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This is my first Presidential election cycle here. What to expect? An all-nighter like Iowa, where I would have had to pick another corner if my candidate wasn't "viable"? (As it turned out, I needn't have worried about that! :bounce: )
The last thing I was expecting as I rounded the corner and headed to the caucus site: a line! The last time I had to wait in line to vote was back in New Haven in 1992. The losing candidate was named George Bush.
For some reason there was a Kerry sign right at the entrance to the site. This was not a true election, but a Democratic Party event, so it wasn't technically electioneering -- but the guy two places behind me grumbled about it out loud.
At the top of the stairs (hello? Wheelchair access, anyone?) we were divided by precinct. Thanks to redistricting, the First Precinct is now about evenly divided between crappy, overpriced apartments (me) -- and one of the wealthiest, old-line neighborhoods in Honolulu! Thus, my precinct chair turned out to be a well-known figure in Hawai'i Democratic politics, whose father had served in Congress.
What it turned out to be was an old-fashioned precinct meeting, with the Presidential preference poll at the end. One by one, willing volunteers for precinct offices of secretary, treasurer, vice-chair and chair were teased out, and elected by acclamation. Then came time to select our delegates to the state convention.
First to announce for delegate: the precinct chair's son, a senior at prestigious Punahou School. The tradition lives on, plus we get some fresh blood in the party! Next, our neighborhood board chair, who came fairly close to knocking off his new, redistricted City Councilmember last time out.
What's this? Are there enough volunteers to fill out the slate of three delegates plus three alternates? No? Into the breach, KamaAina, though I knew not a soul in the entire room.
Oh, dear. Our living link to the past has now cajoled several other people to join the race. He has, however, offered me an out: the chance to contest the alternate slots directly.
The precinct chair's son, neighborhood board chair, and another party activist are duly elected as delegates. Here's where things get ugly: the two defeated candidates are now allowed to drop down to run for the alternate slots! At this point the "KamaMentum" is pretty much curled up in a ball by the side of the road.
What ensued was an electoral defeat of Liebermanesque proportions. After the dust had settled, only one alternate slot remained; it went to a professor of sustainability (!) at nearby UH. I did, however, manage to pull the same number of votes as one of the major Presidential candidates...
The poll itself was nearly anticlimactic. Old-fashioned paper ballots were handed out with checkboxes next to each candidate's name (except Sharpton, who did not file here) and "Uncommitted". The advantage to this system over that of Diebold et al. is that you actually get to stand there and watch them being counted. I looked down for my candidate's pile -- and was astonished to find it nearly the size of Kerry's! Well, I figured, this precinct does have a large student population: maybe he'll still get his 15% and some delegates.
The tally: Kerry 19, Kucinich 14, Edwards 7, Dean 3, Uncommitted 1, Clark 0, Lieberman 0. As it happened, this was fairly representative of the staewide results, with Kerry at 46-47%, Kucinich at 30 (!!!), Edwards at 13, and Dean at 9. (Congressional Rep. Neil Abercrombie, an early Dean supporter, had urged Dean voters to try to get him some delegates.)
How about that! I may be a big, fat loser, but I got as many votes as John Edwards.
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