Less than 1700 precincts in a state and they can't get results to a singular location in less than 2 days? In 2020? Amazon now offers same day delivery on some items. Think about that. The country would have been better off if Iowa used paper ballots and delivered them via horseback. What an embarrassment.
5
Today's related article, "Key to Democrats' Digital Push: Untested and Hastily Built App" reveals the problem in paragraph 5 : "Given less than two months to build an app for reporting caucus results..." Two months?
That tells you the real problem here: the all-too common, destructive "procurement process."
Let's guess what the process looked like: A semi-subject-familiar selection committee put out a non-specific RFP, reviewed the lowest bidders in detail, and then dithered about making a decision until 60 days were left to pull off the project.
The 'winners' of the bid rolled their eyes, bit the bullet and went at it as fast as they could - and, predictably, failed.
When will project managers push back against procurement processes that have no respect for expertise, timing, or real costs? What's surprising is that such a Trumpian approach should come from the Democratic playbook.
You really want to fix the economy?
Return respect for real-world experience to the equation.
Recognize that a "just-in-time" approach doesn't work for every situation.
And stop making the lowest bid the end-all and be-all of your decisions.
Thank you.
Angela Cason
7
Who says that Iowa was not hacked? What qualifications do they bring to the answer? Why did Iowa refuse the help of DHS (as reported by NPR), like the DNC refused the help of the FBI in 2016? The DNC... Sorry, you have been hacked before. IOWA... Sorry, you have vested interest.
The DNC for 2 cycles in a row cannot seem to run an election free of malfeasance. Perhaps they should outsource the matter to as tech firm... Google, Apple, IBM, AWS come to mind.
4
In New York they forced new voting machines on us. The old levered ones worked just right. But no, they had to bring in new “improved” ones where ANYONE in the room can see who you are voting for. It’s simple. Bring back low tech voting machines that cannot be hacked. Also reappoint a new DNC chair, he is clearly not up to this job.
6
@Ozma In Canada we use paper ballots and mark our choices in pencil. The system works: it's simple, secret, and efficient. Voting systems involving machines, as with so many technovations, show clearly that the tail is wagging the dog. The Luddites were right about a lot of things.
3
I loved those old, reliable voting machines
3
Ask yourself why a party that wants direct voting in the general election won't do the same in their own primaries?
2
For any federal election, the process and systems should be standardized (by nonpartisan experts), tested and secured. Anything else is lacks credibility, invites cheating and hinders democracy.
4
Here are the real results. Moderate candidates 57% extreme candidates 43%. But it looks closer because there are more moderate candidates than extremists. That was how Trump got elected - fewer candidates to divide up the smaller pool equals an extremist win. We need to get down to 1 moderate fast to save this election. let Warren and Sanders divide the smaller pool of extremists. The problem is we need the moderate billionaires to fall out so that they don't end up getting Bernie the nomination. Because one thing is clear, moderate voters outnumber extremist voters 57 to 43.
3
Reflect now on how everything has become an over the top drama. There are bound to be mistakes with new technology. Paper ballots are the most secure and should always be used as a backup.
1
Well, did they ever return?
No they never returned
And their fate is still unlearned
They're counting still in the Hawkeye state
The state that never returned!
3
Party admin wonks whose primary job for years has been to glad hand donors need to be banned from technology decisions.
I have watched non-technical admin type big wigs who try to make technical decisions get made fools by the consulting companies so many times in the last 20 years that I could go to the meetings and repeat the consulting sales pitches in my sleep.
As well as the excuses made by the consulting companies in the post-mortem project meetings, when the apps turn out to be riddled with defects and it will cost the purchaser 5X more than the original estimated to try and fix them (with still no great likelihood of success).
The hubris of the stupid admins (in thinking they know what they are doing) is matched only by the greed of the consulting companies.
4
Another Clinton failure. The democrats line up to shoot themselves in the foot. Just watch as the DNC try to insert the oligarch Bloomberg into the mix. Ms Clinton should tell anyone who was associated with her campaign failure to step back and just vote, we don't need their incompetence right now. Iowa has just demonstrated that, and the DNC should let democracy play out because the people as a whole are way smarter than their little committee.
1
If anyone can give us a clear explanation of what happened, it will be Joe Biden.
3
Ha. Well done.
1
For anyone in IT this is mind boggling. Why build a one off app? There are bazillions of survey apps. In fact this case is super easy because the results are meant to be public, there is no anonymity for the chairs, so that every precinct chair can simply check that the final public spreadsheet is correct wrt their own report. There are plenty of public, reliable, scalable, free or almost free solutions that can be made secure enough for this purpose eg Google Groups + Google Forms, polling in groups.io, etc.
5
Both political parties have a credibility problem, but the most recent polls indicate that the maverick Trump now has a popularity rating of 49%, his highest ratings so far. This is only because the press does not like him.
When the election results in Bolivia were delayed, much of the American press supported a coup against the regime that oversaw the election, so this is very damaging to the Democratic Party establishment.
If the Democratic Party wants to win the election in November they need to finish counting the precinct results.
When the election needle of the New York Times offers four measurements from the caucus, but does not include the popular vote in the first alignment or the second alignment in those measurements it also hurts its credibility. Imagine reporting the Trump - Clinton election results in 2016 and not including the popular vote?
Hello?
The way the results have been reported by the Democratic Party and the press may in the end help elect Sanders, just as in 2016 the over-the-top opposition to Trump by the press did more to it help him win the election than any other factor.
@Robert Scull
I see that the Times now is including the popular vote. Thank you. I hope this is also included in the final results.
1
Is there no leader in the Iowa Election Process who knows how to lead, perform detailed planning, training and realistic dry runs to make sure the system works and people know what they are supposed to do and what to do when something goes haywire prior to rolling it out? Sounds to me like a last minute rush job with everyone expecting someone else to have done/accomplished something.
1
Iowa Democrats have proven that our local election processes don't just make it difficult for people of color to participate in democracy. The playing field has been leveled, and as usual, it was accomplished through midwestern no nonsense, plain and simple common sense.
1
So let me get this straight ... Shadow is a company funded by Acronym, which came out of Hillary's failed campaign team and a series of failed products. Is that it? OK. As a lifelong Democrat, I think it's time for Hillary and her people to quietly retire from public life and allow the Democratic party to try and rebuild itself. Every decision she and her team made, including the pantsuits, was a disaster. As was the caucus methodology. This Democrat doesn't want to hear from Hillary or her people again.
9
No one on the Iowa Democratic Party required a through advance run through of the new process.
Their IT managers are fully responsible for this. Presuming they actually have IT managers.
7
And this DNC believes that if we turn over all our rights and personal liberties to a socialist government that knows better than you how to run your life? Their best and brightest couldn't convict a criminal (Trump) and now they hired at the last minute a Hillary Clinton known failure of a company to try to out manuver an elite Trump team that's been able to raise 100s of millions $$? As they say "Your Fired"
7
@Ray Most Americans couldn't correctly define "socialism" if you gave them a crayon and piece of paper and let them sit at a desk forever. Do you ever wonder why the so-called "socialist" countries of northern Europe--where citizens have maternity and paternity leave, universal healthcare, meaningful environmental regulations, etc.-- are so much happier?
4
Stupid and undemocratic doesn’t quite adequately describe a process in which a candidate who gets 28,319 votes [Sanders] receives fewer “state delegate equivalents” than a candidate who receives 27, 135 votes [Buttgieg]. This is evidence of a system rigged for a certain demographic or candidate. A program giving such results is “self-hacking” and should be held in contempt and extinguished.
5
Inept voting technologies in the 2000 American election led to the elevation of the (until then) most ignorant, incompetent, and ridiculous president ever to infect the White House, the Iraq debacle, free rein to rapacious corporations, etc. Now a faulty app and inadequately trained personnel have made the Democratic Party look foolish and given ammunition to the all-time most ignorant, incompetent, and ridiculous president ever to infect the White House.
The 2016 Russian hack, the sinister activities of Facebook, the ongoing meddling by bad actors in the democracies of the world---tech, as predicted by the wise, is biting us in the bum. Paper and pencils, anyone?
7
How ridiculousis is the idea to choose a company with a shady name, Shadow inc., with a track record of running Hillary Clinton's loosing campaign. No wonder Trump is winning every step of the way. Now I am starting to believe conspiracy theories.
6
I think we should go back to how we picked the nominee when I was a kid, AT THE CONVENTION! More excitement, more involvement up to the end. If you didn’t make it on the first round you had to haggle and make some deals right on the convention floor! Then they would try again. I thought it was great. The DNC probably would probably hate it these days, not enough control over the outcome, that’s one of the things I liked! We should go back to it. It seemed like more of the people’s voice decided
5
I believe that because Bernie was going to win, this vandalism occurred. It slowed the momentum he would have had, Read the NYTs article, with this narrative in mind, and see if it doesn't make sense. I am having flashbacks to 2016 when the DNC had their thumb on the scale against Bernie. I have deactivated my Facebook account and canceled my plan to vote for Bernie in the MN primary. I will not be voting in the general election, because the fix is in. The result of this establishment bias against Bernie is a low turnout of key demographics, just like 2016, when Hillary lost. This is not only predictable, but given what I see happening again, it is inevitable.
7
nwxr time use huawei apps. they are anti trumps. and will work the best. never trust locals
The reporting on this is a large part of the problem here. First of all, the fact that the DNC hired an app developer by the name of "Shadow" should be the first thing that seems suspicious. Does no one remember the Russian hack of the DNC in 2016? Instead of blaming the caucus system (as Trump and much of the corporate media has done) it's time to blame those in charge who want quick results and continue to rely on suspect technology and suspect developers to get it.
The caucus system may be anachronistic, but it shows how Americans can actually get off their butts and exert influence on their fellow Iowans in person without attacking each other in the process. In this age of apps and smart (?) phones and computer voting - all of which can be easily manipulated by bad actors of either party - in the end the paper ballot is still safer. Taking time to count the votes accurately, by hand if necessary, should be the backup for all voting, everywhere.
6
Greta Carnes the national organizing director for Pete Buttegeig, works for the parent company of the Iowa caucus app developer. Then Buttegeig comes out and claims victory. Classic bread-fixer.
5
State campaign finance records indicate the Iowa Democratic Party paid Shadow, a tech company that joined with ACRONYM last year, more than $60,000 for “website development” over two installments in November and December of last year. A Democratic source with knowledge of the process said those payments were for the app that caucus site leaders were supposed to use to upload the results at their locales. Gerard Niemira, a veteran of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, is the head of Shadow. He previously served as chief technology officer and chief operating officer of ACRONYM.
The DNC is going to cook these numbers, just like how 6 coin flips magically turned Hillary's way in 2016: "The probability of 6 tosses of unbiased coins being all tails will be 1.5625%."
Congratulations on your "victory," Mayor Cheat..
5
rule of vines every monkey in the jungle k ows: don't let go of the vine you're on until you have a solid grasp of the next one. this is more a planning and execution failure way more than technology per se. leadership not bytes.
4
Gee whiz, didn't anyone think of maybe just having a Google doc in the Cloud that all the precinct people could enter tier totals in? Doesn't seem like brain surgery.
7
Appears to be very corrupt! Add to that the manner in which Tulsi and Yang are treated - disgusting.
3
The quadrennial favorite:
"I am not a member of any organized party — I am a Democrat."
- Will Rogers
6
Buttigieg paid Shadow Inc. $42,500 in July 2019. Also, the CEO of Shadow just so happens to be arm in arm with PB. How did any of this get greenlighted? Absolutely ridiculous.
6
This is more damaging to the Dems than they realize. The image that keeps entering my mind after this is the infamous campaign effort by Michael Dukakis (remember him?) to try to establish military credentials by riding atop a tank, only to have his helmet fall and cover his face. It looked like a scene from Laurel & Hardy. You just knew at that moment he could never win. Same feeling here.
8
The Democratic Party are synonymous with foot shooting.
Trump will win by default, again.
4
what the what!!??
"Mr. Bagniewski instructed his executive director to take pictures of the results with her smartphone and drive over to the Iowa Democratic Party headquarters to deliver them in person. She was turned away without explanation, he said."
3
Democratic Party shooting themselves in the foot.
Trump will win by default, again.
1
This is not a meltdown. This is getting it right.
Now, why are we trusting a Clinton collaborator?
3
So the Democrats just used the veterans of Hilary's successful presidential campaign to redesign their app. What could possibly go wrong?
5
Trump won, Putin won, bin Ladin won . . . need we know more?
$64,000, only two months to build and implement, inadequate testing and no training? Unbelievable incompetence. Hopefully this is the end of the Iowa caucus and Iowa first in line.
4
Do you want to come out on top in the Iowa Caucuses?
All you have to do is advocate increased use of ethanol.
4
Has anyone else considered that this delay is actually serendipitous? The numbers will come into focus just as Trump is taking the stage for his big speech. Can you imagine a greater distraction? It's tempting to think that the "delay" was intentional. If the numbers had been released yesterday, it would have been old news by the time Trump began his SOTU clown act. Now it's going to preempt him completely and rob his thunder.
1
Apparently shooting itself in the foot with the bungled 2016 effort, wasn't enough. Now the DNC is shooting itself in the head.
5
Stop idolizing cellular phones. Intense stare, crooked fingers, uncertain vibe, frustration coming up to the brim, clipped sound frequencies... strange delays that make you talk at the same time and then go silent at the same time... your cellular phone will always betray you. What they needed were full tilt laptops using e-mail... but, oh no, they wanted to be "in" and they all had beards...
3
Wow, so much hand-wringing, name-calling, and doom-saying! Guess what folks? This is NOT a disaster, or an embarrassment, or any of the other hyperbole that populates this comment board. The Iowa Democratic Party will be announcing results within approximately 21 hours of the start of the caucuses. The delegates who are eventually selected in this process will have no trouble planning to attend the convention in.......JULY! New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina voters can vote for whomever they'd like without having to consult the Iowa results. This is more a reflection of our instant-gratification culture, and Democrats' Trump-induced anxiety than anything else. It is NOT the end of democracy. It is not cataclysmic. It's a few technical problems and an abundance of caution to avoid prematurely and inaccurately announcing a winner. (Ask Rick Santorum how that worked out for him in 2012.) Chill out everyone!
4
@Jeff G Agree Jeff, The whole process was perfect.
1
@ncdob Nice sarcasm. Didn't say it was perfect--just not a disaster as the conventional wisdom has asserted.
At a time when transparency of voting data is of utmost importance, the Dems are using a for-profit software provider named "Shadow." How much more farcical can this get?
4
Best analysis to date - this killed Mayor Pete and Sen. Warren and saved Biden.
Both Pete and Warren were lined up for strong showings to catapult them to the next stage. Biden was getting killed and would limp into a do-or-die N.Carolina.
No - all that is nullified. Mayor Pete put all his chips in Iowa and is dead, and Biden gets to still be the front runner.
At three this morning, Pacific time, I propped myself up in bed, turned on my iPad and went to the New York Times to find out the results of the Iowa caucus. Not only was I surprised they hadn't been released, I was even more surprised to read the cause - older caucus officials who weren't sufficiently tech savvy to use the app. They were either too inept to master its intricacies or hadn't been able to download the app at all with the result that they phoned in their figures, overburdening the telephone system. Five hours later the story changed; no more mention of senescent caucus workers. Now the app itself is being blamed. As usual, it isn't the foot soldiers at fault, but the generals.
2
What’s wrong with the Democratic Party. They can’t even win an election against themselves.
7
Once again, the Democratic Party has fumbled the ball. The entire caucus procedure has turned into an embarrassing shambles.
SHAME on the candidates (Buttigieg, Sanders) for proclaiming victory BEFORE the results were officially tabulated and released! Again, the Democrats are setting themselves up for the worst kind of ridicule - especially at a time when they can least afford to.
