of delegate deficit.

Get ready for a fierce month of Democratic politics.
UPDATE: A new CNN-WMUR poll, conducted Saturday and Sunday, has Obama leading Clinton by 10 points (m.o.e. 5).

The first poll of NH to be conducted after the results from Iowa were in shows a decent “bounce” for Barack Obama, but not for Mike Huckabee.
The Democratic poll by Rasmussen has Obama up ten points over Clinton–37%-27%–with Edwards at 19%. Clinton led Obama 31%-28%, with Edwards at 18%, in the last Rasmussen poll, conducted before Xmas.
On the Republican side, Rasmussen has McCain moving ahead of Romney 31%-26% in NH, with Huckabee running fourth at 11%, trailing Ron Paul’s 14%. This represents a precise reversal of McCain and Romney’s standing, while Huckabee hasn’t moved at all.
Post-Iowa “bounces” in the past have often increased a few days after the Caucuses, so this is hardly the final word. But right now the CW that Obama and McCain became front-runners after Iowa looks reasonably sound.
UPCATEGORY: Democratic Strategist
Both these polls closely track the Rasmussen findings on the Republican side, with John McCain holding a six-point lead over Romney, and Huckabee mired in the low teens.

With just three days left before the New Hampshire primaries, candidates are clearly scrambling to play the quick transition game. The Washington Post has a good quick summary of the crucial factors in Iowa that might carry over to NH.
On the Democratic side, the initial buzz is that Clinton is going to go after Barack Obama’s Illinois record for being too liberal, while John Edwards continues to go after Obama for failing to sufficiently understand the satanic nature of corporations. It will be interesting to see if these attack lines cancel each other out, or raise doubts about Obama’s rarely discussed ideological background.

Th day after the Iowa Caucuses, there’s obviously a whole lot we don’t know about how the presidential nominating contests, much less the ultimate election, will proceed.
On the Democratic side, in the short term, we obviously don’t know the size of the “bump” Iowa will give Barack Obama going into New Hampshire just four days from now, though my guess is that it will catapult him into a clear lead. We don’t know exactly what Hillary Clinton’s campaign will do to mount a comeback in NH, though the time frame makes any negative tactic that requires voter reflection exceedingly difficult. We don’t know if the supposed populist fire set by Edwards in Iowa can strike sparks in NH, or if he will essentially disappear in the Obama-HRC crossfire. And will also don’t know if the fierce competition among Republicans in NH will deprive Obama of the kind of voter/media buzz and appeal among independents that he would need to replicate his Iowa win.
In the longer term, we also don’t know if this is going to be a two- or three-candidate race after NH, just as we don’t know whether Clinton’s national lead can survive losing in both IA and NH. We don’t know how seriously the media will take the Nevada Caucuses on January 19, or if the state could produce a saving win for Clinton or (less likely) Edwards. We do know that if Obama wins NH, he’s likely to be an overwhelming favorite in SC, where John Edwards’ campaign will probably die (ironically, in his native state) unless the dynamics fundamentally change. And most of all, we don’t know if Clinton is willing or able to pull a Giuliani if she can’t win before February 5, and has enough residual support and money to muddy the waters with a big delegate haul.
On the Republican side, things are even more muddled. A big Iowa Bounce would still probably leave Huckabee running behind McCain and Romney in NH, and he’ll have to get through a probable loss in MI before getting to favorable terrain in SC. But perhaps the biggest imponderable is whether the GOP/Conservative Establishment, panicked by Huckabee’s Iowa win, moves quickly towards former pariah McCain to kill off the Arkansan, or gives Romney another chance.
But here’s what we do know:
1) In terms of participation, the Iowa results were vastly more positive for Democrats than for Republicans. Check out Chris Bowers’ summary of combined Repubican and Democratic data from the Iowa entrance polls. Dems not only attracted about double the number of participants as Republicans in what had been a narrowly divided state. They attracted 75% of independents; 88% of self-identified “moderates”; and roughly three-fourths of voters under 45.
2) For all the talk about the Iowa winners, Obama and Huckabee, as “outsiders” or “upstarts,” they are polar opposites in terms of broader appeal. Obama won Democrats as well as independents, and liberals as well as moderates, and clearly helped produce a vast uptick in first-time Caucus participation in both categories. Huckabee won with disproportionate support from a narrow and controversial category of conservative GOP voters, conservative evangelicals. Even if elbows get sharp in the next couple of weeks, Democrats remain highly unified on most policy issues, and there’s nothing about Obama in particular (who attracts the most liberal voters while constantly reaching out to indies and even Republicans) that is likely to make him a divisive nominee. Republicans appear headed for a very divisive nominating contest that could produce a controversial nominee and resentment among his rivals.
3) As Democracy Corps and others have constantly reminded us, Democratic prospects in 2008 depend heavily on their ability to maintain their 2006 status as the party of change at a time when “wrong track” sentiment is extremely high. Iowa confirmed that 2008 is developing into another “change” election, made most obvious by the fact that the Republican candidate identified most with “change” in the past, John McCain, could well be the establishment candidate in the end. At the end of the George W. Bush era, Democrats will have a structural advantage in a “change” election, particularly if its candidate appears to personify change.
4) The issue landscape also continues to benefit Democrats. Much was made by pundits in recent weeks about declining public interest in Iraq, which was supposed to benefit Republicans by reducing the weight of that millstone around their necks. But aside from the fact that the Iraq War remains highly unpopular, with the two parties completely polarized on how to proceed in a way that favors Democrats, the emerging issues of the economy and health care probably favor Democrats nearly as much.
To sum it all up, the Iowa results provided a lot of good news for Democrats whether or not they support Barack Obama. At this admittedly early point, Democrats are united, change-oriented, highly attractive to independent and first-time voters, and favorably positioned on most key issues (with the arguable exception of immigration).
We’ll see how things shake out, but as a Democrat, I’m feelin’ pretty good at present.

