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ninanevermoreToday on my drive into work, I was thinking about voting in the Texas political primaries, which I did last night for the first time in my life. I also showed up later to caucus and vote again, because only in the Texas primaries can you vote twice for the same candidate in the same election, and have it be legal. The arcane system is described as The Texas Two Step, after a popular country and western dance.
I've never voted in a primary before for a couple of reasons. The first reason is because I am an Independent and don't claim either major American political party as my own. Most of the time people who belong to one of the two major parties look down their noses at Independents, viewing us as the political equivalents of sluts. In an election year, though, they all start acting like amorous sailors, cozying up to us, asking if they can buy us drinks, and letting us know that they've been admiring us from across the room of politics all night and that they've always found our unpredictability kind of exciting. I have to admit, it’s the only time in my life that I ever feel really, really desirable. This year, I went ahead and accepted the drink the Democrats offered me.
The second reason I've never voted before in a Texas primary election is because up until now, they didn't matter. Texas primaries happen so late in the year that in every election I can remember, the decision was already made before our primary even rolled around. Most people I know didn't bother with them, even those who belong to a party. This year was different. I figured that this might be the only primary in Texas during my lifetime that would ever matter, and I might regret it if I missed it, so I decided to dust off my voter registration and head to the polls.
Now, while I work in the big city of Houston, I live in an area that can accurately be described as rural. The polling place for district 13 (my lucky home district) of my county was a community center a few miles from my house, a small wood-frame building with a gravel parking lot in front. The area is very, very Republican, to the point that every last campaign sign out front was for Republican candidates. The Democrats weren't waiting time or money out in this neck of the woods. A large sign on a post on the front porch read in big black letters: Republican Primary Election Here. Beneath it, a much smaller sign with much smaller letters read simply, almost apologetically: Democratic Primary.
Inside, there were two tables, one for the Republicans (closest to the door) and one for the Democrats. The lady working the Democrat table found my name in the voter registration roll and asked me to sign next to it. Only one other signature from one other voter was on the page, and it was 30 minutes until the polls closed. Still, it was nice to see that I wasn't the only one voting blue in my red district.
"If you're interesting in coming back for the caucus, it's at 7:15 tonight," the woman told me.
When I first heard about the caucuses just a few weeks ago, my reaction was the same as several million other Texans: "Really? We have caucuses? Since when?" No one I know had ever heard of them, much less attended one.
After voting, I went home, kissed my husband, hugged my son, grabbed a bite to eat, and decided to go back, because I've never seen a caucus before and I was curious. I had no idea what to do at one and I wondered if I would be the only one to show up. I walked back into the community center at exactly 7:15 to find myself in the company of 30 other people who also had no idea what to do at a caucus. Two women, Pam and Leu, stood at the front of the room and read out loud from several sheets of instructions. They had the lack of foresight to show up early, and thus wound up in charge.
"We are the temporary chair and secretary," Pam announced, pointing to herself when she said chair, and to Leu when she said secretary.
"Got that? Temporary," Leu said, "We are temporary."
"Does anyone want to be the permanent chair in secretary?" Pam asked.
The 29 people sitting in front of her were silent.
"I think you're doing a good job," a young guy with a soul patch on his chin said. The rest of the room nodded and murmured in agreement.
"Does anyone want to nominate anyone to be the permanent chair and secretary?" Pam asked, looking a little stressed.
"I nominate you," said a woman standing next off to the side, "What's your name?"
Pam introduced herself to the room. "Anyone one else want to be nominated?" No one did. Someone seconded Pam as the nominee. Pam wrote her name on the form as the permanent chair, and took down the name of the people who nominated her.
"All in favor or me being the permanent chair?" We all raised our hands. "All opposed?" We all lowered our hands. Leu ended up as the permanent secretary by the same process. So far, this seemed pretty easy.
"Okay, we get to sent 6 delegates to the district convention," Pam said.
"What's the district convention?" someone asked.
"I don't know," said Pam.
Next, we all signed our names on an official caucus sign in sheet and wrote down the name of our chosen Presidential nominee. As people filled out the forms, those of us who were done chatted.