Trump and the Republicans are making - and are going to continue to make - mincemeat of this sorry debacle. The Republicans are guaranteed to march straight into the White House and both Houses of Congress in November, this time re-elected by a landslide.
Trump cannot be vanquished at this point; his Democratic Party opposition is unable to get its act together, and is showing itself once again to be utterly incompetent.
4
Tom Perez, what happened? No training? No trial run of the app? Even your back up system failed.
Total and complete incompetence at all levels.
Aren't there enough qualified people from Silicon Valley to build a working app? You had to go to no-name company?
Thank God Dems are not running the country.
And not likely to run it after November, either.
Trump 2020, even if Iowa didn't bomb.
6
Do you really trust the Republican federally controlled communications networks with your results reporting?
Paper ballots all the way please.
Democrats can be their own worst enemies. I predict in November they'll handily snatch defeat from the jaws of victory and hand Trump another 4 years.
4
shall we give up on the Democratic leadership?
they muff the impeachment and waste a lot of time and resources...
and now this disaster.
are they competent enough to lead?
Where is Yang and Bloomberg? They are seemingly the only candidates with leadership experience. I hope they come together on a ticket. That would get my vote for sure.
6
The app was issued by Jimmy Hickey of Shadow Inc., metadata of the program that the Des Moines Register analyzed Tuesday shows. Gerard Niemira and Krista Davis, who worked for Clinton’s 2016 campaign, co-founded Shadow.
3
1. Someone(s) must find out who owns, and has sold, any & all election software & hardware/machines. & their relationship to the person(s) who bought it, etc.
2. Simply outlaw any electronic election media from now on, in any way, whatsoever. Paper only under the supervision of community CPAs, bookkeepers, financial managers. Paper only.
3. Do you all understand just how inept & potentially corrupt the Democrats look now? No one will trust the figures coming out of Iowa. They won't. And blaming this secret "app"...give me a break.
Follow the money & engage people in the community to handle all of it by analogue, just like they did in 2000.
People love to be of service & EVERYONE is especially invested in making sure that everyone now gets to vote & that every vote is counted.
Finally: stop listening to your kids, grandkids, salespeople, buddy who knows a guy he can hook you up with, etc. Be out-of-date. At least we'll be able to audit the votes, in Iowa or in November.
2
This is a joke and may have something to do with Bernie winning it and not the Obama favorite. Good harbinger of what is to come in November!
2
Republicans fall in line behind the most immoral president in our history while democrats botch the first vote in the 2020 election.
Finger pointing, unsubstantiated claims of victory, and confusion abound. Dems you are not inspiring confidence.
1
When the insurgent candidate (Sen. Sanders) does well and the establishment candidate (Vice President Biden) severely underperforms, and then - whoopsie! We can’t report the results due to a “technical glitch” ... Stand by for accusations of foul play akin to what Donna Brazille accused the Hillary campaign of in 2016. The “Bernie Bros” are going to be out for blood after this.
The big winner last night was President Trump. And the Democrats have only themselves to blame.
6
And you think THIS is the only weird thing about how we "elect" president? Iowa then New Hampshire then who knows what. The real choice is the DNC secretly picking their best shot at winning. Nothing about who might be the best as President.
This is nothing more than a sporting event from this primary mess to the media coverage overall, it is all treated like a team sport. and then we get someone to be President.
What a crazy chaotic system we have. "But its the best in the world??? really?
An interesting and troubling detail about the Iowa caucuses that I noticed in another publication.....
On the initial round of "voting," if you chose a candidate that got at least 15% of the people in the room, you had to keep that initial choice. No changing to another candidate. And that included voters who initially chose UNDECIDED!
So if you showed up to the caucuses and walked over to the "undecided" group, and that group happened to get 15% of the people in the room, you could NOT move to another candidate/group in subsequent rounds!! Your choice was already made!
How Iowa keeps its "first" status after this is beyond me.
3
"I am not a citizen of any organized territory. I am from Iowa."
- Will B. Rodgered
4
It’s 2020, how can even a modestly skilled team not make a rudimentary messaging app that works? Furthermore, it would not even standout at a weekend Hackathon.
3
The app was built by a small Washington, D.C.-based company called Shadow Inc., the tech arm connected to nonprofit progressive digital strategy firm Acronym, according to people familiar with the matter. State records show that the Iowa Democratic Party paid Shadow a little more than $63,000 over two payments in November and December. Shadow describes itself as a company that builds “affordable and easy-to-use tools” for progressives, according to its website. (From WSJ)
Question - Is political motivation of a supplier a good selection criteria in what should be a free election?
1
As Will Rogers hit it on the nail so many years ago, "I'm not a member of any organized party. I'm a Democrat."
Unfortunately, many outside of the party will conclude that Dems aren't capable of doing anything right.
Time to dump Iowa.
1
One has to wonder, the media can't get enough of Trump his slurs, tweets, and general lack of knowledge regarding his own country, Kansas anyone.
They give this guy unlimited media access to the point that the public is completely exhausted, but the first chance they get, Democrats delay app failure. One has to wonder just who owns the media. Are they about facts or are their screaming headlines, just part of the problem.
2
Will there be shenanigans to declare a specific candidate the winner, at the best of the party bosses?
What baffles me is why anyone would expect this app to work in the first place. Software developers have been issuing updates to their software since the computer was invented. Just ask Apple and Microsoft.
I’m quickly losing confidence in the ability of any branch of the Democratic party to manage anything. If they can’t get this right, how can we expect them to guard against another stolen election? If they can’t get this right, how can we expect them to run the country?
It pains me deeply to say it, but this is highlighting Trump’s genius. He sees the ineptitude of the Democratic party and knows how to exploit it. The Democrats, on the other hand, see Trump’s ineptitude but are powerless to do anything about it. I cannot recall ever feeling this hopeless before.
5
I suspect this is the result of painstaking unpreparedness, the exact crisis needed to muddle the outcome until after New Hampshire. An ‘insurance policy’ if you will....
I hate to say this, but this process is not hard. If the more automated process (of using the app) fails, it should fall back on the manual process (of using voice calls, with all paper trail to ensure there's a way to audit the result, if the need arises). Why it should lead to a "meltdown" is really quite beyond me.
All these point to the rather unsophisticated laymen organizers that give the technology a bad name. And, why would Dems party use such an important occasion for a new technology? Why not use some local elections to test it out first? This is beyond incompetence.
More sadly still, is the fact that this so-called meltdown is going to give the automated election technology a bad name. It should not have ended this way. Dems have given a golden opportunity for Trump and GOP to disparage and undermine the whole election process. This is unforgiveable.
3
From the reporting I've read so far, it seems that the problem is not with Iowa or with caucuses or definitely not with paper ballots, but with the Democratic Party leadership and bureaucracy. Come on folks; this happened three major elections in a row: the democratic campaign committees from the top on down are flaunting the will of their own voters.
We have terrific Democratic candidates in the primary, state and local races - in my opinion the candidates with their plans and the debates have gotten exponentially better from the 2008 election on, and we are winning races at all levels. We just need a more responsive leadership or better yet, leadership from below. What a concept - true democracy!
3
At this historical moment, of all moments, they chose to rely on an inadequately vetted app? Seriously? The whole point of Russian electoral interference is to sow doubt in the whole idea of reliable elections. I understand that the underlying process is paper and reliable, but the optics on this are made for Trump TV and Twitterland.
3
I don't understand how they can make firm denials of hacking, and why they expect us to believe them.
1
The population of Montana is a little over a million. The population of Iowa is 3.1 million and more than 90% white. The population of Orange County, California is also a bit over 3 million. Montana and Iowa both have two senators. Orange County shares a small portion of California’s two senators (with a diverse population of almost 40 million). Similar to Iowa, Montana is more than 86% white. This pattern is repeated over and over. It is undeniable that small white states have overwhelmingly disproportionate power. And then we allow the parties to make it worse by putting the early primaries in those states. Forget about worrying over the incompetent election reporting from Iowa. Instead, imagine if this were a democracy. I admit that is not easy. What about a nationwide urban-primary? But now on to New Hampshire with an overwhelmingly white population of about 1 million people ... almost the number of people in the Orange County traffic jam I was caught in returning home last night.
5
We have caucuses here in Colorado and the local ones are always a huge mess. Totally disorganized. If you are lucky enough to get voted as a delegate and go to the state caucus those are better run. It is frustrating because Dem's are the party with solutions. Republicans have zero solutions to today's problems but man are Dem's disorganized. It really is not hard to get it together. The good news is it is not too late. We are still early in the game and it is better to find these problems now rather than later.
2
This entire process of presidential primaries is antiquated and provides weightage to states that vote initially than later. Why don’t we have a single day when all democratic and republican voters vote for their preferred party candidate, and a few months later, vote for their preferred presidential candidate? Two days of voting without wasting time, money, and resources, and without giving unnecessary advantage to any particular state/candidate!
3
We need national “ranked voting”, an abolishment of the electoral college, term limits and a third party. We need these things now in order for a transparent democracy that citizens can trust in once again.
3
The entire way we chose the presidential candidate needs to be reformed for the modern era. Maybe this worked in the horse and buggy days, but it's the internet era now.
If you're going to use an individual's cell phone to work an app in order to communicate numbers, you'll get what you deserve. The system itself may not be hacked but you'll deal individual human tech abilities, individual phone quirks and hacks. And if you've never test run, wow. There just seem to be so many possibilities for error. Perhaps we need to stop pandering to a news cycle demand for hurry up and instant voting results aka electronic reporting. Perhaps paper balloting and communication is still the best
2
Is attacking a "Democratic" process par for the course by many of the pundits priceless?
Is the problem with the counting by Democratic officials or are the results not to their liking?
1
It seems to me as though we could be seeing the Democratic party torpedoing Bernie Sanders in 2020, after most likely torpedoing him in 2016. The linkage of the software firm that created the app to people connected to Hillary Clinton and Pete Buttigieg could be mere coincidence, but the optics are terrible. 2016 gave us Trump, please, please let us stop eating our own and instead come together and prevent this nightmare from continuing! I know the centrists hate and fear the progressive wing, but we're tried the centrist candidacy and it smashed apart on the rocks of the electoral college. I am afraid that if people aren't offered something better and different, we will fail again. JMHO.
3
Once again, the Democrats have put forth a circular firing squad and everyone is dead. This leaves the door wide open for Michael Bloomburg, and I hope he walks straight through it and lands in the White House. There is not one single current Democratic candidate for whom I would vote, just like I could not stomach Hillary Clinton in the last election, and I am a lifelong Democrat.
And the caucuses are not the problem. Their purpose, it seems to me, is to try to maintain some shred of tradition in the voting process, where people actually come together and discuss issues and candidates. and I hope very much that they are maintained. It's ridiculous for every major newspaper to be calling for the head of this tradition on a platter, and it's a smokescreen for getting rid of the process which they believe is unfair to black voters. Ask them if they want to eliminate the electoral college and have a free-for-all which guarantees--what? A minority president? Whatever the reason, I think that most Americans, particularly US. born citizens, support the caucus process and that they have the patience to understand its relevance.
3
I believe it’s quite possible that this problem is a budgetary one. It looks to me like they tried to do things on a shoestring. If you’re used to dealing with big multinational companies that have tons of money in technology, it may be hard to understand. What looks like incompetence may be lack of funds. If you’re going to be the party that represents poor people you are going to run into shaky operations. I’m not sure if this is the case, but from here it looks possible.
If you want efficiency, having lots of money and authoritarian leadership will certainly give you that. Warts and all, I prefer the Democrats.
In any case someone had the foresight to use paper as a backup. I’ve used tech for decades, I like tech, but it has limitations, especially if you can’t afford top-of-the-line.
1
Since Bush v. Gore, Democrats have still not learned. Why aren't they confirming election and caucus results a second and third time by counting paper ballots? And why didn't Congressional Democrats get that Trump accused them of trying to change the results of the 2016 election by telling the nation Trump tried to rig the upcoming 2020 election? You sure are slow Democrats. Trump is laughing and relishing the Iowa problems. And that should make you think deeper.
1
Who’s going to trust the results after this mess?
No more caucuses should be allowed! It’s a ridiculous way to choose a candidate and the vast majority of voters don’t participate.
I hope this is the last time Iowa goes first. How about Georgia, Washington State, Nevada and New Hampshire holding the first primaries ?
The winner last night was Trump!
1
The problem here is not Iowa but the press. If the press, including the NYT, had not blown this first, minor, primary event far out of proportion to its actual meaning, there would be no great crisis now. Some software failed, an absolutely typical phenomenon which I (as a Nevadan) hope will not happen again. But the results are more important than big headlines, and will become known in perfectly good time. The press set itself up for this publicity debacle and is reaping the consequences of looking kind of silly.
3
This is just another example of the tech/software community selling software and systems that have "bugs." This is why society must be careful how much on this technology we allow into critical functions of our lives (think medical care and hospitals as well). The way this kind of technology is developed uses a process of trial and error, then correction and more trial and error (think Window software). We should not be surprised, but a lot more careful.
3
The latest results show Debacle in first place, closely followed by Fiasco, with Meltdown and Botch nearly tied for third.
11
For some folks, this makes dictatorships look good
For the life of me, I have never understood why Iowa and New Hampshire play such an important role in the primaries and selection of potential candidates. The delegates there in no way represent the diversity of the voters in this country.
Time to do away with this antiquated process along with the electoral college and modernize the voting press.
8
This app was designed by a company connected to Hillary and Obama, so of course nothing could possibly have gone wrong there....
Iowa can kiss its caucus system goodbye and the ONLY question is whether it even gets to matter before Super Tuesday.
3
Always negative,eh, osservatore?
This is so ridiculous. Late-night show hosts are loving it.
7
Maybe the repubs are right. Maybe the democrat geniuses can't even count to seventeen hundred. This stinks to learn your party can't do anything right. Faith has now left town.
3
I think the Iowa Democrats are overlooking the most obvious solution: just call Vladimir Putin and ask what they should be.
2
IOWA : DELETE YOUR ACCOUNT.
Seriously.
5
Dems, if you'd just let Mark scrape the data as it came in - and place ads targeted at precinct-captains - you'd all be home by now, with a trump-roast in the oven for this PM's dinner...
The chatter among Russian election-meddling trolls is that Bloomberg actually won, with 59% of the SRO vote...
PS
You all do realize this is ranked voting - with the absolute security of paper ballots...
Being a life long Democrat I am very disappointed in their ineptitude.
5
Please...it’s “The Democrats” is Iowa’s Democrats who decides this.
And the circus begins.
1
Is it possible that Democratic leadership is this incompetent?
They botch the impeachment and now this.
4
FYI: It is IOWA’s Democratic leadership....not the national leadership.
@Open Your Mind
and Bannon's minions have joined the party...
@Mari , advised by DNC
2
“Even before Monday, there were other concerns with the app itself, which was developed by a private firm called Shadow. Cybersecurity experts worried that it had not been vetted, tested at scale, or even shown to independent experts before being introduced in Iowa.”
1. Shadow Inc launched on 17th Jan 2019.
2. Mayor Pete announces run for President on 23rd Jan.
3. CEO of company that owns Shadow tweets out her support.
4. New CEO of Shadow worked for Hillary's campaign.
5. Pete's campaign gives giant contributions to Shadow.
Via @TheGrayzoneNews
“Behind the app that delayed Iowa’s voting results is a dark money operation funded by anti-Sanders billionaires. Its top donor, Seth Klarman, is a Buttigieg backer who has dumped money into pro-settler Israel lobby groups.”
5
Worse than Florida in 2000.
5
@Jonathan Katz
clearly Steve Bannon's operatives have found a target of opportunity.
The app was like putting lipstick on a pig.
1
The fix is in.