Turns out my microexperience in Des Moines Precinct #19 was pretty representative of the Iowa Democratic Caucuses as a whole, at least in terms of the amazing turnout. The semi-final numbers showed 236,000 Democratic participants, nearly double the levels of 2004 (and about double the levels of Republicans tonight, who also exceeded expected turnout). Going into the Caucuses, people who said turnout might reach 200,000 were considered hallucinatory.
The Entrance Polls for the Democrats were quite interesting. Because they represent first rather than final preferences, they show HRC doing significantly better than Edwards, and Obama a bit below his final levels. Participation by independents was pretty much where it was in 2004 (about 20%), and though Obama won heavily among them, he also narrowly carried self-identified Democrats as well (and–mirable dictu–women). Despite the heavily left-bent nature of Edwards’ closing pitch, and the rapidly spreading stampede of progressive bloggers from Obama to Edwards on grounds that Obama was sounding like one of those damned centrists, Obama won decisively among those calling themselves “very liberal,” and by double digits among those calling themselves “somewhat liberal.” Meanwhile, Edwards romped among the small number of self-identifed conservatives, and his best income category by far was those earning more than $100,000.
The most astonishing entrance poll figure involves age: as high a percentage of Democratic Caucus participants (22%) were under 30 as were over 65. Since Obama won 57% in the former category and HRC won 45% in the latter, the relatively young age distribution was probably the single biggest factor in the outcome.

Courtesy of C-SPAN, I did get a little hint of what the Iowa caucuses were like. I certainly appreciate the argument that the Iowa caucuses are no way to run a Democracy, advanced by Larry J. Sabato and others. Yet, I felt a twinge of envy towards Ed for being there. It just looked like a fun night out, if somewhat exhausting — hanging out with fellow supporters of your candidate and others, making new friends, hashing out issues with all the media attention and knowing that your little vote probably means a hell of a lot more than that of the average citizen in any other state. I imagine the Obama afterglow party was a blast. His victory speech was excellent. No wonder Iowans love their crazy process.
I clicked on over to C-SPAN2 for a little while, where a GOP caucus was being spotlighted, and watched a young girl singing a slightly off-key version of that “I’m proud to be an American” song, while Republicans who could have been lifted out of a Norman Rockwell tableaux looked on. The GOP caucus process appeared to be a good deal more orderly and a lot less fun. I tried to imagine the Huckabee victory party. Back to C-SPAN1.
I get the critique of the Iowa caucuses not providing a representative reflection of the states’ voters as a whole, with such a small percentage turning out and no secret ballot etc. But there is something to be said for the human interaction you get with the Iowa caucuses — citizens coming together, boldly declaring their preferences and arguing and negotiating their way to a fair ballot count. It gets at the spirit of democracy from another angle. Still, after the elections the Democratic Party should move towards allowing all states to take turns as the first primary/caucus. No one state should have a hammerlock on first-in-the-nation.
For addressing the lessons learned and questions raised by the Iowa caucuses, the CNN entrance poll findings referenced by Ed are a great place to start.

Returning from my own Caucus Adventure, I discovered that the deal had already gone down statewide, with Obama winning by a healthy seven percent over Clinton and Edwards, who basically tied, and Huckabee croaking Romney by a very surprising nine percent.
Haven’t seen anything about total turnout, but I’m guessing the Democratic turnout must have been very high. Going back to the key question about media spin that Chuck Todd discussed this morning, the gut-wrencher now is whether Clinton and Edwards are deemed as having tied for second, or one is adjudged as beating the other. This might, for example, be the difference between faint hope and extinction for Edwards, and if it goes the other way (as appears likely), the media hype over Clinton finishing last in the Big Three could be damaging if not deadly.
As for Huckabee–well, it will be most interesting to see what kind of post-Iowa bounce he gets in later states. Romney’s now on the ropes, and before long, we could have the strange spectacle of conventional conservatives flocking to John McCain.

The “persuasion period” in Precinct 19 is coming to a close, and since participants are literally scattered out of the room and into the lobby, even Edwards supporters are “lobbying.” There’s lots of cheering as people join the viiable groups. It looks a little like some sort of fraternity or sorority rush.
The final count: 156 for Obama. 78 for Edwards, and 69 for Clinton (a handful of Biden people refused to regroup with another candidate, so virtually nobody left between the first and second vote).
By simple math, Obama gets 4 delegates, Edwards 2 and Clinton 2. Thus, to be clear about how the statewide count works, in this precinct, Obama got 50%, and Edwards and Clinton each got 25%. Nothing else that happened here tonight counted.