"How often do they do this?" asked a woman behind me, who looked to be in her 60's, "I've been voting all my life, and I've never heard of this before."
"I think they do this every year," I said, "I just don't think people have ever shown up to it before."
When everyone was signed in, Pam and Leu tallied everything up.
"Okay, we have 18 in favor of Hillary Clinton, 11 in favor of Barack Obama, and two uncommitteds," Pam announced. "You have to have at least 6 people in order to form a caucus, and the uncommitteds don't have enough." She was furiously reading the instruction sheet, trying to figure out where to go from there.
"Why don't we just ask them to commit?" I asked.
"I don't know," said Pam, "I don't think that's how it works."
"That's how it worked on the caucuses I watched in other states on TV," I said, "Who are they?" The uncommitted pair was a married couple by the last name of Silva. Two more for Hillary, I thought, because all the pollsters had been announcing for weeks that the Hispanic votes were overwhelmingly going to Clinton.
"Were we supposed to write down the name of a candidate?" asked Mrs. Silva, "We're both for Obama." So much for the conventional wisdom.
Pam wrote the Silva's choices down on the sign in sheets. "Okay, 18 for Hillary, 13 for Obama." For the next half hour we wrangling over the math of how to officially divide up our 6 district delegates between our 58 and 42% divide. There were some very specific rules to how this was to be done, and it worked out that each candidate was to wind up with half of our delegates, in spite of one having a lot more votes.
"Okay," said Pam, "Now we are supposed to go to different corners and caucus. The Hillary supporters need to choose 3 delegates and 3 alternates, and the Obama supporters are supposed to be the same. Obama supporters to over there," she pointed to a corner, "and Clinton supporters go over there," she pointed to the opposite side of the room.
Pam joined those of us in Obama's corner. Leu went over to Clinton's corner.
"We need to pick 3 delegates," Pam said.
"What does a delegate do?" some asked again.
"I don't know. Attend a convention, I think," Pam said, scowling at the in instructions.
"A convention where?"
"I don't know. It doesn't say. Does anyone want to volunteer?"
We all looked around at each other. A few people took a step back away from the rest of the group.
"It's almost 8 o'clock. The Republican caucus starts in a few minutes. We need to get this figured out," Pam said. Finally, the kid with the soul patch volunteered. Then two women in their 40's did, as well. Pam wrote their names down on the back of the instructions for the caucus.
"Anyone want to be an alternate?" Pam asked.
I looked at the 3 delegates, and decided they all looked pretty healthy, so I volunteered to step in if one of them keeled over. Two other people followed suit. By this time, the people showing up for the Republican caucus were slowly filing in the room, standing off to the side and making a point to alternately stair at their watches and look at us.
"Are y'all almost done?" a man asked, "We need to set up more chairs." Apparently they were expecting more than our meager 31 souls.
"Almost," said Pam and Leu, who were gather up their paperwork and comparing notes, making sure they had done all that was required of them.
With that, we all bid each other goodnight and left, even as the gravel parking lot was filling up outside.
I went home and told my husband about how I became an alternate delegate for Barack Obama.
"What does that mean?" Jeff asked.
"I don't know," I said, "I think it means that I almost matter in this election, but only if someone else gets sick or chickens out."
"If that happens, where will you have to go?"
"I don't know. I'm hoping someone will call me with instructions. Do you think my Republican father will babysit for me if I need him to?"
"He might."
If the need arises, I think I'll tell my father that I'm going to a wild party with lots of booze and drugs. I believe he'd be happier to help me out if that were the case. Telling him I'm going to attend something for the Democratic Party will trouble him deeply and make him wonder where he went wrong.
Anyway, ladies and gentlemen, this is my lesson on how to do the Democratic Texas Two Step in a small town. If you found the whole process confusing, don't worry: it only means you're in the same boat as those of us who were there.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * # * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
I've never voted in a primary before for a couple of reasons. The first reason is because I am an Independent and don't claim either major American political party as my own. Most of the time people who belong to one of the two major parties look down their noses at Independents, viewing us as the political equivalents of sluts. In an election year, though, they all start acting like amorous sailors, cozying up to us, asking if they can buy us drinks, and letting us know that they've been admiring us from across the room of politics all night and that they've always found our unpredictability kind of exciting. I have to admit, it’s the only time in my life that I ever feel really, really desirable. This year, I went ahead and accepted the drink the Democrats offered me.
