it was entertaining as a matter of sociology and people-watching, but definitely felt like a failed experiment. my friend told me that in her precinct in vegas, in spite of a higher mathematical number of delegates (out of nine) for obama (ie, 4.7 vs 4.3), they each rounded to 4 and then picked a CARD to choose the 9th delegate: 4 for O, 5 for clinton. she said: "Why were they stupid enough to give Nevada a vote? It came down to picking cards!"

and muslim rumors, apparently.

I'm pretty sure they were supposed to round up, so if that's true, that was against the rules.

looks like reno went obama, perhaps: http://news.rgj.com//apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080119/NEWS19/80119034

Which do you have a bigger problem with, that Clinton people would stoop to spreading false rumors in order to get elected, or that people would be stolidly against voting for any Muslim?

In other news, Ron Paul is in second place! Nevada's voting in all sorts of crazy directions.

If Hillary wins, then I've got a chance at Bloomby '08. Even if Barack-O tanks, I've still got strong hopes for the future.

CNN showed an entrance poll stat that the breakdown for Hispanic voters was something like Clinton 65, Obama 20, Edwards 15. In Nevada, that's big trouble for the big O.

I have a bigger problem with the first.

disinformation is depressing in and of itself.

mis-, rather

I'm the one who witnessed the fact that, like everything else here, it all came down to cards. 120 people showed up. It was something like 56/53 Obama/Clinton although we were confused because it was 50/52 O/C for the first round and I think more than 6 people (including me) joined the Obama camp on round 2. Anyhow, the guy in charge added his vote to Hilary's camp at the end. After calculations, we each got 4 delegates and the Clinton picked a card from the Clinton-voting guy in charge (she picked first). It was a king so Clinton got 5 delegates and Obama got 4 even though more people voted for Obama.

Yuk.

The people running the show were ALL Clinton supporters --

friend in vegas, that was definitely against the rules. i suggest you contact the democratic party and report it, even if Clinton has already won the state.

Thanks for the live reports, Marco and Flea. Sounds upsetting though--so much for Martin Luther King's weekend of peace and understanding. Marco knows the vibe at my school and many of the black educators/parents I know think the US is not ready for Obama. They're actually afraid for what it will bring to light and that he'll be judged only as a black and a Muslim--not to say they won't vote for him.

Did I mention before that my 6th grade students literally did not know it was legally possible for a black or a woman to be president? Since kids learn by patterns, white old male x 43 didn't leave much room for anyone else in their minds.

So I'm excited by the possibilities of "firsts", just hate to see them get muttered in anything but the issues or for the population to get distracted from our international mess.

This may be classist, but I think the Clinton misinformation campaign is worse because all of those people are extremely well educated. They must realize that they are doing things that are ethically wrong, if not also legally. When it comes to ordinary people's racism/religion-ism, I just sort of sigh and assume they haven't been exposed to many minorities.

It is, however, cheering to see that this election is opening Annie's students minds a little.

I think it's more likely a black man could be voted than a woman, but that's beside the point.

I called the Dem party -- not answering -- and the Obama people.

Ah, yes. Not surprised after participating in the Idaho
Caucus four years ago that you came away disappointed and disillusioned with the caucus in Nevada-- it really does seem like a fool hardy way to elect someone: wrought with logistical problems, disenfranchising to those who cannot come at the right time, and depressing to see how other people act like sheep and come in so uninformed. Well, as an Obama fan it's time to look forward to South Carolina, and hope that the Clinton distortion/win-at-all costs machine can be stopped. Otherwise, a SC loss would almost ensure a Clinton victory I think... John Edwards' poor showing makes him a non-factor at this point.

Cards? Couldn't they have used a better 0/1 selection strategy? Like how about a roulette wheel -- that way they could be cute and go O if it's black and C if it's red (that's only half-cute unless you say like red is for period blood, which is dumb and gross). If it came up green they would randomly give it to Kucinich or something.

Or, how about they, you know, FLIP A COIN like everyone else does when they have to decide between exactly two things? Why cards? How many cards were there? Did they pick until they got a queen or king? Crazy.

Wow, Jon. That's one comment that hopefully *won't* be featured in a magazine.

I'm actually hoping Wired starts a monthly feature where they run one quote of mine from your blog. You hear that, Wired editors combing this blog? I'll give you gold! It'll be like EW's Shaw Report, but potentially more offensive!

Wired: Jon May
Tired: Jon Stewart
Expired: JonBenet Ramsey

i don't understand "those Muslim e-mails."

what did they say? who got them? who sent them?

leum: http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/muslim.asp

Hmm, there are some reports floating around of bad and potentially rule-breaking behavior of Clinton supporters around the state:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/19/162953/644/790/439573
http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/01/obama_manager_accus...

I didn't see anything like this at my caucus location, but the Clinton supporters were definitely far more aggressive and rude than those for Obama and Edwards. I doubt it would've made any difference, but it certainly raises some questions about how the Clinton campaign is being run.

It's too bad you didn't see any of this stuff, I'd be curious to know exactly how accurate the report was. I tend to think that people who are heavily invested in things like this overreact to some situations.

Some of the stuff from DailyKos seem like honest mistakes (closing the doors early), some seem perfectly fine (the daughter dragging the father who won't speak up for himself into the Clinton camp... that's what's going to happen in caucuses) some of it is amusing (out-of-towners voting not being prohibited because you can't ID them... that's an issue dems are always behind!) and some of it seems pretty damned slimy (people outside the doors telling voters that the room was only for Clinton delegates). I'm curious how much is real, how much is imagined and how much is exaggerated.

We need to get the parties out of primary elections. They should be run by the state in the exact same fashion as the generals.