An Argument in Favor of the Caucus Portion of the Texas Primaries [View All]

[thevoiceofreason]

Ok Ok. We've sat through the weeks and weeks of everyone and their dog trashing Texas and our "Texas two-step." And, without a doubt, the system needs some serious attention, especially in light of the difficulties that come along with the unprecedented participation. But the cacophony screaming for the end of our system misses the mark.

The precinct conventions on March 4 were chaotic. But here is the point. We stuck together and hung out. For hours and hours. In a primary that is voting only, that doesn't happen. You come in, vote, then leave. No contact. No interaction (unless you come back and blog on DU bitching about the other candidate and their tacky supporters). Another thing - you know what else happens at the precinct conventions? You sign in. Almost everyone writes in their phone numbers. And e-mail addresses.

Next come the weeks before the state senate/county conventions. What happens here? In many many/most cases (like ours), we have a copy of the sign in sheets. We call the participants -- especially the delegates to the senate convention. We e-mail them. My wife and I hosted events for the delegates. WE GOT TO KNOW EACH OTHER. And in our pretty damn red, well-to-do precinct in West Houston, we built a democratic organization, based on friendship and dedication to a cause! More than half of the folks we contacted and who are part of this network were only "reachable" by cell phone and email, which we were only able to get through the precinct caucus sign in. Before this -- no organization whatsoever.

Next came the senate convention. Our entire precinct, which was pretty evenly split, stayed for about 10 hours. Everyone was adamant in their support of their candidate, but we all talked. We got along. And we agreed, to a person, that our precinct would shake the earth this fall by going blue (OK, maybe bluer).

And this is my point. The caucus side of the Texas prima-caucus is an exercise in party building. I am my precinct chairman. I now have a working list of phone numbers and e-mails of over 100 committed democrats in my precinct. About half of them were involved in one form or another in the activities AFTER the precinct caucuses. This is how you build a party.

Are there issues we face? Yes. We have to streamline the credentialing process. We have to have more resources from the state (we are, in part, at the mercy of what the state (R) sends us for our elections). We have to build the base of county volunteers so we can get things done more quickly. But there is a lot of good going on here.

As a final note, I can't help but overlay what I've seen with some history and the complaints about this process that I hear from the Clinton camp. A common complaint I remember from the 1992-2000 timeframe was that it was all about the Clintons and little help or enthusiasm worked its way downstream to local and state parties and candidates. In Texas, in 1994, we lost our democratic strength statewide and haven't recovered yet. Local organization and strength has diminished (until this year). That is why I dislike the Clinton's attack of our system insofar as this is the best way I'm aware of to build our party from the ground up. Deep down, Texas is not the state of George Bush. It;s the state of Willie Nelson. Let us return to our roots.