- OBJECT. The object of the game is to gather with your neighbors in an airless church basement in order to select party candidates for President of the United States, causing those candidates with the smallest percentage of votes to drop out of the race before any state primaries.
- PREPARATION. Each candidate spends countless dollars and time pressing the flesh with each of the state’s 2,982,085 residents.
- EQUIPMENT. Each game piece represents a candidate. To begin, hold the plastic candidate in one hand while tearing away its known ideals along the perforated edge, and then stick a rod up the candidate’s arse to maintain its position.
The colorful game board is divided into several Iowa state industries—pork production, corn production, egg production, and John Deere production—from Cedar Rapids to Council Bluffs. Unlike the more popular Primary Election Game, there are no ballots or voting machines.
The all-white game cards represent Iowa’s citizenry.
- PLAYERS. Ages 17 & up (assuming the player will be 18 by the National Election day), a U.S. Citizen, and a resident of Iowa within the caucus precinct. Each player must be registered with a party in order to vote, although the participant can register at the caucus, or change their party affiliation at the caucus.
- PLAY. The game began this past Tuesday January 3rd at 7 pm when caucus doors shut tight against latecomers. The Republicans and Democrats approach their caucus rules in different ways.
The Republican players write the name of their preferred candidate on a blank piece of paper that is then tabulated at each caucus precinct and transmitted to the media.
The Democratic players use a more complicated caucus process. Because they can. These players show support for a particular candidate by standing in a designated area. For thirty minutes, players move around the room trying to convince their neighbors to support their chosen candidate. After thirty minutes the supporters for each candidate are counted, and only the Viable Candidates (those receiving at least 15% of the attendee vote) can move forward to the next round.
Then the clock is set for an additional thirty minutes so the supporters of non-viable candidates can realign with a viable candidate.
In the final round a democratic head count is conducted and the results are reported to the state party, who in turn counts the number of apportioned delegates and reports the results to the media.
- GAME OVER. Play ceases when the candidates point their luxury buses toward New Hampshire. Iowa who?
Dear Bossy – Is this game available in stores? And can it be used to vote people off the island?
Bossy has done it again! Better than Phoenix online univ!
You forgot to mention the magical Lobbyist card…..or should I say the thousands of magical Lobbyist cards.
Oy vey! Voting in the states is crazy complicated!!
I hit the democratic caucus here in Nevada last time around (they asked me to show up again in a few weeks) and it was the same; stand around in groups, then count, then move around and stand some more. Very exciting.
this election is making me dumber. It’s actually taking the few viable brain cells that I have left in my head and squeezing them until they pop. it’s unnerving. I’ll soon be reduced to a drooling madwoman whose only utterance is a vehement BLAH BLAH BLAH shut UP whenever a codgy old white republican’s face takes over the screen. in other words, it will be a permanent condition.
It’s easier here in Canada. On Election Day, Olivia just drives up to her Community Centre, hides behind a piece of cardboard, looks at her “ballot”, goes “Eeny, meeny, miney moe ” and puts X on Moe. Or Eeny, or wherever her pencil stopped.
Provided Olivia even remembered it was Election Day . . .
Oh, how I’ve missed these enlightening Bossy Tutorials!
Thanks for explaining the whole Iowa Caucus thing. I never really got it until I read this enlightening post. Well done.
Thank you Iowa for making BatshitcrazyBachmann go away.
I couldn’t agree more with Little MIss Sunshine States comment. Ugh! I couldn’t stand Bachmann!
Wait. Are we still talking about Bossy’s root canal?
Picking Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum does not make me trust Iowa’s ability to pick leaders.
@Olivia in Canada: Election Day is a TOTALLY DIFFERENT animal than CAUCUS DAY(S) here in the States. Election Day mirrors our neighbors’ to the North.
Caucus Day is where the names that will clog up our tvs, newspapers, radios, phones and internetz for the next 9 months will occure BEFORE Election Day. It’s like an STD that feels like it will never end.
I couldn’t figure out why the Democrats were at the Iowa’s caucus. Maybe they were gathering intel or something…I really don’t think there was a lot of intel around, but you know. It could happen I guess.
That’s what Olivia meant, Gail. We don’t have to do the 3-2-1- year lead-up to Election Day – we just do Election Day. There’s a bit of dancing and handshaking beforehand but most of us ignore it – including the media 🙂
(And, um, we don’t have any chads – hanging or otherwise. Just tiny scraps of paper . . . )
I think I am moving to Canada. I like the food, people, and the no hanging Chads, Bills, Bobs etc.
I’m packing the U-haul and heading north! (I knew I should have stayed there after my honeymoon!)
a) Amber Star, you made me LOL at my computer.
b) So there are no primaries in Canada? How do the parties decide who’s going to run? Or are there just more candidates on the final ballot?
Bossy, I think you should travel to Canada and investigate, then report back!
c) Bossy, “the all-white game cards represent Iowa’s citizenry” — True that.
Even though Olivia lives in Canada she ALSO thinks that Bossy should travel up here and report back. What DO we do? Olivia would like to know as well.
Olivia knows for sure that there are no primaries because the only time she has heard the word “primary”, it is referring to school. Other than that, she has no clue what a primary is???
We operate on a parliamentary system (we are, after all, pseudo-Brits. We even have a “stand-in” monarch – the Governor General – although s/he is trumped by the real monarch who, technically speaking, has no power at all). The Prime Minister (head of the country) is the leader of the party that gets the most votes. The “leader” is voted in by a party convention – but it is a one-off, low key affair, and, unlike the president, he can remain the leader forever and a day, much to our horror.
Bossy – please DO come up and explain our system to us all!! Now Olivia is totally confused by all of this and thinks we should all just go back to kings and queens who run the whole show.
huh, eh!! this is so confusing to this Canadian eh?!?!?!
You may be happy to know that this former Iowa girl (now of the Batshitcrazy Bachmann Minnesota) dubbed the event “The Hawkeye Caucai.”
Because that’s what I do with politics. Make them fun.