My Personal Account of a GOP Precinct Caucus in Colorado

[Kelvin]

I'm in Colorado, and I participated in my precinct caucus.

First there was a straw poll:

Paul 11
Mitt 15
Grinch 10
Sanatorium 29

After which many people LEFT!     There was NO trickery involved (e.g. "you are free to go now, but if you want to stay while we conduct other party business, you are welcome to" or adorning to another room to select delegates or the like).  If they wanted to have any direct input into the process, they should have stayed and voted on the delegates.   

As it was, all they accomplished was to express their preferences to those of us who stayed the extra hour and a half to actually elect the delegates.  In fact, only people who were running for or voting for delegate positions were required to show ID!  So anyone could have voted in the straw poll! So I felt free to give the straw poll results the same weight as I would the opinions of several people off the street who told me whom they support, but wouldn't actually make the effort to vote! 

During the short speeches which followed, I adopted a stealth strategy -  I Didn't "come out" for Ron Paul.  I just confessed my past apathy, expressed recognition of impending economic collapse, personal awakening and the end to apathy, determination to defeat O'bama, and promised to go the distance.  That means to FL (in August!) if necessary.  There was no requirement to or even pressure to commit to any candidate.  So as it stands, the delegates have not committed to any candidate and free to vote based on their judgment after considering all the facts and their personal belief about who would be the best choice for our country.  Sort of like a jury is supposed to be, I guess.  After all, if the intent was that the delegates were to follow the straw poll, there would be no need for delegates- we would just take the straw poll, and divvy up the delegates proportionally, and be done with it.

Enough with justifying my actions.     I won a state delegate slot. 

There were 10 delegates and 10 alternate slots for County (which then send delegates to state), and 4 delegates and 4 alternates elected directly to state.  My Precinct filled all 10 county slots and 5 of the alternates, and all 4 state delegates and 2 alternates.

My area is extremely socially conservative.  So much so that at caucus training, we were advised that the best strategy was not to blatantly come out for Dr. Paul, but to parrot the aspects of the generic party line that we felt passionate about.  I followed the strategy, but several other people did not.  They made short speeches expressing their preference for Dr. Paul.  So other "stealth" RP supporters should have also gotten delegate slots.

To sum up:

Paul got AT LEAST 20% county delegates, 20% county alternates, and 25% of the state delegates.

I know this because they all (except myself) did speeches which identified themselves as RP supporters.  I consider it highly likely that others Ron Paul supporters got delegate in stealth mode, like I did.  Being a Delegate is not a fun job.  Going to county means taking a day off (paying) work, and going to state means taking off even more.  And it probably sucks.  Somehow, I suspect that Ron Paul supporters are more likely to make this sacrifice than the other candidate's supporters.  Plus, chances are, if any delegates fail to show up and are replaced by alternates, those replacements are also more likely to be Ron Paul delegates.  This is because RP delegates will be there for sure to take their places, and RP delegates are also the most likely to show up for the next level caucus, no matter what. 

So the actual electoral influence gained by Ron Paul as a result of the caucus was significantly greater than what most people would conclude from projections based on the straw poll results.  I'm not claiming that Dr. Paul won the majority of the delegates, but it's a fact that for purposes of choosing the nominee, he did far better than was reported.

Here is more info on the campaign's strategy, featuring Doug Wead, an adviser for the Ron Paul 2012 Campaign:

http://www.dailypaul.com/212952/alert-doug-wead-on-rachel-maddow-msnbc-9pm-et-tonight

-Kelvin

[One two three]

Good work!  I noticed that things were different in NV.  In NV, delegates are selected and than people vote for the Republican to represent the state.  I watched a few caucuses in Maine and things were different in ME, also.  Pretty much everyone stayed the entire time in ME as the Republican presidential straw poll was one of the last things done.

I disagree on how fun it is to go to the state convention.  Voting on the CO GOP Platform sounds like a ton of fun

As for the stealth strategy, that's likely how the campaign staff are teaching it in a bunch of states.  I noticed similar things in NV.

I saw the Ron Paul press release that mentioned how things went in CO.

http://www.ronpaul2012.com/2012/02/08/ron-paul-winning-the-battle-for-delegates/

"“We are confident in gaining a much larger share of delegates than even our impressive showing yesterday indicates. As an example of our campaign’s delegate strength, take a look at what has occurred in Colorado:

In one precinct in Larimer County, the straw poll vote was 23 for Santorum, 13 for Paul, 5 for Romney, 2 for Gingrich.  There were 13 delegate slots, and Ron Paul got ALL 13.

In a precinct in Delta County the vote was 22 for Santorum, 12 for Romney, 8 for Paul, 7 for Gingrich. There were 5 delegate slots, and ALL 5 went to Ron Paul.

In a Pueblo County precinct, the vote was 16 for Santorum, 11 for Romney, 3 for Gingrich and 2 for Paul. There were 2 delegate slots filled, and both were filled by Ron Paul supporters."