1
1.) Russia! Mueller report = dud
2.) Impeachment flop; America didn’t care
3.) Economy soaring; 49% Trump approval, higher than Obama @ this stage
4.) SOTU address Trump show = full econ credit, mockery of Dem’s public failures
5.) No DNC plan, candidate, or path; too much infighting; “Trump is terrible” isn’t winnable
6.) Trump 2020
5
this reminds me of walt disney’s “sorcerers apprentice”
Is it too late to write in Barney Fife for New Hampshire?
3
They didn't have a solid contingency plan? Sloppy. And this is NOT the first time such a thing has happened. There's is, indeed, some greed and arrogance and stupidity at play here. It's not just a partisan thing, either.
1
anything to cut the momentum of bernie sanders...
and now a front page nyt feature about the billionaire oligarch doubling his spending.
it will either be a tin pot dictator or the oligarch...i choose neither.
2
Paper ballots worked just fine. Guess what ruined that??? Yep tree hugging liberals wanting to eliminate paper. See the trend?
1
@RS : The drive to eliminate paper ballots was never about "saving trees". It was about politicians from both parties getting kickbacks from the makers of electronic voting systems.
And FWIW, the Iowa Caucuses DO have paper ballots as backup. The app was just for reporting results.
2
"Hello, is this Mike Bloomberg? You're the one who knows about computers, right? You're also the one who skipped Iowa, right? Your Party is calling on line one."
6
Pathetic
And they want to lead the country ? Oh boy
1
At this moment, Putin is grinning ear to ear, sporting that eternal smirk, proposing a vodka toast with his fellow Russian oligarchs and mobsters. Russian Bowl fashion, he has called a smashing shut-out: through his cyber war mega-success, he has engineered an Iowa caucus disaster, making Democrats look like inept fools; he has inveigled his Senate Republican caucus—53 moles strong—to let his sweetheart democracy-destroyer totalitarian wannabe Trump off the impeachment conviction hook through a theater-of-the-absurd Russian-style trial (an Orwellian guilt is innocence), and, through his top apparatchik Billy Barr, used media propaganda to deep-six the Mueller report into oblivion. Putin has conquered America, Britain (via Brexit), and the West without firing a shot. Putin has engineered an unfathomable, tsunami-like wrath, just on this site alone, against the “stupidity” and “ineptitude” of the Democratic Party, as the lemmings, spewing hatred, walk off the edge of a cliff. Putin’s go-to guy Trump will gloat and purr, full-bore obnoxiousness, during his “State of the Union” Address, to be followed by vodka toasts all around at the East Room of the White House, led by Mike Pompeo, capped off with a congratulatory phone call from Putin on a secure line. America Made Great Again! Damn those Democrats! Who on earth would trust them to manage our health care?
You can bet President facepalm will make a cute jab about it in his state of the toilet address because he is such a grown man.
2
@Ryan: You would have lost that bet. He didn't address it at all. He behaved like a gentleman, unlike the Democrats.
I'm a software engineer. If voting is on any electronic platform it will be impossible to prove to the non-technical public that it works perfectly.
If something unusual occurs how will you ever show that it wasn’t an error in the software or its management or its use or that it wasn’t hacked.
Paper ballots are time-consuming and so don’t scale well, but they provide a clear record and they never need to be rebooted.
10
Hopefully this is not a preview of Election Day 2020, with various states having problems reporting results. Giving candidates an opportunity to question the validity of the results. How was this not fixed after Florida in 2000? Does someone think they benefit from having a broken electoral system?
It is entirely predictable that the volume of phone calls to party HQ would drastically increase over the old days when each caucus always simply called in to report results, because people having problems using the new app.
1
My fellow Americans,
it is time to rethink the Primaries. As someone wrote in the comments, let's have 4 or 5 "Super Tuesdays", representing the various areas of the country and rotate them on each election cycle. We will then avoid this disaster of the "first caucuses" or "first primaries".
But will reason prevail?
7
Dear Iowa, please meet Florida, your first cousin in election chaos.
I'm staggered that they did no prior testing of that app. That's just totally unacceptable and led to a predictably anarchic outcome.
Also, nothing will convince me that there wasn't some technological shenanigans going on. That app is about as secure as a $100 bill left on a city street.
3
@BothSides But Mayor Pete gave the company that made the app over $40,000, and he seemed very confident of the results. Isn't that secure enough for you?
2
Why did they use an untested app in the first place? Because it's new and very cool? And it failed. Would a major retailer bring in new cash registers and wait until Black Friday to use them? Pencils, legal pads, calculators and telephones. The rush to get the results out first is no reason to trip over coffee tables and down the stairs. I hope the entire caucus nationwide learns something and goes old school. Paper, pencils, and a telephone.
2
"It was a surreal opening act for the 2020 campaign that included unexplained “inconsistencies” in results that were not released to the public, heated conference calls with campaigns that were hung up on by the state party, firm denials of any kind of hacking and a presidential primary left in a strange state of almost suspended animation."
And, don't forget, it gave the Trump administration a YUUUUGGGEEE and victorious talking point for tonight's "State of the Union" message.
We still use paper ballots here and I'm glad we do. After endless reports of fake postings in social media, hackers seeming to access just about everything they'd like to, and all the claims of election rigging driven by conspiratorial posts, you would think the last thing anyone would undertake is a stronger leaning to going paperless and adopting questionable apps and voting methods. So, the networks won't be able to project a winner within seconds of the polls closing, at least we would be assured of a reliable count as we have for the entire voting history of this country.
I would suggest that we move the ballot box out of the current culture of instant gratification and back into the more antiquated, but secure realm of hand counted ballots. Sometimes being antiquated is not such a terrible thing.
3
I think Tom Perez of the DNC needs to have the courage to make a statement denouncing the process in Iowa and promising the Democratic electorate that we will never start a presidential election in Iowa again.
1
"I don't belong to an organized political party. I'm a Democrat." WR.
How can the party that bemoans the inherent bias of the electoral college system give rural white conservative states Iowa and New Hampshire such an outsized role in the candidate selection process? Permanently? I live in blue Maryland and we never have any voice whatever in picking presidential nominees. The candidates I like will likely all be gone by the end of April. It will be down to the geriatrics.
I'm sure the folks in Iowa are nice people but they have let us all down with this fumbling process. It shows amazing ego that they think we should all defer to their political wisdom.
3
The mechanisms by which the chaos in Iowa will have far reaching aftereffects are several-fold including: It will breed cynicism, and cynicism will favor only Trump. It will feed conspiracy theories, which the supporters of one or two of the candidates are especially prone to overindulge in, and those conspiracy theories will discourage voters from voting for the Democratic nominee no matter who it is.
2
@Robert, your comment makes me suspicious. Could someone have done this purposefully? Yes.
I hope I am at least the 100th person commenting here who hopes Iowa does away with caucuses.
They are not fair. They do not accurately sample the electorate.
Only people with transportation, lots of free time and no crippling disabilities that limit their ability to get around can participate.
There are probably very few emergency workers or doctors and nurses or pilots at caucuses. It might be difficult for them to get time off to spend an evening voting.
But, mainly, there are very few non-while people in Iowa, so Iowa should no longer be first.
The Iowa voters are given far to much control over our choice of nominee.
All states should hold primary elections with machines that include paper ballots for back-up.
5
The basic incompetence shown here is appalling. I have 40+ years of systems implementation experience at all levels and scopes. The lack of basic quality assurance, the lack of communication and training of user community shows an unbelievable of inexperience and naiveté. How about a simple “let’s have a practice run” a few weeks before the live date?Has no one in the Iowa Democratic organization ever implemented a computer system before. An IT project manager with 1 year of experience would not have made any of these basic mistakes. I am now speechless.
4
@Mike, the folks in the Iowa Democratic party’s volunteers, are mostly regular people. Most are not experienced as you or my husband who is a tech guy. They needed to have brought in someone with tech experience to vet the app. They didn’t. It’s a shame.
And maybe by the time of the Dem Convention we'll know just who gets those Iowa caucus delegates. It's past time to get rid of these early primaries that consume money, exhaust attention spans, and fail to represent the full span of the Dem Party. Two or three Super Tuesdays is what is needed.
Reminiscent of the ACA Federal Exchange website rollout. Any chance the same software developers are involved with this mega fail.
2
Yes, a disaster.
But far worse is the quadrennial disaster where so many people act as if the Iowa caucuses matter.
Two examples: Ted Cruz won in 2016. Rick Santorum won in 2012.
These caucuses are like many of Trump's tweets. Best to ignore.
Iowa Caucus, Outdated, just have a primary where voters choose candidates on a BALLOT.
Our elector system is outdated, popular vote for President.,
2
I can’t believe that the Iowa Dems were so naive as to not test the app and train the people. Romney and the republicans made the same mistake in 2012 when they rolled out a system that no one knew how to use.
This really makes me worry that the Dem turnout machine is broken for the real election. Maybe Mike will be able to put something better together between now and Nov. - let’s hope so.
1
Not a good start to the Primaries
Unfortunately, it plays right into Trump's hands nicely as he can now claim that the system is / was bugged, hacked, illegal, compromised - whatever term he can come up with - if he loses.
And going by this start, it seems he may be able to make the argument legitimately without attention drawn to Russia or anyone else.
He could even claim it's unconstitutional - not that that's ever bothered him before - and the election should be nulled.
It's astounding to think that such a high stakes event could be so embarrassingly bungled. The DNC has respected Iowa's "tradition" of going first with their wacky caucus. The Iowa Democratic party's obvious lack of preparation shows disrespect for the voters and our democracy.
Unfathomable.
Assuming a generous turnout of 200,000 Iowans....we have an average of only 125 people per precinct (there are 1600 precincts).
Why would a mobile "app" ever be considered as a necessary tool when the average precinct only has to count 125 people?
This is completely illogical.
The only possible explanation is that this was an "insurance plan" that was designed to be deployed if Bernie Sanders started to gain serious momentum. And evidently it has worked perfect. We have Buttigieg, Warren, Klobuchar, and even Biden all now claiming how wonderful they performed last night.
If any State needs a pocket calculator, slide-rule, and a legal pad to tally up THREE SETS of numbers in order to determine how many votes and delegates each candidate gets, then they shouldn't be allowed to participate, let alone be the first State in the process.
Good Grief! A process that would even boggle the mind of Rube Goldberg.
@SparkyTheWonderPup it wasn’t the state that did it...it was the Democrat Party. Grow up. Or one.
It is not the failure of the system nor the phone system. It is the total melt-down brought upon by the incompetent people who organized the primary. With the slackers like that, I don't have any confidence the democrats can deliver the victory in November.
2
The fact that Trump is relishing the failure indicates possible sabotage that should be considered. "Krebs", and "Shadow"? It's not like the Republicans aren't interested in destroying democratic functions.
One can only hope that Iowa's "systemwide disaster" is not the only real prognosticator of what is to come in the November elections.
The party needs to soul search this one. Its failure to run the caucus efficiently and accurately is clear evidence that these people are totally unprepared to run a national health care system. The Lefties need to wake up and smell the coffee.
At this point, I throw in the towel and await entry by Mayor Mike. Our last hope for winning in 2020. the entire primary field so far are losers in a tight election.
When an "establishment controlled" party continues to indulge in corruption and innuendo, any wonder why Sanders and so many, especially, young progressives who previously abandoned the party in disgust, feel that in order to continue to be relevant in the future, why it needs a complete overhaul and NOW? Add to that, because he gave the DNC several million dollars in "donations" they immediately changed the rules to allow an "interloper" BILLIONAIRE into the debates(or not)any time he wishes and without condition?
Who is the REAL enemy of the democratic voter AND democracy here? Trump and republicans OR the democratic /party establishment itself?
1
I understand the frustrations of tech and all the embarrassment of what many believe to be an arcane --and this year--untested system of reporting. However, I believe it is not half as embarrassing as our Republican Senators, after reading that 70 to 75% of ALL Americans wanted to hear from additional witnesses and see subpoenaed documents during President Trump's impeachment trial, refusing to do so. Let's not, so early in the game, become intentionally diverted and lose sight of where the real shame and embarrassment should lie.
1
Who ever is leading the DNC should be fired. Last night was a complete joke. Even funnier was watching the candidates coming out and signaling a win without any proven results. How much more does the DNC want to do to strengthen Trump!
2
As someone well to the left of the political spectrum, I have to say this is a hoot. The party that is running against Trump's incompetence. What's next? Let's see, how about proposing something totally undemocratic. Let's call it the Electoral College.
2
After the Romney-no-wait-Santorum caucus in 2012 and now this fiasco, Iowa's first-in-the-nation status should end. It's absurd to demand that candidates spend so much time and money on a convoluted system that can't even report the winner.
2
The tip off yesterday (on CNN) was when a volunteer was shown asking everyone (off camera) to move so she could do the calculations. Something about “it could be two, three or four” or something along those lines. She looked like she was having a rough go.
As to the app... Shadow, Inc. Name alone tells you this sounds like a bad idea. Fraud Guarantee anyone?
Thanks, Iowa Dems. First rate job.
1
Falling right into the hands of the Trump State of the Union speech writers.
4
I see Iowa is trying to capture Floridas' mantle of election incompetence.
3
What an absolute embarrassment for the Iowa Democrats. Everyone involved in this debacle should be fired, from the top down. I am really trying to believe this meltdown was due to incompetence and shoddy project management. But if there is more to this story, I wouldn't be surprised in the least.
I am hoping that who ever ran the process in Iowa is fired. This kind of gross incompetence is just shameful. Our voting processes are a neglected and marginalized affair to begin with, but this is just beyond belief.
I can't decide whether this is the dress rehearsal for the Trump election theft, or the groundwork for Bloomberg to steal the nomination.
@Bill Wolfe
Bloomberg isn't stealing anything. The DNC is selling the franchise to Bloomberg and getting a receipt. And they can't do it soon enough. Yeah - he might not tick all the progressive boxes, but he's the only qualified, competent candidate the democrats have. When the alternative is Trump, some choices aren't as difficult as they might seem.
Hmmm... The latest greatest from big tech. One step forward two steps back. Developers are always the worst. Roll it out and make the User the guinea pig. Sounds like standard stuff to me.
Hyperbole much?
Now we have to wait one day for results of a caucus in a non-representative state. I can't stop sobbing.
1
Is it possible that Democratic leadership is this incompetent? They both the impeachment and now this.
1
@Open Your Mind , yep. The botched the impeachment. And now this fiasco.
1
Am I the only one who has trouble seeing this as a "meltdown", or "debacle", or "disaster", or some other cognate. No one credible has suggested that we won't get accurate results in the next 48 hours. Whether Iowa should be first, or whether the caucus system should remain in place are separate issues, pressing (if they are) independent of this reporting problem. As many have pointed out, no one voted electronically, and the paper trail is there. We'll get the result a couple of days late, which is bad for a couple of the candidates, but really 'oh, well' in the grand scheme of things.
43
@Tony Debacle is being polite. Downloaded an untested app to personal cell phones (in areas with poor cell coverage) and bypassing Apple's security protocols, what could go wrong.
And Plan B? telephone. Using the same cell phones that couldn't install the app, to call a phone number that was also the helpline? Total incompetence!
Seriously don't want DNC touching our healthcare system or anything else that depends upon software.
2
@Tony, it is embarrassing and shows great incompetence while introducing doubt about the results.
It's kind of ugly, and very sad.
5
@Jack B Yes, mistakes were obviously made. But I agree with Tony-Ithaca,NY that essentially, this is a first world problem. People turned out in good numbers, caucused, votes were cast and counted, and chances are very good that we'll get bonfide results from a bonafide election process very soon (hours/days at worst). The silver lining might be that we decide to get rid of the caucus process altogether because it disenfranchises many voters and tends to favor more activist (vs. centrist) candidates that increases polarization and makes it more difficult to win general elections.
1
I fear the Democrats just lost the general election in November.
