[Assam] Caucusing In Texas

[Ram Sarangapani]

Very few people in Texas have voted in the primaries and much less in the
Democratic primaries.
And boy, was it an experience.

For those who are not familiar with the process, Texas has, what they call,
a "two-step' process for the Democrats. The Republican, don't go thru that
process in the Primaries - its the regular 'vote your candidate' process.

The first part is to vote for the particular Democratic Party candidate ,
and a certain number of 'committed delegates' are given proportionally to
the the candidates.

The second part is what is called the "Caucus". Now, this is easier said
than explained. But basically, from what I understand:
After the last person in line (at 7 PM) has voted, the Caucus begin. In the
Caucus, people are supposed to 'influence and cajole' voters who don't
support your candidate, form a goup and elect delegates to the State/Central
convention who will, in turn represent your candidate and cast their ballots
in his/favor.

Confused? Well, so am I, and everyone I know is too.

What really happened: from start to finish - it took about 5 hours. There
were just 6 machines, 3 people to register, and a bunch of other volunteers
giving you wrong information from time to time.

But we did get to vote, and then stood in line for caucusing (if thats a
word). After an eternity, they basically told us to separate into lines (one
for Hillary and the other for Obama). The Hillary line had only a few
people, the Obama line was long in the precinct we voted. In the Caucusing
part, we had to write our names/address etc on a form. Thats it.

There was no 'caucusing' in the cacus. They could have just cut to the
chase, and kept a form next to the ballot machines and people could have
done the same thing.

On the whole, it was fun, and exciting to have taken part in a process that
certainly seems important..

Hope y'all enjoyed this.

Well, that much for politics - at least as its done in Texas.

--Ram