The second reason I've never voted before in a Texas primary election is because up until now, they didn't matter. Texas primaries happen so late in the year that in every election I can remember, the decision was already made before our primary even rolled around. Most people I know didn't bother with them, even those who belong to a party. This year was different. I figured that this might be the only primary in Texas during my lifetime that would ever matter, and I might regret it if I missed it, so I decided to dust off my voter registration and head to the polls.
Now, while I work in the big city of Houston, I live in an area that can accurately be described as rural. The polling place for district 13 (my lucky home district) of my county was a community center a few miles from my house, a small wood-frame building with a gravel parking lot in front. The area is very, very Republican, to the point that every last campaign sign out front was for Republican candidates. The Democrats weren't waiting time or money out in this neck of the woods. A large sign on a post on the front porch read in big black letters: Republican Primary Election Here. Beneath it, a much smaller sign with much smaller letters read simply, almost apologetically: Democratic Primary.
Inside, there were two tables, one for the Republicans (closest to the door) and one for the Democrats. The lady working the Democrat table found my name in the voter registration roll and asked me to sign next to it. Only one other signature from one other voter was on the page, and it was 30 minutes until the polls closed. Still, it was nice to see that I wasn't the only one voting blue in my red district.
"If you're interesting in coming back for the caucus, it's at 7:15 tonight," the woman told me.
When I first heard about the caucuses just a few weeks ago, my reaction was the same as several million other Texans: "Really? We have caucuses? Since when?" No one I know had ever heard of them, much less attended one.
After voting, I went home, kissed my husband, hugged my son, grabbed a bite to eat, and decided to go back, because I've never seen a caucus before and I was curious. I had no idea what to do at one and I wondered if I would be the only one to show up. I walked back into the community center at exactly 7:15 to find myself in the company of 30 other people who also had no idea what to do at a caucus. Two women, Pam and Leu, stood at the front of the room and read out loud from several sheets of instructions. They had the lack of foresight to show up early, and thus wound up in charge.
"We are the temporary chair and secretary," Pam announced, pointing to herself when she said chair, and to Leu when she said secretary.
"Got that? Temporary," Leu said, "We are temporary."
"Does anyone want to be the permanent chair in secretary?" Pam asked.
The 29 people sitting in front of her were silent.
"I think you're doing a good job," a young guy with a soul patch on his chin said. The rest of the room nodded and murmured in agreement.
"Does anyone want to nominate anyone to be the permanent chair and secretary?" Pam asked, looking a little stressed.
"I nominate you," said a woman standing next off to the side, "What's your name?"
Pam introduced herself to the room. "Anyone one else want to be nominated?" No one did. Someone seconded Pam as the nominee. Pam wrote her name on the form as the permanent chair, and took down the name of the people who nominated her.
"All in favor or me being the permanent chair?" We all raised our hands. "All opposed?" We all lowered our hands. Leu ended up as the permanent secretary by the same process. So far, this seemed pretty easy.
"Okay, we get to sent 6 delegates to the district convention," Pam said.
"What's the district convention?" someone asked.
"I don't know," said Pam.
Next, we all signed our names on an official caucus sign in sheet and wrote down the name of our chosen Presidential nominee. As people filled out the forms, those of us who were done chatted.
"How often do they do this?" asked a woman behind me, who looked to be in her 60's, "I've been voting all my life, and I've never heard of this before."
"I think they do this every year," I said, "I just don't think people have ever shown up to it before."
When everyone was signed in, Pam and Leu tallied everything up.
"Okay, we have 18 in favor of Hillary Clinton, 11 in favor of Barack Obama, and two uncommitteds," Pam announced. "You have to have at least 6 people in order to form a caucus, and the uncommitteds don't have enough." She was furiously reading the instruction sheet, trying to figure out where to go from there.