There are many people in swing states that are torn between disgust for Trump and fear of the Democrats. Specifically, they fear that the Democrats will advocate an expansive role for government and then manage it ineptly, as we saw with the initial roll-out of the ACA. At least when it comes to Trump, they will think, the competence is marries to an effort to reduce government's intrusion into the economy.
If Democrats want to win, especially with a progressive agenda, they need to convince these swing voters and the average American that they have the ability to execute their ambitious agenda with competence. Insane failures such as the one we just saw in Iowa will drive these voters away. I may detest my current insurance company but at least their app works.
56
@Insider I can already see the headline in Trump's tweets: "Lookie here, Dems can't even handle the tiny state of Iowa, they can never handle prime time issues like economy."
2
Seems to me that the DNC just handed the national election to Trump. Is anyone investigating?
1
@Anna, it really doesn't take much investigation, 90% of the facts are in the article. An untested app for so many people, apparently not downloaded until the evening of the event, downloaded and put to use by people that may not be tech savvy, some of them in rural areas with poor cell reception? Amazing.
2
Again we can be laughed at. Trying to be contemporary by using an untested application created by a startup was a bad decision.
The Iowa caucus is outmoded.
If I were a plumber it would be like putting a spigot on the toilet bowl. Wrong time, wrong fit, wrong apparatus.
I hear the flushing, it must be my cat pushing the handle.
There is the vote. Ta Da!
5
No doubt Nancy Pelosi will blame Trump for this too….
5
There is another article in the New York Times today, headline is, “The App Used to Tabulate Votes was Quickly Put Together....” THIS tells us everything we need to know! For Pete’s sake, Democratic National Committee SPEND good money on excellent technology our elections are worth it!!!
Pay for the best technology Silicon Valley has to offer!!!
2
@Mari The tech company behind this originated in 2017 from Hillary's former tech team. Yup, the crowd that could't count Electoral College votes are behind this one, too.
The answer isn't "better" tech; it's NO tech in the ballot process. It brings NOTHING to the table of democracy. It's not innovative or helpful, it's intrusive, complicating, and harmful.
1
Unmitigated disaster? Hey, NYT and the rest of the media. Get ahold of yourself. I'd say the media need to start behaving themselves. Stop editorializing and report the facts. The facts are that the results are delayed. Period.
5
"I am being served by fools." ~Democracy
2
Who's on first?
3
And Trump laughed.
3
As I wrote before, this show is idiotic, and Iowa is one of those places most people fly over while traveling somewhere else.
Time to end this worthless political and media circus.
9
It's time to go Ludite with our elections.
2
By all means, let's keep making the Iowans feel small and stupid. That will help us in the general.
2
Iowa greeting: "Wassapp?"
Headline from Iowa: "Caucasian Caucuses Cause Chaos"
6
Occam's Razor, meet Murphy's Law.
K.I.S.S. !
4
Putin 1, Democracy 0.
1
The caucuses did not "melt down". The hastily produced app to report the results failed, and foolishly the Iowa Dem Party manageers didn't provide a robust backup.
Must you overdramatize everything? You are getting as bad as Fox "News".
3
The app failed, then the backup plans failed and we have no results. That's a meltdown.
Are people making too much of it? Yes.
It's far better than the Democratic convention in '68. So there's that.
1
Iowa Caucuses big winner: Donald J Trump
1
Iowa, you made the Democratic Party appear to be the party of stupid, and woefully incompetent to govern, at the WORST POSSIBLE TIME.
5
This is a stupid, undemocratic and wasteful system. Why can't the DNC say all states set a date - allowing that all 50 states do so, early in March - and allow all registered dems to vote. I could go to my local polling station in Mass. and vote for my candidate of choice to be nominee. The top 5 contenders across the nation are the candidates at the Convention. It's all done in one week, less money is spent and all dems get a vote. The results of the debacle in Iowa may prove to be the gift wrap and ribbon on Trump's re-election.
2
“Most of my precinct chairs were a little older,” said Laura Hubka, the Democratic chairwoman in Northern Iowa’s Howard County. “They weren’t comfortable with it.”
Yes, Laura - you ageist nitwit- maybe because it was a bad decision and we older people refused to accept an app written by a private company and which had not been tested for security or tested at scale. Oh, and there was no training...
5
Mike Bloomberg won, he spent no time or money going down this rathole.
3
Iowa in chaos...Hillary declares victory
1
For a time I managed an app start-up. In that role I was involved at a very deep level with issues of app security, encryption, and scale-up on the cloud. While it can be done securely, it is vulnerable in many ways starting with coder inexperience (or in this Iowa case perhaps even poor coder math skills?).
Where are the NSA & FBI and Stanford/Cal Tech/MIT when we need them? A national program like the moon race. The state and even national parties lack the skill sets to secure elections without help from the pros. Paper backups are fine, but in the end flawed in their own tedious and chain-of-custody ways. This is a solvable problem set, but we do not need 50 different solutions, we need one that works!
In remembering the 2020 Iowa SNAFU, do not forget the lessons of 2000 Florida, butterfly ballots and hanging chads.
2
Did Iowa have Boeing write the software? Everything has become so complex. I agree this is why the government can't run healthcare it would have the efficiency and cost control of the Defense Department.
4
And this is the party that wants to run our healthcare system, and indeed nearly every facet of our life can be better run by government? This is the Obamacare (1st) enrollment debacle all over again. I'm guessing a lot of independents (including me) are thinking VERY closely (again) about the wisdom of having such a government heavy hand in our every day life. And the answer is: No.
6
WOW, untested app and no results to be posted.
I think it’s time for Iowa to lose the power they now have with their antiquated caucus system. This problem has caused the Dems to look like idiots!
8
What absolute idiots. Why on earth would they need an app? Also the way they conduct these caucuses with people grouping in different parts of the room and then grouping by room is insane. This is not a voting process. It’s like a bad comedy movie.
Why on earth don’t primaries happen all on the same day. What’s the point of having the taxes staggered? So more money can he raised and spent and so the media can harass the public with endless analysis articles every 5 seconds?
The US is a joke and never was it the world’s greatest democracy.
Ah, programming engineer half-think, nothing works as it is supposed too. All too common in every industry, most of all cars and AI. Spend the */*&#* money and do it properly.
3
NY Times editors: this piece should be at the top.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/04/technology/election-tech.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage
I am again reminded of the movie Idiocracy. A lunatic sexual predator in the White House leading a nation of morons.
Before we ditch digital voting, given Russian (2016)and Republican (Florida 2000) hacking, we should recall that LBJ’s election to the Senate was all analog. Remember Box 13!
It's Putin's fault!
Quick, get Mueller on the case!
4
Let this be a warning for the national elections!
Let’s heed the warning!
Paper ballots, paper trail.... no more antiquated caucuses, Primary votes!
We can’t afford to be this stupid.
Please put Iowa in Super Tuesday and be done with them, time out for you Iowa for the next 50 years, bad Iowa, bad.
6
If Iowa survives this to be first again, then we are truly a stupid people.
6
Trump 2020
3
And once again the Democrats deny Bernie Sanders in an attempt to rig their selection of the candidate for president. I am no fan of Sanders, to say the least. He is an avowed socialist and represents everything contrary to our system of capitalism. However, he was buffaloed by the Democrat party leadership in 2016 when the rules of the selection process were changed to favor Hillary Clinton. Now, when leading substantially in Iowa, somehow the caucuses are botched by a mysterious app snafu, once again denying Sanders his place at the top of the ticket, at least to start the primary process. Rigged system? Coincidence? You decide. I already have.
3
@paul
May I have the honor of being the first to flag this comment for its disingenuous dishonesty? The party leadership did not change the rules to favor Clinton. The rules were what they had always been. What they have done is changed the rules for 2020 to be in line with what Sanders and his supporters wanted. The reset of Paul's comment is also just conspiracy theories. Assuming the author really is Paul. Given that some sizeable fraction of the divisive trash here is likely to be coming from Republican and other trolls. Finally, readers should note that one reliable sign of a fake comment is when it includes claims like "I hate Trump but ..." or "I am no fan of Sanders ... however ..." or "I am a Democrat but ..."
1
In a world in which some -- maybe even many -- no longer care about history, it's important to play the long game and remember that the ancient Maya, who built one of the great civilizations in world history, abandoned it and allowed nature to reclaim their magnificent stone structures, because they lost confidence in their leadership.
When you can no longer trust the process or those in charge of the process, then you splinter, turn inward and disintegrate.
The Trump Administration, China's handling of the coronavirus, Brexit, power concentrated in the hands of the world's "strongmen" and now this: We are going to hell in a hand-basket, abetted by technology. -- thegamesmenplay.com
1
Very Seinfeldesque of the Dems after their spectacular flameout in the impeachment debacle.
And in honor of Jerry's "And you want to be my latex salesman"
And you want to run the country?
5
Just mark an X on a piece of paper, you insufferable narcissists.
5
Typical.... Software not made for users but instead the other way around!!! Many of the users are old people not used to using phone apps!!
If Iowa insists on continuing with this ancient and unfair system, then they must NOT be 1st in nation. LUDICROUS! The system suppresses votes, inordinately sucks up candidates' resources and IOWA does NOT reflect US population diversity. It is, like NH, an almost all-white state!
2
Recalibration is essential. How were best practices of instigating new technology overlooked? How did the right hand not know what the left hand was doing? If this is the 3rd cycle of results that are problematic then what kept the chairman's/administrators from proactive questioning. Iowa needs to do a through vetting of how to fix this for the future and be open about the process. What could go wrong and what will we do are useful planning questions. BUT this isn't just Iowa; problems could happen in any state. Hearing various news anchors preen as if this was a midwest "fly-over" problem wasn't helpful nor will it unite anyone. If you are in the news and you are simplifying a problem to be one of geography or provincial issues you haven't even gotten out of the gate before having bias. This is a national problem and I still don't feel secure that our last election results had purity. Too many pundits jumped too quickly to the bandwagon "results weren't compromised". If that was true how would we have known it so quickly? Take a breath America. This is an opportunity. And BTW Iowa doesn't want to give you false data. That's a positive. Suck it up. One of the problems is the news is demanding immediate results and each station vies to be first. We can manage especially if you don't imply we can't. And turn your attention to that Senate who won't get over the power of Mitch McConnell and get us some voting protection. We want votes to matter.
1
I hope this puts Iowans to shame and they will no longer want to be first in the nation to screw things up. All attention given to a small rural, elderly, lily white state was for naught.
Democratic party elites MUST change the system so little Iowa does not get so much attention and to prevent the results to carry so much weight.
AND the MEDIA needs not focus so much on such a tiny state.
1
There's a fundamental difference between what happened in to the Democrats in Iowa, and the Republicans have done. In Iowa, this seemed to be a technical snafu, as opposed to Republicans' purposeful efforts to undermine fair elections through gerrymandering and restrictive voter registration laws.
The NYT should know better than to jump on the sensational news bandwagon and announce chaos in apocalyptic fashion. People are trying to collect more data this time and trying to do the right thing. As someone who is not a huge fan of the caucuses but participated nevertheless, I appeal to readers to question the tone in which newspapers report (not claiming false news in you-know-whose fashion). It will be alright and the results will be out in a bit. Progressive candidates kicked butt! Can we just celebrate that for a minute?
I don't even need to see the results yet to guess what the "real" problem is here.
The problem is that Biden's campaigned belly-flopped on a grand scale. The Sanders campaign won.
This is merely another disgraceful attempt by the Establishment Democrats to quash a Sanders candidacy. Since their favorite son got spanked, they'd prefer that no one talk about that, and for God's sake, not to talk about a Sanders win.
The Party Dems already tried to kneecap the Sanders campaign by preemptively forbidding him to talk about early results. Now they don't want to hear about any results... until the news cycle shifts to NH.
Why? Why sabotage Sanders again?
Because the DNC is just as dependent upon the billionaire-zillionaire class as the other disgraceful party. Because no one wants to hear or talk about income inequality, or billionaires and corporations actually having to pay taxes like us poor schmucks.
I wish this was a conspiracy theory, but I'm pretty much convinced its the only rational explanation. The delay of results only favors one candidate, the one who will be shown to have absolutely flubbed.
2
Most of the sharpest critics in this thread are from big cities. And most of those critics equate the technology (such as it is) with the caucus system itself. This is a correlation drawn from one event, from which these critics draw a conclusion of causality. Correlation does equal causality. The caucus process, however arcane it might seem to non-Iowans, has nothing to do with this screw-up. It does raise questions about using the technologies of the digital world in elections.
1
Were the lack of caucus results a letdown this morning? Sure. But heaven forbid any of us should have to wait longer than 24-48 hours for official results. Take your time and get it right, headlines and hysteria be damned. In the grand scheme of things, this is small potatoes. Our current impeached president is going to deliver his state of the union address tonight while a morally corrupt GOP senate clears the way for his future unchecked abuses of the office.
Testing for the App probably consisted of the developer downloading the App to a phone, logging in and transmitting 3 numbers while connected via wifi over a T1 connection from their office. Naturally It worked great then. They probably didn't even consider minimum connection speeds necessary to download, install and transmit results. And of course the User, with no training, probably did all the tallying and prep work and then said to themselves, "OK lets download this great new App". I feel sorry for those guys and wonder what they paid the developer for this leap in technology.
4
The democratic party is in disarray, and perhaps they are covering up the vote, which they will continue to do. We all know who won. Principals matter, and Bernie should run as an independent.
3
@sh If you want to make 100% certain that Trump gets reelected, just have Bernie run as an independent.
That's essentially what he did in 2016 -- he was the ghost candidate whose resentful fan base, after the primaries and convention, helped elect Donald Trump.
2
The day before the Iowa caucus, I had trouble connecting to the internet at work. I work retail, and this happens with a new program. But Sunday night, I noticed an update on my Windows 10 program at home; I let the computer do its thing, but before bed, the download got stuck at 91 percent. When I woke up later and checked it (several times), the updates never finished downloading.
In the morning, after the machine purged the worthless code, I could not download other software I needed (everything continually stopped downloading at 91 percent or so).
I blog, write, and edit; I couldn't work all day because the programs I needed wouldn't work. The internet had slowed to a crawl.
Officials in Iowa have said there were no hacks to the system on caucus night, and this is probably true, but I am glad they are taking the time needed to be sure. Yesterday was a lousy day to be online in western Iowa, at least at my house, where high-speed internet comes over the phone lines. I became so exhausted fighting the computer I decided to stay home instead of going to the caucus.
Trump's sons and others are already disputing the Iowa results, even though the Republicans did just fine here. Yeah, maybe it was just a coincidence, but we are already fighting among ourselves. It's polite here in Iowa. But we are beating ourselves up over what happened last night. Sadly, some are gleefully waiting for more. And terrifyingly, I fear the worst is yet to come.
2
So much time spent on Debates. Yet, it looks like not much time spent on verifying the process guidelines, or the check list. Did the party review or evaluate the experience of 2012? Does the caucus system really work? How will things be, moving forward to the other States? Will the Democratic Party review all the short comings and make the necessary corrections?
1
The Iowa debacle only confirms just how vulnerable our entire electoral system remains for 2020. I can foresee a scenario, where we have a contested election and No. 45 exploits the situation to hold onto his throne!
3
In the Iowa crises, the democrats have the opportunity to make the nomination process more representing of their demographics. Iowa is a classical example of "white privilege promoted by both parties.
Our political parties want a state consists of older whiter (91% white compared the nation being 61%), rural, voter to make the most impact in choosing our president. Using traditional as an excuse is pure nonsense of their hidden agendas. The facts are that Iowa represents the demographics of the GOP and NOT the democrats, one should ask, why do they always go first?
The answer is white privilege still rules our politics and if the democratic party wants to have their demographics begin the process of selecting our next president, it is time to take this opportunity from this crises to put Iowa somewhere in the middle of this process and have state or states who represent the true demographics of the nation but especially the democratic party be first.
