LIVE CAUCUS BLOG: First score

DES MOINES -- With 554 voters divided into groups around the school gym, here's the count of supporters of each candidate:


Obama: 231

Clinton: 103

Edwards: 103

Richardson: 38

Biden: 46

Dodd: 3

Kucinich: 13

Gravel: 1

Uncommitted: 16

The top three candidates are "viable." No one else is. Not the "realignment" or wooing period starts.



Now the fun starts.

LIVE CAUCUS BLOG: Here we go

DES MOINES -- The caucus in Precinct 70, Des Moines' largest, has officially begun. The chairman has called things to order (and passed around an envelop for contributions to offset the costs). Now they're counting people the old-fashioned way: having people count off.

The unofficial count: 623. In 2004 there were 360.

And that doesn't count the dozens of kids sitting on the floor in a corner of the gym.

Overheard from a John Edwards caucus leader: Obama has a LOT of people here.

LIVE CAUCUS BLOG: Edwards camp gathers

DES MOINES -- Leslie Pomerantz staked her place in the first row of the bleachers here at the gym. She came equipped with a John Edwards poster, buttons, stickers and a list of 150 names of supporters she expects to show up.

Pomerantz, a 64-year-old retired teacher, is Edwards' precinct co-captain. You wouldn't mistake her. She's got a half-dozen Edwards buttons plastered to her black sweater, including one of Edwards as Superman. Forty minutes before the caucus kicks off, a handful of other Edwards fans gather around her.

When Pomerantz was a teenager, she worked for John Kennedy's campaign. Now she compares the two.

"He just made you feel optimistic," she said of JFK. "I have not felt that until John Edwards."

LIVE CAUCUS BLOG: C Minus 90

DES MOINES -- The activity is picking up at Merrill Middle School, site of at least three precinct caucuses tonight. Volunteers in Precinct 70 have set up chairs in the gym ("Home of the Mustangs"). A CNN camera stands ready in the corner. A handful of Clinton supporters have staked out turf in the bleachers, marking it with a tall 'Hillary' signboard.

The action starts in a little less than 90 minutes. In 2004, this precinct had 360 caucus goers, second highest in the state, according to Sally Troxell, whose husband is the caucus chair. This time she's betting -- literally -- on even more.

"I'm guessing 650," she says in the hallway, where registration tables are being set up.

She's in a pool with a few other volunteers. So far the highest estimate is 735.

Riding on the outcome? A dime prize.

Edwards: Stretching presidential power?

When it comes to health care, John Edwards is promising to play hardball with members of Congress. The problem is, they might not play.

The former N.C. senator launched a new ad Tuesday in Iowa, where he's locked in battle with Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama with barely seven weeks to go before the state's crucial caucuses.

“When I’m president," he says in the ad, "I’m going to say to members of Congress and members of my administration, including my Cabinet: I’m glad that you have health care coverage and your family has health care coverage. But if you don’t pass universal health care by July of 2009 — in six months — I’m going to use my power as president to take your health care away from you. There’s no excuse for politicians in Washington having health care when you don’t have health care."

Clinton's campaign called the proposal "unconstitutional."

"That's not the way we're going to get universal health care in America," spokesman Phil Singer said. "We'll get universal health care by electing someone who has the strength and experience to actually get it done -- Hillary Clinton."

Edwards' campaign, which has been upping its attacks on Clinton, gleefully responded by saying, "she defends health care for politicians while millions of Americans and their families go without care."

But how would Edwards take away congressional health care? After all, he can't do it by executive order.

A spokesman said a President Edwards would have legislation introduced and, in effect, dare Congress not to pass it.

"If any member of Congress wants to argue that they should have health care while the American people don't, he should find a new line of work," said spokesman Eric Schultz. "When he’s president, John Edwards is going to demand accountability from Congress and he’s going to get it."

As for the constitutionality, Schultz cited the opinion of University of Chicago law professor Cass Sunstein, an Obama adviser quoted in a Politico blog.

"If legislation is introduced and Congress enacts it, that's fine,"
Schultz quoted Sunstein saying.

But Sunstein went on to call the Edwards' plan "a stunt."

"Congress isn’t going to enact legislation taking away its own health care," he said.

Democracy, Iowa style

Pat Minor sat in a sun-drenched park in Anamosa Iowa Saturday, a few feet from John Edwards. It was the third meeting of the day with Iowa voters for the Democratic presidential candidate. But not his first with Pat Minor.

At the gathering of about 150 people, the 55-year-old bookstore clerk asked Edwards whether, as president, he would invite the Palestinians' elected Hamas government to the negotiating table. Not until it recognizes Israel and renounces violence, he replied. Then Edwards complimented his questioner.

"You do a thoughtful job of bringing this up everytime I see you," he said.

Minor has talked to Edwards about the Palestinians four times this year. Earlier this month, she got a chance to ask former President Clinton, campaigning with his wife Hillary. That's how it goes in Iowa. It's an old saw, but a lot of Iowans won't decide who they'll caucus for in January until they can look a candidate in the eye, kicking the tires before they buy.

"It's always up close and personal," said teacher Connie McKean.

With their January caucuses, Iowa voters get the first say on the 2008 presidential race. And they take thier role seriously. Almost 400 showed up to hear Edwards in Fort Dodge Thursday night. Other crowds swelled appearances in smaller towns on Friday and Saturday. Clinton and Obama have drawn even more.

People who show up ask nuanced questions about returning veterans, energy policy, health care and other issues.

"Your voter out here is a savvy voter," said Mike Robinson, chair of the Linn County Democratic Party in Cedar Rapids.

In North Carolina, the presidential race is still an abstract issue for a lot of voters. If candidates pop in at all, it's usually to raise money or change planes. Here, amid the cornfields, politics counts. Voters aren't the only ones who know it.

"You actually get to look us in the eye and judge who deserved to be president of the United States," Edwards said in Anamosa.

Fields of Dreams

Yesterday our three-van caravan sped through north-central Iowa past miles of corn and soybeans. The land is basically flat, which made the steel windmills loom like giant towers on the horizon, their blades turning lazily in the breeze. The wind farms out here are expansive and seem to stretch on forever. Like the corn.

It was probably as fitting a place as any for John Edwards to lay out his latest plan, for "green-collar" jobs. Those would be part of a plan to reduce America's dependence on fossil fuel and create jobs along with a new energy economy. Edwards is doing his part. He rode in a Ford van, not the SUV he routinely drove around in four years ago.

The green economy was the subject of the speech he gave at five stops. It was a short speech. Five minutes and then Q&A. Iowans seem to like that.

The Edwards campaign knows a photo op when they see it. The last stop, just outside Webster City, was smack up against a corn field. Rows of head-high corn stretched out behind Edwards as he spoke to about 150 people just before dusk. Red, white and blue bunting hung over a barbed wire fence between him and the corn. Photographers had a literal field day. If you pose it, they will come.

At one point, there was some rustling in the corn. Edwards seemed startled. "Somebody's walking around in the corn," he said. A photographer pushed her way past the corn, cameras strapped around her neck "I'm glad those are cameras in your hands and not guns," Edwards said.

Edwards has visited Iowa a couple dozen times, and been to almost if not all its 99 counties. I guess that's why he forgot a little of North Carolina's. In Humboldt, a woman prefaced a question telling him she was from North Carolina.

Where, he asked.

New Bern, she said.

“New Bern – Carteret County,” Edwards replied.

New Bern is actually in Craven County.