"Why don't we just ask them to commit?" I asked.
"I don't know," said Pam, "I don't think that's how it works."
"That's how it worked on the caucuses I watched in other states on TV," I said, "Who are they?" The uncommitted pair was a married couple by the last name of Silva. Two more for Hillary, I thought, because all the pollsters had been announcing for weeks that the Hispanic votes were overwhelmingly going to Clinton.
"Were we supposed to write down the name of a candidate?" asked Mrs. Silva, "We're both for Obama." So much for the conventional wisdom.
Pam wrote the Silva's choices down on the sign in sheets. "Okay, 18 for Hillary, 13 for Obama." For the next half hour we wrangling over the math of how to officially divide up our 6 district delegates between our 58 and 42% divide. There were some very specific rules to how this was to be done, and it worked out that each candidate was to wind up with half of our delegates, in spite of one having a lot more votes.
"Okay," said Pam, "Now we are supposed to go to different corners and caucus. The Hillary supporters need to choose 3 delegates and 3 alternates, and the Obama supporters are supposed to be the same. Obama supporters to over there," she pointed to a corner, "and Clinton supporters go over there," she pointed to the opposite side of the room.
Pam joined those of us in Obama's corner. Leu went over to Clinton's corner.
"We need to pick 3 delegates," Pam said.
"What does a delegate do?" some asked again.
"I don't know. Attend a convention, I think," Pam said, scowling at the in instructions.
"A convention where?"
"I don't know. It doesn't say. Does anyone want to volunteer?"
We all looked around at each other. A few people took a step back away from the rest of the group.
"It's almost 8 o'clock. The Republican caucus starts in a few minutes. We need to get this figured out," Pam said. Finally, the kid with the soul patch volunteered. Then two women in their 40's did, as well. Pam wrote their names down on the back of the instructions for the caucus.
"Anyone want to be an alternate?" Pam asked.
I looked at the 3 delegates, and decided they all looked pretty healthy, so I volunteered to step in if one of them keeled over. Two other people followed suit. By this time, the people showing up for the Republican caucus were slowly filing in the room, standing off to the side and making a point to alternately stair at their watches and look at us.
"Are y'all almost done?" a man asked, "We need to set up more chairs." Apparently they were expecting more than our meager 31 souls.
"Almost," said Pam and Leu, who were gather up their paperwork and comparing notes, making sure they had done all that was required of them.
With that, we all bid each other goodnight and left, even as the gravel parking lot was filling up outside.
I went home and told my husband about how I became an alternate delegate for Barack Obama.
"What does that mean?" Jeff asked.
"I don't know," I said, "I think it means that I almost matter in this election, but only if someone else gets sick or chickens out."
"If that happens, where will you have to go?"
"I don't know. I'm hoping someone will call me with instructions. Do you think my Republican father will babysit for me if I need him to?"
"He might."
If the need arises, I think I'll tell my father that I'm going to a wild party with lots of booze and drugs. I believe he'd be happier to help me out if that were the case. Telling him I'm going to attend something for the Democratic Party will trouble him deeply and make him wonder where he went wrong.
Anyway, ladies and gentlemen, this is my lesson on how to do the Democratic Texas Two Step in a small town. If you found the whole process confusing, don't worry: it only means you're in the same boat as those of us who were there.
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no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 08:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 08:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 08:55 pm (UTC)Seriously. Think about the HUGE consequences of these decisions.
Would you let someone step into the cockpit of a jumbo-jet and pilot it without any clue of how it works? Would you let someone perform brain surgery, on just one single person, without any idea of what they are doing? Would you let someone launch a rocket into outer space without some rudimentary knowledge of the procedures and the consequences?
Yet we allow people to blindly walk into a polling place with ABSOLUTELY NO CLUE, get nominated as chairs or some sort or another, take votes, guess about the official procedures, assume that *someone* needs to be a delegate - even though no one knows what that means - and that this process can actually have an impact not only on the leadership of this great nation, but can and WILL have a significant influence on the course of the world.