This is another example of a rigged system favoring the rich and well connected who is more representative of the Iowa demographic than the nation.
This is perhaps, why the young and minorities don't vote, why would they if we continue to push white privilege! This is exactly what Elizabeth Warren has been saying if anyone listens to main thesis of what is wrong with America. It is time that the democratic party becomes more democratic!
This demonstrates several facts. The caucus system is obsolete, too unwieldy and complicated. They need to move to a primary. Secondly, the Iowa State Democratic Party let someone convince them at the last minute (apparently about 2 months ago) to use an app. The app wasn't stress tested, and obviously had a lot of issues. Many couldn't even down load it, much less use it. The Iowas State Democratic Party leadership is not competent, was unprepared and unfortunately for second cycle in a row has caused confusion and suspicion about the process. This needs to go. Candidates should ignore Iowa in the next cycle if they do not change.
5
Forget about Iowa. New Jersey would be the Perfect State for a primary testing ground. It's got 8 million people, swaths of urban and countryside, and is beautifully diverse. Instead it's got a primary in June when either everyone's already decided or gone down the Shore. What say you, Governor Murphy?
2
All of the Democrats focus should be on the totally bogus impeachment cover up.
Iowa won’t matter if our Democracy is dead. All the articles and commentary won’t help to figure out what happened and the results could have been sabotaged.
1
Time to scrap the caucus system entirely in favor of primaries. Start with a Super Tuesday of sorts with primaries in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina. All relatively small states, but representing a much better cross-section of the electorate.
4
Nothing that depends on computers ever works the first time, and usually not the tenth.
4
I consider this fiasco and Boeing's latest 737 woes to be related. Both are side-effects of the "Agile" software development practices that our (I'm a software developer) industry has embraced over the past 15-20 years. While these software development methodologies are great for quickly building a startup's initial product, they're not appropriate for building mission critical systems. In fact, "Fail Fast" is an oft-touted startup motto; a recommendation to release a half-baked product, so that if it's bound to fail, you'll realize it ASAP and try something else before you run out of budget. In such contexts, there isn't anything fatally flawed with the Agile approach. Unfortunately, this mentality has proven less appropriate when lives and/or credibility depend on the software being developed. Arguably, even on projects where Agile practices aren't explicitly adopted, its mentality seeps in anyway. The world has come to expect fast software development times, ignoring or underestimating the complexities and fallibility that lurks within.
5
Lots of people in this thread are overreacting. Get a grip and maybe get a drink or something. The reaction seems worse that the mess in Iowa. And stop with the equating of the caucus system with the technological failure. They are not related. Just because A happened and then B happened does not make for a causal relationship between A and B.
And stop with the arguments that Iowans (1) have more influence than other states and (2) their opinions and choices don't matter because they come from a state that does not reflect the ethnic and racial backgrounds of the country as a whole. They are Americans as much as people in the more demographically representative states are.
The real story, from the information I've read is voter turnout, which seemed to be on par with 2016, but far short of 2008 and Obama's election. Getting the people energized should be paramount to winning in Nov. We may have to many people running, and their messages. Trump just has Trump, and every lie he can think of towards the Democrats. Let's hope a front-runner is found soon. Go, Joe Biden!!!
3
They are handling this Shadow app just as intended.
It was set up by anti-Sanders billionaires and is run by former Hillary staffers. Its top donor is a Pete Buttigieg backer.
It’s not a failure. Hillary's and CIA-Pete’s apps were supposed to under report Bernie's results.
Cue all the Bloomberg talk in the media, mark my words. Like Pete, he'll be another media creation. They tried to make Klobuchar a thing, it almost worked. Yet all they did was cancel Biden.
Also, cue the next narrative that will get constantly pushed, "they can't run a caucus, how can they run a national healthcare program?"
Question is whether Americans are really that thoroughly propagandize and dumbed down to not see what’s happening here.
6
@Chris I'm sorry, but this is nuts. And coming from Berlin? Get a grip people!
However, did anyone think that a Democratic Revolutionary like Bernie Sanders would be given a fair shake in Iowa with the recent polls buoying him up? MSM attempting to spin away his gains with The People. Everyone and his sister and brother was being interviewed and highlighted sans Bernie. This will continue to happen as the have’s want to have. If the world would have a President Bernie Sanders, then there will have been a miracle. Meanwhile all thanks to Nina Turner, Killer Mike, Michael Moore, Cornel West and other saints.
3
I hope is not a total surprise that "Shadow" the company that designed the App is owned and run by former Clinton campaign staffers. The owner is married to a Mayor Pete campaign worker.
How about those ingredients to boil up a hearty conspiracy dish?
Not to have training and a trail run for the App is inexcusable.
Will the DNC have the courage to end this IA first folly and their Byzantine caucus rules?
Do not count on that given their past history in designing the rules for the "debates".
2
As a Florida resident and voter, and former journalist who covered the 2000 chad election and recount, I can only shake my head and wonder when will we ever learn how to hold a safe, secure and accurate election?
Though the caucus vote was run by the party, this should be a warning shot fired across the bow of every Supervisor of Elections office in the country. Be Ready, Get It Right!
1
This app fiasco has shone a shining light on the undemocratic nature of the Caucus voting system.
As another comment has stated, requiring physical presence means that the disabled, elderly, sick and those unable to attend due to work pressures are completely disenfranchised.
I'm surprised that the American With Disabilities Act hasn't made this discriminatory voting system illegal.
Disallowing secret balloting also allows the powerful and influential to bully and intimidate others present.
This app glitch may have done us all a favor if it results in democracy finally reaching the people of Iowa and others who are saddled with a caucus system that belongs back in the days before the secret ballot was introduced.
1
Whether or not the computer system was hacked, the fact that that possibility is so real underscores the importance of safeguarding the electoral process.
We all know that the Russians manipulated the 2016 election and that they're going to do the same for the 2020 election. We all know that Trump and his corrupt administration welcome the Russians' efforts to ensure his Putin-directed administration continuing in office. We all expect that Russians and others will spare no effort to subvert any and all coming elections.
As absurd as all this may seem, it is clear that printed pages cannot be hacked and that hand-marked paper voting ballots have no software code accessible to hackers. The solution is obvious: paper ballots, counted by hand by pairs of observers who agree on the results, which should then be transmitted in person to central tabulation places that do not use networked computers.
It wasn’t about speed or efficacy. It was about creating chaos! Don’t be fooled the DNC is very pleased with itself!
On September 19, 2019, Zuckerberg met 45 in the Oval Office. Quid pro quo - - Lay off Facebook and we'll help you win in 2020. Essentially, this is what 45 said in Davos. In grand prix, if you fail in your first pole position, you're toast the rest of the season.
1
Our expectation of the speed of our election outcomes is ridiculous. In fact, we are very childish about how we handle them as a whole. First of all, we have found that vote by mail with paper ballots are the most convenient and cheapest, and safe way to go. But do we do that? Oh no those that want to cheat will go on about the town hall and civic participation when in truth they want nothing of the kind. So countries get very good results where they require citizens to vote. We act towards our elections as a bunch of yokels showing up at the next carnival faith healer to rip us off again. We need to stop this nonsense make it easier to vote encourage folks to vote and prosecute the only real election fraud that we see over and over again. That would be the crime of removing valid voters from the roll and other efforts to repress the vote.
Ever notice how this type of thing does not happen to the Republicans? We need to get our act together in so many ways.
1
The irony of democrats trying to impeach Trump over trying to rig elections. On top of it the talking points are now to get rid of caucuses just as the talking points were to get rid of the electoral college.
So democrats who can't play and win by long established rules are again playing victim and want to tear everything down. This has the stink of 2016 Clinton cheating all over it. The democratic party is destroying itself and the only salvage is to clean house. Obviously the corrupt machine is doing everything possible to keep that from happening.
3
Having Fun Yet?
Don’t count on the Dems to keep their count straight,
Don’t count on the Dems to keep food on your plate;
It’s Iowa, boys, all caucus confusion
Say it ain’t so, it’s all a delusion
That they have a winner, but just can’t be found
Can’t count the votes, our system’s not sound;
So best to surrender, we don’t have a champ
Can’t count the voters, it’s time to decamp
Up Canada way, a hard freeze in winter,
But count votes they can and have a winner.
1
How did this happen unawares? Did none of the media know about this fiasco when it was being created months ago?
Well, at least they didn't have to use magnifying glasses to interpret hanging chads. Yet.
That's progress for ya. I think.
What's strange, and unexplained, is why the phones weren't working. It's one thing for an untested program to have bugs, but it's a pretty big coincidence when the phones quit working at the same time. Seems more suspicious than it does random.
4
I was a precinct leader in 2016 and caucused for the first time after moving to IA. What a disaster, including with the app the party used then. Before we ever sent in our tallies, we had to wrangle with each other (various candidates' precinct leaders but mainly Bernie's and Hillary's) over (a) who was allowed in to caucus (the rules say anyone can register on the spot and then participate so a lot of Bernie supporters showed up and though they were not on the lists of voters for that precinct and didn't have proof of address they were allowed in), (b) how to count heads (it sounds simple but with hundreds of people gathered in a school cafeteria, milling about, getting into and out of line, it's very hard), (c) whether we trusted each other's counts since we counted each other's supporters and of course got differing numbers, (d) whether it was okay for supposedly neutral caucus managers to wear Bernie T-shirts (we made them turn them inside out before opening the doors), (e) whether people in line (but not in the door) by 7 p.m. could actually come in (the lines were long; we let them in). In the end, we didn't agree on any numbers and had to take our physical notes with counts to the county office the next day. The entire process took several hours. The caucus is an undemocratic mess, closer to the old back-room nominating process..."some people" (whoever they are) get together and decide who to nominate. I did not participate this year and I am not sorry.
15
@Iowan What a farce. Thank you for the post.
2
Thank you for your comment. Time for the DNC to have a huge Super Tuesday primary, we all vote, the vote in national and fair! Listening DNC?
Too much technology! Technology is no longer a tool. It has become a monster that has us in its grip and refuses to let go. Our eyes glaze-over every time Apple comes out with a new thousand-dollar phone and everyone spends hundreds of dollars they don’t have to be among the first to have one, when they hadn’t mastered everything available on the last phone.
We have become insatiable in our love for and dependence upon techno-gadgets. Mary Shelly tried to tell us . . .
5
Elections should be administered by competent neutral officials, not by the general public. No one is going to trust these results, no matter what anyone says. The lesson learned should be that all elections should be paper ballots, optically scanned by machines not connected to the internet, and randomized audits by hand.
I like the idea of a first primary in a manageable size state so that it's not just a money contest. I also like the idea of data for who supporters of nonviable candidates will migrate to.
How about a primary with instant run-off ballots? The instant run-off data might be more valuable than identifying the winner.
A few manageable sized, somewhat diverse states are CT, MD, NM, MI, SC, NV and AR. Let's rotate between states in the future.
6
Typical: Americans only care about elections during the elections. For the rest of the year - or the four years - election funding is cut, security is an afterthought and individual municipalities and counties are forced to develop their own methods.
How can a country all itself "modern" if the most important tool of its democracy is ignored until it falls apart?
7
@D F
We’re not modern in so many ways.
From a program management perspective, what an utter failure.
I guarantee you they were asked to roll this out without beta testing testing because there was no room in the budget for it.
There were probably changes until the very last minute.
There should have been a soft go live where they ran a test with real delegates with no software changes after it. Bet they didn't do that.
They didn't seem to have any training for the entire process either, or it wasn't communicated well.
Nice job team.
5
The app and its debacle is a minor issue. The caucus process itself is the problem. This is the first time I watched a caucus and I was left scratching my head. All it really indicates is which candidate's supporters are most effective at convincing others to jump ship. It was akin to watching an elementary school playing "Red Rover, Red Rover, send Yang's team on over." And to think this will be reported as "(Fill in the blank) wins Iowa". May the caucus rest in peace after yesterday.
11
Classic "blame the users" spin this morning from the Iowa DNC leadership. All of this was preventable with sufficient support and training. Putting things in an app does not make problems go away, nor does it make it all the user's fault. Next time, they need to take their lead from public health and community organizing folks, not slick promises made by IT.
5
This was totally expected given the state of smartphone app development. The app developers testing philosophy is rapidly code, get something out there for users to find errors, fix quickly and redeploy. No thought given to testing under heavy loads. No thought to the underlying infrastructure that the app has to run. No worries, it's in the cloud and someone else's problem. Cellular, wireless, it's all good. not my problem.
7
Maybe just maybe instead of always wanting things quick, fast, instantaneous, the slow sure way is the only way to go.
3
The caucus system, along with the electoral college, are woefully archaic. The caucus system is far too clumsy for a modern society. I watched a video of a woman counting a loosely formed group of people. That is a challenging way to find a tally. It is so easy to miss someone or count someone twice. Furthermore this process discounts those who have difficulty having the time or the means to go sit in some school gym for hours. The population numbers are so far beyond those in 1700 that the process is just too unwieldy. Theoretically everyone should want to participate. I am not sure local school gyms could accommodate those numbers. In this current climate of tightened public discourse and participation in political processes the numbers may be much bigger than in previous times. Spaces that used to accommodate those who came out to caucus may be inadequate this time around. The caucus system is confusing to many so they just don't bother to attend. There is no privacy like provided by a voting booth which is very problematic. Voting in private assures that influence or pressure from others do not taint choice.
This blood bath should surprise no one. But even without there are too many ways it could go wrong. Time to change both the caucus and the electoral college.
7
Yes, the process selects for older moderately well to do voters because they are the only ones who can go to caucus. Parents with young kids at home could at most spare one adult. A babysitter would be an adult missing the caucus also unless the babysitter was a non-citizen. Anyone working a night shift or going to school at night, a lot of folks with disabilities, or retirement home curfews etc would also be disenfranchised.
If the app developers had been hacked and code altered how would they know? A vulnerable supply chain allows attackers to sabotage code before it is deployed. It’s one of the tools in the Russian’s toolbox.
This is why it’s important for cyber security experts to be involved throughout the process.
4
First the Mueller report was inconclusive. The there's the likely impeachment acquittal. And now there's this boondoggle in Iowa. Let's just keep giving Trump reasons to laugh at us guys. This will really help us win the election.
7
The caucus system is an antiquated system and is way past its use. After the fiasco from 2016 regarding the presidential race, Colorado has switched from a caucus to a primary. However, the other offices are to be done by caucus. A waste of time and effort regarding the caucus.
2
Will this latest debacle finally serve as the desperately needed catalyst for us to abandon the absurd practice of caucusing altogether? Let the people vote. This nonsense needs to end.
3
Our electoral system is archaic, flawed and unbalanced.
It is representative of our educational system.
This event does not surprise me in the least.
The Democratic party has trouble organizing a 2-car motorcade.
3
Iowa has lost all of its credibility and importance with this kerfuffle. I'm actually not that disappointed though. Honestly, it's time to move into the modern era and replace this bizarre system. It was controversial and skewed from the get-go.
6
Watching the returns, the danger signs were there: cafeteria table, yellow legal pad, and hand held calculator.
2
Even the most ill informed American can clearly see the incompetence of the Democratic Party. There's no way they want them to run our country.
6
@Hozeking And you think the GOP is competent? Really? At what?
Is this the people who want to run the country from 2020?
5
@Trassens Scary, isn’t it
My head is spinning. THIS is how we select the President of the United States?
2
We no longer select them. The office is bought and paid for by the highest bidder.
2
@William Pining for the days of Tammany Hall
Democrats in Iowa: Helping to Keep America Great.
10
I can see it now on Fox News and the Republican fake news Divine intervention for our chosen one. They said before Trump was called profoundly immoral he was the chosen one. For hundreds of years we use paper and pen ballots we need that in November 2020.
2
Release the results during the last minutes of the state of the union and steal the news cycle from Trump.
