Obama & Huckabee Win Iowa Caucuses

The caucuses have convened and the 2008 Presidential Race is off and running. I watched C-SPAN coverage of the Iowa Caucuses this evening with my wife. I was surprised to find out that the Democratic caucus is run differently from the Republican caucus: both do elect delegates to their county and district conventions, but the manner that they do it are quite different.

Democratic Caucus:
All of the attendees gather in a room and at a given signal, everyone breaks off into groups of support for individual candidates: Obama people at the front of the room, Clinton folk back by the water fountain, and Edwards supporters by the double doors. Any group that lacks viability (less than 15% of the caucus attendees) must join a group for another candidate.

This evening, neither Joseph Biden's nor Christopher Dodd's groups were viable at the caucus I was watching, their supporters then moved to support other candidates.

There is a count of each group and then the number of delegates are assigned based on a percentage of supporters for each candidate.

At the caucus I watched on C-SPAN, Obama received 3 delegates, Edwards received 2 delegates, and Clinton received 1 delegate. These delegates go to the county convention in a few weeks.

Republican Caucus:
The attendees write the name of their candidate on a piece of paper and then the caucus organizers count up the votes that each candidate receives. The delegates are then apportioned based on the percentage of votes. There is no viability test at the Republican caucus.

At the caucus broadcast by C-SPAN, it was a close race between Huckabee and Romney; I was surprised but there was very little support for Guiliani.


All of the news services (AP, CNN, NY Times, AJC) are reporting that Democrat Barack Obama (with 37%) and Republican Mike Huckabee (with 34%) have won the Iowa caucuses.

Enjoy Barack Obama's Victory Speech here.

The evening's surprise is third place Clinton's near tie with second place John Edwards, and Guiliani (4%) coming in a distant sixth place behind Romney, Thompson, McCain, and Ron Paul. Biden and Dodd should call it quits on the Democratic side as their candidacies have gotten little to no national attention. On the Republican side, it is still a muddled race and I can see most of their candidates forging on until Super Tuesday in early February.

BLOG UPDATE (01/04/2008): The New York Times reports that both Biden and Dodd have abandoned their campaigns for the Democratic nomination for US President. plezWorld predicted this move a few hours ago based on the low appeal of their candidacies with the caucus attendees ... damn, I'm good!