That thought scares the ever-loving hell out of me. In fact, it disgusts me to the point of making me sick to my stomach.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:17 pm (UTC)This isn't about the US political system, it's about the strange and confusing rules of the Texas political system. The other 49 states aren't this bizarre.
Before this election, neither party ever talked about these caucuses. They were for the hard-core party members who run things behind the scenes. I've voted in every election for the past 20 years, and never heard of them before. My high school government class never mentioned them, nor my college poli-sci class. The press never mentioned them either.
Trust me, this was a room full of fairly to very bright people. We had 45 minutes to figure out 2 hours worth of very arcane instructions, and under the circumstances, we muddled through pretty well.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:20 pm (UTC)The temporary chairs got roped into the jobs; I think they did their best.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:22 pm (UTC)I'm still not sure what my job as an alternate delegate is, though.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-08 05:47 am (UTC)This was the first time I ever attended a party caucus and I've been voting for 40 years.
BTW - I volunteered to be a delegate for Hillary.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-08 02:50 pm (UTC)I'm kind of looking forward to the District Convention. For all the chaos, the caucus was kind of fun, in a wonky sort of way. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 09:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 10:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-05 10:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-06 04:29 am (UTC)Oh dear god, no, they didn't - at least, not here in my precinct in Austin. Imagine, instead of about 30 people with no clue what's going on, you have about 250. It was impossible to hear anything, and by the time my husband and I had signed in, we'd been there for about an hour and a half. After that, we decided neither one of us was
stupidnaiveresponsible enough to serve as a delegate, so we left. The permanent chair (who was also the temporary chair, and was, in fact, quite knowledgeable about the whole process) said we could, so we did.According to her, as an alternate, you can also go the the happy fun county convention (I think it was county...but don't quote me on that), and apply for one of the extra "at large" spots. They have a few of those slots available, and all the alternates are eligible, but only a few are chosen.
*shrug* Best part of the evening was taking Max with us; he barely made a peep the whole time, and had an entire room of people to charm. ;)
no subject
Date: 2008-03-06 02:48 pm (UTC)This double system has been in place for 20 years (I learned on the radio this morning), but before this, only the local party officials ever showed up, and sometimes not even they did. In my precinct, we had an envelope with instructions and sign in sheets, but no one from the party who had ever done this before. I'm willing to bet that the Montgomery County democratic party has fewer members than the county has precincts.
The only reason we weren't there until after midnight was because the Republicans had the room after us (for what, I don't know), and we had a 45 minute time span to figure things out and get out of there.
It was actually kind of fun. I won't mind going to the local convention, provided someone contacts me and tells me when and where I'm supposed to be.
You probably know this by now
Date: 2008-03-08 05:53 am (UTC)The difference is that, since about 1976, Democrats elect additional delegates at the caucuses. It usually doesn't matter because usually all candidates, but one have dropped out be the Texas elections.
Re: You probably know this by now
Date: 2008-03-08 02:58 pm (UTC)This year, there are surprises, and run off elections in some of the closer races. A lot more people are interested in the process, because our votes matter for the first time. This is how a democracy is supposed to work!
I'll babysit...
Date: 2008-03-07 05:50 pm (UTC)Re: I'll babysit...
Date: 2008-03-07 07:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-07 11:22 pm (UTC)MWAHH!! Too funny!
I, too, am registered independent...a fact that grieves my parents no end. They are registered democrats...simply because THEIR parents were, and apparently That's the Way It's Always Been Done.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-08 02:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-13 01:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-13 08:46 pm (UTC)Most states have one or the other. In Texas for the Democratic party, 2/3 of the state delegates are chosen in a general election, and the other third is chosen by caucus. Since voting with a ballot doesn't disqualify you from voting in the caucus as well, it means that you can legally vote twice for the same person.
But that's probably more than you wanted to know.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-14 12:08 pm (UTC)not at all... it was very helpful! thank you! :)....
and that really may not be fair, the whole "being able to vote twice" thing... hehehe no wonder so many people in this world dont trust politics
no subject
Date: 2008-03-14 02:03 pm (UTC)