3
This is unfortunate but not foul play. I have faith in the results.
I do take issue with the DNC changing the rules to get Bloomberg on the debate stage. He only started running when Sanders and Warren gained traction, both of whom propose a wealth tax.
And it will get really dirty if Bernie ends up being the nominee and Pelosi works with Trump to replace Obamacare right before the summer with a beefed up Republican version.
If you think this is ugly, fasten your seatbelts.
3
What an amazing overreaction. Get a grip people. Mistakes happen. This why ballots should only be counted by hand.
2
@Bill
Unfortunately, with corporate/establishment democrats unwilling to acknowledge the change that is coming within their party, these so-called, "glitches" are getting just a bit too regular.
1
Utterly embarrassing. That shot of a proctor poring over paper vote tallies in a high school gymnasium says it all. Inefficient and outdated.
3
Careful. The last thing we need is to make the Iowans feel small and stupid, driving them in Trump’s arms. The results will come and they are solid, paper based. Be patient.
2
We now know all about Iowa, we will have to wait a little longer for results. Not that important. Now we could talk about the traditional WH dinner before the SOTUS. The CNN reporter has been banned to attend, will other journalists join him and be absent in his support? Just as interesting would be if any members of congress will be absent tonight? Or will there be no protests absent the white dresses?
It doesn't matter.
Trump is re-elected 2020.
See you at the celebration.
5
Where are all the Mr. Smiths when we need them :(
People across the country are livid. Iowa has laid an egg. They have lost the honor of being the first in the nation to hold a caucus/primary. They simply cannot handle the responsibility. It is a national disgrace.
3
Dear Iowa:
We're very sorry, but America can no longer be held hostage to your "our law says we go first" nonsense. Your time is up because you can't be trusted with a simple thing like tallying votes. Belief in voting integrity is hanging by a thread in this nation, so no matter what is announced later today, no one can or will fully believe your results, and that's your doing.
The 2020 election is the most frightening in our history. It will literally determine if the United States will continue under the rule of law and the Constitution, or be redefined as a plaything for the oligarchs and a financial cookie jar for Donald Trump.
American democracy is on life support and the Democrats’ only job is to get her to the election hospital where the best surgeons, the most skilled technicians, and the finest facilities can keep her from flat-lining. Instead of demanding professionalism -- What do we have instead? We have Iowa using their hand crank, party line telephones to figure out what to do, and then they hitch up 'Ol Grey' to the buggy to lumber down the dirt roads to the local country doctor's office. Flat Line!
It won't do, and if the DNC doesn't stop buying bargain apps, playing elite preference in this wasteful mainstream/progressive sideshow, and continue to allow idiot, unreliable primaries, the GOP threshing machine will grind them up like last year’s Iowa corn, and with it, the final remnants of “The Last Great Hope of Earth”.
6
Never postulate fantastical causes when human incompetence suffices as an explanation.
4
trump thinks this is an unmitigated disaster. That is coming from a truly unmitigated disaster.
4
Just scrap it and have a vote. Quaint does not go well with politics.
3
Developing an app in secrecy, failing to test it at scale and failing to train volunteers on its use was pretty much a guarantee of widespread failure. Anyone even remotely connected with software development would know that.
396
@Evelyn Just as anyone remotely connected to common sense would know the Iowa caucus process is an idea whose time passed long ago, as well as wherever there are computers and apps and people who think they are geniuses, we will have this type of "oops".
26
@Evelyn Unfortunately nobody in management ever listens to the concerns of the software developers...
52
@Evelyn
In other words, blatant incompetence, just like the Obama/Biden rollout of healthcare.gov, which cost us 1.7 billion.
18
Just one more reason - if any were needed - to revert to paper ballots in all elections. No fears of hacking or technical breakdowns. And somehow - imagine this! - we were able to get the results that evening or the next day.
6
Sorry to say it, but I am glad. In a democracy, we should all vote at the same time and have the results published at the same time. I don't know why the people of Iowa think they should vet and select the candidates that I get to vote for in New York. Already they winnowed out some good candidates. They are no better than the other 49 states. Let us all vote at the same time. And, let the total vote count be what selects the candidate. This state by state tally is worse than the electoral college. I have to remind people that the number of total national votes Hilary got in 2008 was greater than Obama. Obama won these caucus states.
7
Were the requirements clear? Was the design vetted? Were there reviews, checkpoints and milestones during development? Was there a defined test plan? Was any testing done at all? IT should be left to the professionals.
5
Spending 18 months on political campaings before an election is part of the systemic problem of the American electoral system. Nothing warrants this amount of time and money to have candidates to be elected to lead their parties. Nothing. This marathon is not necessary.
''According to a 2016 report about voter turnout in developed countries, just 53.6 percent of Americans performed their civic duty during the 2012 election cycle, which places the U.S. 31st out of 35 OECD nations. By contrast, Belgium saw the highest percentage of eligible voters turn out for its 2014 election; approximately 87.2 percent of Belgian citizens cast their votes.
Every Australian over 18 is required by law to register to vote and to participate in federal elections. Anyone who doesn’t show up on Election Day is fined AU$20 (around $15). Failure to pay that fine results in even steeper penalties—up to AU$180—and can result in a criminal charge.
People in France and Sweden don’t need to worry about making time to register ahead of Election Day. The government automatically registers voters when they’re eligible—in France, that’s as soon as people turn 18. Sweden relies on tax registries to create lists of eligible citizens.''
There are solutions out there but since the U.S.A. has the best electoral system, the best senate, the best judicial system, the best planes crashing to earth and the best _______ (fill in the blank ad nauseum). No need for any change.
14
“Even before Monday, there were other concerns with the app itself, which was developed by a private firm called Shadow.”
The app developer is named SHADOW? As in darkness, a lack of light, low visibility? Not a great way to establish trust with a process that is supposed to be one of the most transparent and honest in our society.
4
The Democrats are like the Knicks of politics. You want to like them. But they make it so hard...
15
@GMooG Priceless
1
One nationally funded primary three months prior to to a federally funded election on a declared holiday. Stop the pan handling. Stop the greed.
11
Why do I think that Bernie won and they're recounting since that obviously can't be right.
10
It seems that the American people there elections right there hack by the Russians 2016 to help President Donald Trump get in office, this is a national disgrace how do we know who we elect and we can't get it right now Sen. Mitch McConnell or the Congress should start new legislation to get it right this is horrible for the electric this is not America if you cannot fix the problem here with our elections.
Iowa what happened there the shot that was heard around the world people in dismay in the United States because of the file up of the Democratic or Republican party that can't seem to get it rate right. Is now to get it right we should Sen. Mitch McConnell sitting on his desk our bills to improve the electoral system this is a follow up with the Republicans get their act together and no time in American history we need this to be solved we send people to the moon we can't get in the electoral college votes right we can't get the American people bolts right is a sham a shame and a disgrace .
I waited all night last night to hear the results of the elections in Iowa nothing a coating air a glitch I cannot believe this is even happening where are our legislators they should be in Washington making a new bill to fix the problem so we don't have to go back in 2016's or other elections we need action and now.
3
Iowa is officially irrelevant now. It doesn’t matter anyway, as Bloomberg is going to take the nomination.
2
Yes, we give you the people who want full control over your healthcare. I am so stoked to see that happen.
5
Just a preview for November when every state will question the results. Russia, good job! Trump, good job! You have taken big steps to ruin our democracy. Wait until Nov. indeed. Good job GOP, you have joined in the frey.
@K Shields This was home grown Democrat incompetence. Russians and a Trump had nothing to do with it.
Whatever the end results are, no one will believe them.
4
The Iowa caucuses from the Heartland no less.
Democracy is always messy, but this is ridiculous and momentously embarrassing for the Hawkeye state.
As for the candidates, well they ought to take a deep breath and cool their heels instead of contributing to the first installment of election mania.
So much more to come.
5
It's incredible how fast the process of becoming a banana republic has been. Everything is falling apart.
9
Just for laughs, I want to know the CVs of the folks who developed this app. Thanks.
3
@h king They are mostly Hillary’s tech team veterans.
Great, just what the GOP needs to full the fire of the elections. All the Democrat nominees running around like the Keystone cops , bumping into walls and looking utter ridiculous. This could have been vetted out beforehand ?
3
I think we can safely wait a day or longer.
2
Let's all move on from a state with 41 delegates and not a clue as to how to process voting.
3
Arguably the most important election of the past 100 years and we Democrats are doing everything within our power to steal defeat from the jaws of victory.
3
The Iowa Democratic Party has just announced that the "majority" of the election results will be released "at 5:00 pm Eastern time." They didn't say what day.
7
Incompetence or corruption, take your pick. Either way, no one should trust the DNC ever again to be transparent or execute something properly.... this is a broken and biased party. Citizens of all political leanings, party members or not, demand answers and accountability. After the blatant favoritism and borderline corruption within the DNC in 2016, the party has violated any trust I have in them... it’s time for people to leave. I have already.
2
@F. Jozef K.
When a party is STILL controlled by an outdated corporate/establishment that because they were handed several million dollars, the DNC immediately changed their rules to allow an "interloper" BILLIONAIRE to enter the fray without condition, one finally realizes why "progressives" like Sanders and others recognize the obvious corruption and why the party must be totally overhauled?
Ask yourself, who are actually the REAL opposition to the vast majority of democratic voters and democracy? Trump and republicans, OR recognizing their days are numbered, the "old guard democratic establishment" who will do anything to hold on to their power, no matter the cost?
1
@Deus i think we’re largely in agreement , however I do not believe the party can be or should be salvaged, and that’s perhaps where we differ in our prescription.... everyone should at least suspect that the same influencers and monied interests who are propping up Trump administration and candidacy are heavily hedging their self interest in lobbying and coercing the Perez DNC... they can tolerate a Biden or Buttigieg administration but not a Sanders one... I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t garner enough influence within the DNC and sought to sabotage this caucus to make the entire party look bad.... either way, something is suspiciously wrong here. Des Moines Register poll fails to be released because of a methodology error? Give me a break....
Would not be a legitimate caucus in 2020 without uncertainty, conspiracy theories with a Twitter "it does seem odd that...." hashtag. Here we go folks!
This reflects poorly on the Democratic party. An app by a company named “Shadow” that no one is trained on before the event?
Talk about losing faith in the system.
6
The app was not ready for prime time. The Iowa Democratic Party is not ready for prime time. I can only imagine the variety of losers required to create a disaster of this magnitude for something this important. There has always been a compelling reason Iowa should not go first in primary season. Let's hope and pray this seals the deal. We can't have these clowns doing this.
4
Log-ins? Downloads? Maybe, God forbid, passwords? Has none of these people learned anything in the past 20 years of this nonsense? The tech geeks who tell you how great it will be are only ever trying to flaunt their own limited expertise, not help you or your organization. Would some adult in the Democratic Party please tell the tech boosters to get lost permanently? And maybe Tom Perez should not let the door hit him as he leaves.
5
Well, Tammany Hall is famous for delaying results to make sure the numbers are “right”. One person one vote expect when someone voted “wrong” and needs correction.
4
A rare Luddite victory !
3
@Khagaraj Sommu Thank you for the deep chuckle. Amen!
I am reassured by them having paper backups. It may not be quick. But it is reliable.
If you live in a rural area, you may understand. Family members came to visit me. They were confused by the fact that their cell phones were sporadically working. They were convinced that I could get 5G service in the house, somehow, (but maybe I was just too stupid to figure out how.) We went to a restaurant in the nearest small town. Better, but still not stable enough to do some stuff on their phones. Low level panic ensued.
And now we want to do nationwide single day online voting?
What could possibly go wrong?
3
Other outlets report more on Shadow, apparently a Hillary Clinton and Democratic Establishment outfit: "
Shadow..........was formed by “campaign and technology veterans” who worked for Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Apple and Google.
It is amazing the state party bought this essentially sight unseen and untested. It must have come with the right recommendations.
If Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have a financial interest, let them declare so or deny it, now.
These characters have the utter gall to hoot on about "Russian" hacks. The party is as evidently corrupt as 2016, when they snookered Bernie for the first time.
3
Who benefits from invalidation of the Iowa caucuses?
Joe Biden and the DNC.
3
No system for error correction in either the app development, its rollout, or in the caucus process itself. Result: anarchy.
I feel bad for the appless, I mean hapless, Iowa election volunteers who were just trying to be civic-minded and now are being unfairly ridiculed.
3
Chaos is a ladder.
I love it! This fiasco reflects what the Democrat Party has become: a ship of fools that is sinking fast. Thank you.
2
Makes the Dems look incompetent and manipulative. Their integrity is greatly diminished. It dove tails into the Russia probe and the impeachment. The more they do poorly, the better trump looks.
2
Like usual the DNC turns out to be its own worst enemy. Good grief.
5
“ I am not a member of any organized party. I am a democrat”. Will Rogers
4
Headline "Confused and Angry Democrats" was not the best idea for the now perversely left-wing NYT. It forces the reaction "Well, aren't they always?" Democrats' complex schemes to solve nonexistent problems don't work. In the end, after the expense and wasted energy, they prove to have been poorly planned and executed, all to no good end. This has become a specialty of the party. The botched phoney and country-dividing impeachment is another, bigger sad example. Everyone on board for more of this?
No need to worry about the Russians messing up our elections, We can do that ourselves.
6
Reason number 897 for why I am no longer a Democrat.
2
No problem, the Iowa Democrats only need to repeatedly claim their caucuses were “perfect” and any claims of snafus are a “witch-hunt” and “hoax”. Problem solved.
1
If Democrats are smart, they will use the Republican playbook and start spreading word claiming Russian and Ukrainian involvement.
2
"Christopher C. Krebs, the director of the Homeland Security Department’s cybersecurity agency, said late Monday that the mobile app had not been vetted or evaluated by the agency."
Remember Walter G. Krebs of Television fame? Are you still trusting Television or the Republican Homeland Security people? Yes, like all uniforms, they are Republican. Would you Democrats really trust having your software analyzed by Republicans?
And the company that developed the app is called "Shadow"?
2
All the people I have seen in the caucus photos are white. WHy is such a homogeneous state so important to selecting the candidate? Iowa is anything but an accurate representation of the USA.
Caucusing looks like fun on the other hand, but I bet it gets tiresome with so many people.
2
@Timuqua I disagree with your angle of Why?: it's because Iowa is a state where it happens to start the process and there are a lot of white people there--not all white people are alike, by the way. The presidential elections only starts there: influential, yes, but it doesn't take the general election.
HMM...
Last poll before caucus had a glitch and wasn't released and now vote counts were botched.
I smell a conspiracy against Bernie Sanders to deprive him of momentum.
Remember 2016?
3
The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world to call cellphones "smartphones"
What's happening in Iowa is not smart. It looks like Florida in 2000 when we were treated to the reassuring sight of "officials" hunched around ballots poking and scratching at hanging chad.
That was twenty years ago. You've come a long way, Baby.
3
As a software engineer, I have to laugh at this entirely predictable outcome. Not training users or testing the app before the primary? That's hilarious.
As a citizen concerned about the state of democracy in America, I'm shocked and appalled. This outdated, undemocratic, non-inclusive approach to choosing a candidate is a disgrace. It's inappropriate to allow unrepresentative, 97% white, rural Iowa such a dominant role in the process.
I'd rather see the whole primary process boiled down to a few days with, say, 1/4 of the population voting on each of 4 days. So we'd pair big states like CA, NY, and TX with a larger number of small states. And make the order random! Seems much more democratic to me.
229
@Rich
Like the idea you've presented, though, we think the electoral college is more of a problem than the anachronistic 2-party system shenanigans. Independents should figure out how to run their own candidate, IMHO.
As an aside, having lived all around the country as an interracial couple (yes, even Iowa), your characterization of that population is offensive to me. I don't think we've experienced a more thoughtful electorate than Iowa despite its racial make-up, though we've never lived in NH.
8
@Rich
Yup, total amateur hour. I would laugh if it weren’t such a disgraceful example of sloppy planning, craftsmanship and execution.
5
@Rich Really? Given that wish, you'll never again see a candidate like Barack Obama. Or Ronald Reagan.
Did the DNC learn nothing from FIFA who foolishly deployed VAR on a wide scale for the first time during the World Cup?
How can you try to launch an app without fully testing it and them debut it on prime time - the first caucus to kick off the primary calendar? Yikes....
2
We Democrats are so doomed. Say it ain’t so.
2
Iowa has 99 Counties, 1600 Caucuses,
so around 16 Caucuses per County.
Have each Caucus report to its County Headquarters
by phone. That should not take longer than one hour.
Have ten Counties, each, report their results to
District Vote headquarters by phone.
That should not take more than an hour.
Then have those ten District Headquarters report
to the State Vote Headquarters.
That should take no more than an hour.
No need for computers, phone apps, hung up calls.
Along the way the accumulated totals could be accessed
by the Media and Campaigns to give you a running total
that would provide a pretty accurate idea of who was
winning in Iowa.
3
I'm trying to look on the bright side. When the Democrats overcome this opening night glitch and go on to a resounding victory in November, they'll only look the better for it.
There is a tremendous opportunity, too, for all candidates to act and appear presidential, managing a crisis with a cool head. Lashing out at one another, at political operatives, or "the system" is not where they should go. Look forward and let go until it can be straightened out.
Having said all of that, I vote for no more caucuses and moving opening night to another state a bit more representative of the country.
4
Please also report about where the Iowa Caucus went well. The Iowa caucuses give candidates an opportunity to campaign without having to have an enormous amount of money to start, Iowa voters faithfully attend events and listen to candidates. Reporters also have a chance to talk to candidates and their supporters in Iowa.
The caucus I went to was well attended and the precinct chair was organized and followed his script. The many volunteers were outstanding and knew what they were doing. The facility was ADA accessible. We were given paper forms to fill out that were clearly marked 1 and 2. The instructions were clearly given, and the forms were properly collected in a timely manner.
At my caucus where hundred of people attended, Biden was not viable by about 42% after the first alignment, and his supporters were all of an old demographic and sitting down. Bernie's supporters were milling about and not contained. Warren had a mixed demographic and did well. Yang was not viable but had some strong supporters. Amy and Pete are the future and had about the same number of supporters--Amy slightly more. Both were viable. The Pete supporters had tremendous energy and vitality. Amy's supporters and Pete's were organized and friendly (not aggressive like the Bernie supporters). Amy and Pete have the most appeal going forward because as centrists they can both pull in voters from the left and right. Too many voters are a hard no on Bernie.
3
@Charlie At my precinct the first alignment numbers were 80 for Bernie, 64 for Warren and 50 for Pete. Amy was in the 30’s, Biden in upper 20’s, Yang had 16, Steyer had a few, and Bennet had 1. I did not feel well so left before the subsequent alignments. Even though this snafu with the app occurred, I would think precincts would be able to let the heads of the campaigns in DesMoines know what these figures were and at least give a general idea where each candidate stood, albeit not an official count. A sad day for my state, but like everything that happens, this too shall pass, it won’t ever be forgotten, but it will be easier to stomach as time goes on.
The caucus system (not just in Iowa, but especially there) is inherently such an ordeal and so inconvenient, that it is really a form of voter suppression -- because it discourages people from participating in the vote to select the party's nominee. Sure, it's a primary and not a general election, but then so was the old White Primary in the southern states.
5
This seems right for the ‘time of Trump’
I don’t even blame him or Russians. I was a software developer and know how new apps can fail. I always made my users go thru at least one month parallel full test cycle in the live environment before I made any new system live. There are always issues & surprises that don’t show up in a test.
It’s just that this is a crazy time and crazy things are bound to happen all the way to people believing Donald Trump and planning to vote for him although he’s made it abundantly clear that his policies are meant to advance himself and will hurt anyone who isn’t Trump or already wealthy.
We’re in for a rough ride and we’ll all lose if Democrats don’t smarten up. Trump wants to run again Sanders. Republicans are ready for him. He’s afraid of Biden but even more afraid of Bloomberg, a wealthy man who didn’t inherit his money, never went bankrupt and pays taxes.
6
I'm a Democrat, but I hate to agree with Ted Cruz: how can Democrats manage government run health care if they can't even count votes!
8
@John: I disagree. The votes were tallied correctly, it’s in the reporting with the app where things went wrong, due to it appears a major software error.
1
@John it's one state, not to mention an array of variables. Have patience. Issues like this early on will only strengthen the resolve for accurate vote-counting measures during the REAL election. I'd rather this happen in Feb in all honesty. It may be a nasty fight in Nov if the election is close. Better iron out the kinks now.
2
@John
Let us clarify the fact that it is STILL the "old guard" corporate/establishment wing of the democratic party that "rules the roost" during any election, just another reason why the younger more progressive generation feel now is the time to overhaul a party and its "hangars on" to make it relevant and accountable to its constituents, NOT the corporate donors and their wish for the "status quo".
1
It was time for the Democrats to use the GOP playbook.
They should have immediately blamed the Russians and the GOP for interfering in our elections.
They should have 24/7 repeated this mantra on all the TV stations, and to any reporter that asked them.
In our society, where truth doesn't matter now, they should have started the never ending chant of GOP/Russian election interference.
Truth doesn't matter any more, just keep repeating the lie and it will become accepted fact.
5
@galtsgultch The GOP playbook? I believe the Democrats were the party blaming the Russians for stealing the 2016 election, no?
2
Really? We can't wait a day or two for solid results? Is this THAT important? Are we so demanding of instant information that we can't compute that a short wait might be worth it to get a complete and accurate set of results?
I sort of understand and do respect that the results of the caucuses can be interesting information for various parties. But, the failure to provide instantaneous results does not constitute a "meltdown", or "failure".
I fear that the situation has devolved so far that we simply equate campaign coverage with "who is ahead and who is behind". Even the campaigns seem to have fallen into the trap -- questioning the integrity of the system because it didn't produce instant statewide results. As the article says, this is powered solely by volunteers. Can we give them a break?
Have we completely forgotten how to treat campaigns seriously -- treat the candidates seriously, treat the issues seriously? Are they qualified? Where do they stand on important issues?
I am really disappointed the Times has used the highly-charged word "meltdown" to describe this.
4
@John (in Arlington): Thank you.
Maybe Iowa shouldn't be first, but I think its funny people are calling it "undemocratic" and calling for a nationwide primary day.
A nationwide primary day would be problematic for underdog candidates. Candidates like Amy Klobuchar could not afford to run a nationwide campaign. By having staggered primaries with small states first, it helps underdog candidates get traction that might be impossible otherwise.
Also a caucus is very democratic. The participatory nature is actually a good thing. We need more of that, not less.
Do you mean to tell me that the party whose chairman in 2016 fell for a rudimentary phishing scam, and whose email password was "password," can't run a simple app to accurately tabulate the results of their own primary? I am shocked!!!
So sure, by all means let's have them take over healthcare, hi-tech and the energy markets!
4
@GMooG: The DNC is not involved in government. What about a president who holds up top secret documents to foreign visitors, and blabs confidential info to the Russians?
@GMooG
You mean, we should give over control of healthcare to the party that clearly doesn't care about providing it? Why not? The Republicans are striving to destroy the "free market system" that Obama pioneered, while replacing it with - what? Nothing.
When you are charged $300 for a Tylenol, and your coo-pay is $295 (if you are lucky enough to afford insurance), think about how much the Republicans despise you.
And when you Medicare and Social Security are privatized out of existence, consider how you paid increasingly large taxes into the system, while corporations and the very rich got massive tax breaks.
Cuddle up to that future.
1
Yeah, I'm sure the Republicans would be so much better at healthcare, high-tech, energy, the environment, foreign relations, immigration and all if we could just have them in charge, but......oh, wait....
The criticality that the app should work must be 100% minimum, and the necessary redundancies to ensure success needed to be coded in the first place, then fully tested alongside the main functionality. This is not secret knowledge. What happened is a manager pushed out the app statewide regardless whether the coding was finished and fully tested. Very common blunder among relatively fresh college graduates, i.e., that all you have to know is how to type into the person-facing app, and just ignore the hard work needed under the hood.
1
An App that essentially records and transmits 3 numbers doesn't sound very complicated. Must have got a ten year old to write the code.
3
And these are the people who want to run our health care?
4
@Ed: No, they are not.
1
This debacle could be due to bad organizational skills and ineptitude OR as some others have suggested, it could be a well orchestrated "fix." (Let's be realistic; politics is blood sport."
To me, this may well be an indication of the type of skulduggery Sanders would have to deal with as president.
It's also an indication of why America - as well as the rest of the world - so badly needs his leadership.
1
Not everything need be automated. (CEO, Computer Software for Professionals, Inc)
1
Isn’t it time we took volunteers outta voting? Gosh, we even hire and pay people to count the census.
1
@Sheela Todd
Unfortunately, elections and election needs are shunted aside once the elections are over. Sure, professionals would be an improvement - but only if they are well-trained and conscientious.
As long as local and county governments have to pay for it, volunteers will be the only way elections can be held.
One ballot; one method, one machine. California's Ink-A-Vote is fine. Your mark the ballot with a stylus type stamp. Hand your ballot in and GET A RECEIPT; that is traceable back to your ballot. Then the votes are counted in a SIMPLE electronic way. Everything can be recounted and traced , if necessary. This machine and method should be utilized IN ALL FIFTY STATES. Enough of this every county has a different method.
7
@Surfrank
But at least in my jurisdiction (LA Country) the receipt only shows that you voted. It does not record your votes.
I can’t wait for driverless cars.
11
This is inexcusable.
Rehearse?
Also inexcusable is national media's failure to challenge this undemocratic caucus process. It excludes virtually all voters.
1
Invalidate the results and reapportion the delegates over the balance of the races.
1
This will teach Iowa not to follow Boeing's method of updating users on how to use new apps.
2
I don't think Iowa or the democrats can blame anyone else for this. Although no fans of Trump, our household members are betting that sooner or later the Iowa State party leaders will get around to blaming him. It's all become too ludicrous.
2
When you write ‘wheels up’ are you referring to the Amtrak passenger trains the candidates are taking to reduce their carbon footprints?
2
It was an app that failed, not the caucus system. Getting rid of the caucuses because an untested app fails is like leaving the bath water and throwing out the baby.
1
“Only I can fix this”. Another win for Trump, he will ride this mess right until November.
2
Ah, the faith in technology again misplaced. Remember the tech failure that “launched” (undermined) Obamacare? Just the description of the thinking and execution sounds like typical tech-project bungling, a combination of poor mgmt and planning, insufficient testing, overconfidence.
2
As an outsider looking in this appears as another HUGE nail in the coffin for the Democrats.
Mueller, the ineffective impeachment process and now this. The Dems have given DJT plenty of ammo to toss their way.
Lots of luck bailing yourselves out of this one. It's not like they didn't know this date was coming.
You get what you deserve.
1
Troy Price, the chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party, has some explaining to do.
Perhaps some NYTimes journalists can remind him of his Jan 14th proclamations to NPR:
"Despite Election Security Fears, Iowa Caucuses Will Use New Smartphone App"
"If there's a challenge, we'll be ready with a backup and a backup to that backup and a backup to the backup to the backup," Price says. "We are fully prepared to make sure that we can get these results in and get those results in accurately."
6
I think it's time to scrap the caucus and have a regular primary like everyone else. If you don't train properly on the new apps. it's hard to expect things to go smoothly. It's primary time Iowa!!!
1
Dems; Way to help putting Trump back in the White House.
I can hear him now:
'The brain dead Dems can't even run their own election. How can they run the country?'
So, the IDC used new software this time around?
Basically they used a beta release of software for the most important primary caucus in Iowa history.
Trump is in the White House.
That's the bad news.
The Dems are our only hope.
That's the other bad news.
There is no good news.
Don't want to start a new conspiracy but watching the reporting from last night it seems that the Democratic Party' favorite wasn't doing to well. Evidently this make the imprachement trial mute as it doesn't involve a political opponent but just a US citizen. Are we getting rigged results?
The Iowa Democratic Party owes Iowa voters a sincere appology.
6
.. perhaps they should have paid to remove the ads from the app first for full functionality! ;)
Can there be a bigger joke than the process of selecting the Democratic party nominee?
If running this Caucus is not an Iowa State Dem Party Core Competency, what is? Sounds like some resignations in order. Never attribute to malevolence what can be explained by incompetance
3
This byzantine system is no way to run a democracy. The incompetence is mind boggling and alarming for other countries desperately hoping the democrats can get their act together and select a viable, competent, sane candidate to unseat Trump. What a farce.
So was it sabotaged on purpose? Possibly so it won’t ever go back Iowa. I’m sure a lot of the left can’t stand to go to fly over country.
This is the perfect reason why many of us are so skeptical and leery about giving governments more and more power whether it be about our health care, industrial control, financial records, etc. Mr. Sanders and Ms. Warren want health care to be completely taken over by the federal government and Iowa could not even send out voting records for one evening. And let's not forget the debacle that the ACA had with its start up when patients did not know who their doctors were for several months, in many cases. Private companies and the people who work for them are nearly always more state of the art, more tech savvy, and more intelligent, than those who choose (are stuck) working for a government bureaucracy.
This is not a "glitch." This is an unforgivable and completely avoidable disaster. Whether there is more to it, something truly dishonest, hardly even matters.
I think people who live in Iowa are absolutely as important as people who live on the coasts; I'm from the midwest with some family roots in Iowa. Last night, however, was the first time I ever watched the caucus process, the embarrassing antics of grown adults turning our election into a game of capture the flag. The party apparatus in Iowa has shown themselves to be incompetent two election cycles in a row. We just can't afford to make them the face of our party again. Ever.
200
@Jersey Not just Iowa leadership. How do the DNC leadership relieve themselves of all responsibility for this mess?
26
@Blair Exactly, the DNC needs a complete overhaul. Enough is enough.
15
@Jersey John can we just scrap the electoral college, closed primaries, and Caucasus and go to a nationwide popular vote for the primaries and general election already please? 😭😭
6
Lucky for Biden that nobody knows the results yet. He came in fourth, just above Klobuchar. That would have been the headline last night had the results been released in a timely fashion, that the Biden campaign is on life support. Now he swoons into New Hampshire, unabated, given that even once the results are known, they’ll be so convoluted that none of it will matter.
Don't blame the caucus system. And don't blame hacking. Votes are data. Data have to be handled per strict protocols, or inconsistencies will pop up. If they do, a seed of doubt is planted and people start pointing fingers. Even minor, no-big-deal-easy-fix inconsistencies can have that effect. Everyone, chill.
Hey, I've got an idea: let's develop an app two months before the biggest political event in years, not test it, and then give it to a bunch of 80-year old farmers to use. What could possibly go wrong?
5
Let's look at the big picture here. What we have is a failure of infrastructure. This is at a time when hyper-partisan paralysis means we can't handle the basics -- from pot holes at the local level to the FAA's failure to keep airplanes from falling out of the sky at the national level, and so much in between. Both political parties must abandon hyper partisanship and relearn the principle that politics is the art of compromise. As we yell at the local level, "Fix the pot holes!." Let's get back to the basics. Make things work!
2
Perhaps Shadow should recruit someone with a formal CS or math education. According to the profiles of their employees on linkedin, none, including the founder, are guilty of possessing a degree in STEM. Ideology has limits...
3
This is just an utter embarrassment. Why the Democrats only thought just a few short months ago that an app could be developed and used in time for the Iowa caucuses defies belief. That it was not at all tested is beyond laughable. And who was this firm called "Shadow". Does the name speak for itself? That the Sanders and Buttigieg campaigns declared themselves victorious while the results are still in doubt says little about both candidates. I'm ashamed to be a Democrat. Is this the best we can do?
102
@Michele Only someone without any knowledge of technology would think you could use untested software. And then to have the arrogance to expect people to use it without training is maddening. These people should never be allowed to work for an election again in any capacity. If the Democrats allow Iowa to be their leading state again they will demonstrate that they cannot learn from their mistakes. This was a clown show.
24
@Michele I believe this was a calculated call on the part of the Democratic establishment in order to muddy the waters. We already know they don’t want Senator Sanders to gain the nomination, or the presidency: on top of the media largely ignoring his campaign and later attacking him once he gained too much momentum to ignore, they most recently withheld the latest and historically most accurate Iowa poll days before the caucus (and on shaky grounds at best). My theory: Sanders was surging and they didn’t want to release a favorable poll that might sway undecided voters to support him. Now we hear an untested app was implemented and when the backup system of phone calls was used to report the results they were ignored. Furthermore, photo documentation was taken and HAND DELIVERED to DNC headquarters and turned away without explanation. Why have no partial results been released? “Quality control?” Yet they say the ballots themselves are not being called into question? I’m not at all convinced by their behavior or their sorry excuses for this debacle. All this does is further undermine our faith in the democratic process. It is a sad time for America, I only hope we can bridge the divide. I understand not everyone is as excited as I am for a Sanders Presidency, but if he is the candidate the people are backing (as I believe is the case), the powers that be within the Democratic Party must allow his candidacy to proceed unhindered, or this will surely be the death of the party.
7
@Michele. Yes and this is why Trump will win the next three presidential elections.
With something as important as an election to decide who will lead your country, why not learn from past adverse experience? I cannot fathom why America has deemed it so difficult for people to visit a Polling Station, (how ever many local establishments such as schools, libraries, et al) to cross a box on a piece of paper? Logistically, children get a day off. Teachers, Librarians, and support staff get a day of running an election. After school staff, ditto. Then, there are a few hours, usually staffed by volunteers, until the polls close at 2200hrs. I really thought that those pregnant Chads would have given birth to some common sense.
5
I don't think the Russians are going to be needed this year. The DNC has it covered.
33
This is utterly ridiculous. I am not a Luddite. However, voting is sacred. Remind me - what was the problem with paper ballots?
184
@Judith Stern Although I’d like to think I’m not one either, the advent of this debacle as well as the broadening use of face-recognition software that cannot distinguish complexions darker than a brown-paper bag are making it harder not to become one.
Bring the paper ballots back! They always worked for us in Louisiana :)
21
@Judith Stern
Demand paper ballots for every state.
15
@Judith Stern
The republicans wanting to steal the 2000 election was and apparently is the problem with paper ballots. In other words they are just fine but we have to go on pretending there was a real problem because??????? I guess the powers that be are to afraid of holding real dictators they can actually lay their hands on to account.
4
One thing we can all believe is the local level volunteers who tallied the votes did their job with integrity. The American people must immediately regain control of how their elections are tabulated. Get involved in the process of deciding how you want your vote to be handled and counted. We’ve had far too much controversy in the last several election cycles related to electronic voting machines and their manufacturers. This uncertainty, cascade of errors, and fear of hacking has to stop or we citizens won’t be able to trust some electronically produced result. Demand and expect better from those in charge of our vote.
7
Technology that has become so prevalent in our daily lives will (sooner than later) lead to our downfall, and there's really nothing we can do to stop it.
4
Who makes the decision as to
how Iowa votes in the primary?
How can we from other States
put pressure on Iowa to join the
current century. Who is it we can write letters to about this
antiquated system trying to use
tech they don't understand ?
Who is head of the Dem. Party of Iowa and does that committee make
decisions for the entire State?
I am beginning to think the Democrats can't get anything done correctly. Let's get Mike Bloomberg
as President, one who has experience actually running big companies and a metropolis.
1
The app used for the Iowa caucuses was apparently vetted by Robby Mook, the former Clinton campaign manager who, beginning in the summer of 2016, was alerted to looming electoral catastrophes in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
His response was to do nothing, despite fellow Clinton staffers literally begging him to see the writing on the wall.
Hillary went to campaign elsewhere, an ad was filmed with Bernie promoting Clinton, but the campaign decided not to air it, even in the states where she needed the most help with working class voters.
Much has been said about the rot within the Democratic establishment, and anyone doubting those claims only needs to look at how it rewards failure with greater opportunity, then stands back and wonders aloud how the party once again finds itself mired in disaster, insisting that no one could’ve foreseen any of it.
26
So it turned out there was a coding error after all. Rushed development. Insufficient QA. No dry run months in advance. Sadly this happens all too often these days.
And we were led to believe the problem was befuddled senior volunteers who aren’t tech savvy. It’s not rocket science. We know how to plan and run a boring old paper based, telephone reporting system that has an audit trail and produces verified results on time.
4
So, it appears that coding is not taught in Iowa’s public schools. Same for how to test new products before they are rolled out.
1
@Bascom Hill The app was developed by a company in Washington, DC, not Iowa.
In Canada, paper ballots are used, and they are hand-counted. Voters wait (usually overnight, but sometimes a day or so longer) for the final tally to be announced.
Kevin Roose had a helpful column in today's NYT regarding this.
Election tabulations are so important, why must we continue to rely on technology which is so vulnerable to error and hacking, regardless of the expertise of the user?
Perhaps we're all too addicted to instant gratification and fear of being cheated, but this would be an adjustment that over time would give more security not less. Restraint and circumspection could be reintroduced into the reporting process.
And the 24-hr-news channels would have to find something else to speculate about. The vote counting process shouldn't be subject to the needs of flash-reporting/programming and the collective yawp of electronic media that introduce destructive speculation and paranoia into the country's bloodstream.
As if we needed any more of that.
19
@cmk: Just had to say to you: "Very nice!"
After all the time and money spent in Iowa by the democratic candidates resulted in not having important totals, where do they get a refund?
1
The entire Iowa caucus system has to be the most undemocratic process I have ever seen. The number of people disenfranchised is astounding as there is no way to participate unless you are physically present at a caucus site. There are numerous scenarios that come to mind: if you work the 3-11 shift you cannot participate; if you are out of town for work, you cannot participate; if you are the primary care provider for a sick child or parent it would be very difficult to participate; and two parents would have to choose who gets to go and who stays home with the kids if they can't find a sitter or the sitter calls off. But most importantly, Iowa does not reflect the electorate as a whole, thus giving that state far more power (and disproportionate power) in the process than it deserves. Let's go to a regional primary system and simplify the process so ALL people can meaningfully participate.
8
Can we put an end to the tradition of the same states starting the primary/caucus season off every year?
Here's a idea. Split the country into five regions of 10 states apiece. Randomly order the states in each region. Then, run primaries/caucuses for five states each week for ten weeks.
Set that random order the first time, but from then on, the states cycle through. I.e., if NY state were week 2 in 2024, they would go to week 1 in 2028, while the previous #1 goes to #10; if PA were week 2 in 2024, they would go to week 3 in 2028, and so on. So, every 40 years, every state will have been at any point in the sequence. States will have eternity to plan, since the order will be permanent.
Much more fair. I don't know the mechanism for making such a change, but it seems far superior to privileging some states above others.
4
Maybe the most important thing for Democrats right now is to stop assuming the worst about each other. Assume these volunteers at precincts around Iowa are NOT part of a vast conspiracy, and that in fact technical glitches and human error are often to blame for problems involving humans and/or human-made technology.
We all want to defeat Trump. Most of us really don't care who the next president is, as long as this person can drain the Trump swamp and move left on major issues.
Now, relax, focus. It's gonna be okay if we don't tear each other's throats out before the primaries are over.
6
Hopefully the ripples of this sadly hilarious incompetence will include consigning the caucus system in general and the 'First Four' (IA, NH, SC & NV) to the dustbin of history. Quaint nostalgia for retail politics and regional toe-dipping does not democracy make. Well-meaning amateurs running elections wouldn't pass muster as reasonable advice on the democratization of some banana republic. These early tests should be as of little importance to the outcome as the First Four does to the NCAA basketball tournament--a largely irrelevant appetizer to the grand feast.
2
For 2024, if there is a 2024:
1. Abolish the national conventions. Have a nationwide primary in May for each party, using ranked choice voting, on hand-marked (except for the disabled) paper ballots.
2. On election day in November, again have ranked choice voting, again on hand-marked (except for the disabled) paper ballots, for the primary winners (including third parties).
3. Allow in both cases for early voting and mail-in ballots (with security features).
4. And because we will never get rid of the electoral college, we still may have a minority elect the President.
3
This cloud’s silver lining may be that we’ve come to the end of Iowa’s perceived importance in the electoral process. The insatiable 24-hour news cycle is responsible for making a small state that is notably unrepresentative of the nations demographics and electorate so inappropriately powerful.
2
You could tell last evening at the caucus sites that the tabulation system was going to be a problem. Precinct volunteers are often older (can you say flip-phone?) and ill-prepared to handle accurate counts in even one room with 200 people milling about. Assumptions killed the caucus. Technology is great, but face it, a first-time outing with a new app, no training and Luddite volunteers is going to be a disaster. Party leaders who thought this would work are getting a hard reality check. I can't imagine the national parties or candidates will set themselves up for this kind of incompetence in the future.
1
I would ask the people in charge of election processes in every state to Please:
Leave computer systems out of the process.
Save computer systems for the absolutely final historical documentation of the vote tallies.
These voters are writing their votes down with pen and paper and either mailing in their physical document through our federally protected U.S. Postal Service, or handing it to a local elections volunteer.
This is the person-to-person moment that seals our bond to our country. We need to preserve this intimacy with a limited chain of people who are individually responsible for their role the process.
Web-based communication is essentially anonymous, despite the PIN roadblocks and identity puzzles. Personal responsibility is fairly easy to avoid and flaunting this anonymity has given new meaning to the word "troll".
It's entirely subject to the idiosyncrasies of whoever is writing the specific application's code. How things work in the application will make sense to the coder and the "team" - but it won't necessarily make sense to the tens of millions of Americans who don't do their work in this medium.
And once a communication is released into the web, it is in a global public domain for any interested party - quite a boon for all these cottage industries gathering advertising contracts and scraping up salable data.
Web-based communication is offered as a "convenience".
Please keep it out of our American elections process.
2
They should have asked for only TWO numbers: initial votes incl the below 15% candidates, and final votes.
The THIRD number they asked for - how the votes for the below 15% candidates got recast - is fully redundant as it is simply the difference between the first two numbers.
Asking for more than a thousand perfect subtractions is of course an invitation for "inconsistencies", and sheer nonsense.
Good luck in November.
I think this kerfuffle in Iowa caucus may be a precursor to national voting in the 2020 election. The president continues to categorize the Russian interference in our elections a hoax. States must insure that our votes truly count and there is no cattywampus indicated in the voting realm.
Put this Iowa caucus business out of its, and our, misery. If they vote conventionally for a President, let them vote in a primary so that idiocies such as this one don't happen. Let's also not forget that Iowa represents an archaic view of reality both in culture and demographics.
1
Surreal. What a nightmare. Strange way of handling the primary elections with all the messages we have been receiving from experts about the precarity of the internet, surveillance (of intended and unintended bites), hacking, cyber interfering, glitches, not to speak of plain incompetence with digital devices on the part of many users (especially of some generations). Please, do not try to "technify" or "digitalize" elections. At least use this as a "teaching moment," a warning sign, of where not to go. (Could it had been the "Russians" again?...)
On the other hand, great opportunity to break with the precedence or primacy of Iowa in electoral politics. Just move on to the next primary and let them take their time counting--or redoing the caucus thing all over again. Next stop.
1
Be careful what you wish for. If we take away the Iowan's moment of fame, it might cost support for the Democrats.
Give them some slack, already.
1
Iowa's 6 electoral votes just aren't worth this hassle. Make them go after another 25 states and they can become as irrelevant as they truly are.
2
Here's a radical new idea, fair to all political persuasions:
1) Have ALL the primaries across the nation take place on the same day. Do we really need to know ha another state voted in order to make up our minds?
1b) have all ballots in every state be paper ballots.
6
The Iowa Caucus has been a bad idea for decades. The state, while charming is one of the least representative populations in the country. It is white, old and rural .... in other words it doesn't look anything like America in 2020. The whole concept of the Caucus is bizarre with people milling around and then separated into voting blocks who then try to convince those in 'losing' groups to join them. The rest of the country casts a ballot for a candidate and someone wins. To add insult to injury they apparently had a Junior College IT class develop an APP to collect all the results that didn't work. What a surprise! Embarrassing for the state and totally useless in selecting candidates for the highest office in the land. Can we just move on?
2
@Dennis W
There is more representation than you think and you also seem to not quite get the intellectual nature of the process or the benefit of meeting pols face to face to ask them questions and get answers or avoisions directly from their mouths.
@magicisnotreal It's always fun to hear from someone who lists earth as their location and manages to use the word avoisions in a sentence. You are correct that I probably don't recognize something as intellectual by 'your' standards.
The Iowa Caucus needs to be declared null and void, a complete failure. Simply split the delegates equally among the candidates. Nobody will trust the "results". And nobody should. Let's hope this is yet another demonstration of the absolute necessity for deep electoral change.
3
As a lifelong Democrat this result is not surprising. The surprising headline would be. "Iowa caucus goes off without a hitch. Democrats look forward to continued flawless primary elections". The Democratic party is like a child that still lives at home in his 30s. You still love them but wish they would grow up and behave like an adult.
1
@Richard
In other words it a real American party of people looking out for their own interests who cooperate because it is necessary not mandatory. As opposed to being a communist oops, I mean republican where you can only do what you are told to do or else.
Nearly 20 years after the butterfly ballot debacle... people running elections still don’t have a clue. It’s time to end Iowa’s role in this process.
1
@JB
there was no butterfly ballot debacle. That was a scam the republicans used to steal the election. They had not yet perfected voter suppression or gotten the corrupted by them SCOTUS to end voter protections in the south.
This might just be me, but I can't imagine why you'd trust a company named "Shadow" - it quite literally sounds shady! - with any kind of sensitive data or operations. Who's their CEO, Dr. Evil?
3
@Q
Fraud Guarantee recommended them.
Sadly Trump has a point when comparing this fiasco to the roll-out of the Obamacare website.
How about we measure twice (thrice?) and only then cut once.
Democrats want to run the country?
When they apparently can’t run their own elections.
So much winning!
3
It is way past the time to end the tyranny of the political significance of this ridiculous Iowa caucus system. There could not be a more UN-democratic process that was less-representative than this farce. The Democratic Party needs to scrap the entire caucus system and insist on primaries. Iowa is 91% white - hardly a reflection of the electorate. The events are chaotic free for alls and receive out sized media exposure. Time for future candidates to say "enough - I will mot compete in this circus" and bypass this mess until they institute a primary process.
1
OMG! We have to wait 24 hours to get the results! How will we survive. Deep breath. Yes, the TV networks lost out on the opportunity to pontificate about who is out and who will be the nominee. What a pity.
Yes the tech gaffes are a bad look. But Iowa provides about 1% of the delegates needed to win the prize. After New Hampshire it will rise to 3 percent. The media obsession on declaring the winner before 95 per cent of the country votes has always been a artificial construct. Remember Michelle Bachman winning Iowa. Or John McCain winning the nomination after the press had declared him out of the race. Instead of focusing on who has the "Big Mo" or the rest of the horse race blather just sit back, discuss the issues, and let the rest of the country vote.
How can Democrats govern the country when they can't manage small scale election? Trump and Republicans are laughing while Democrats and Socialists fight.
2
Gee, maybe all the developers and tech gurus AREN’T the smartest guys in the room?
2
@L.A. Observer
You are confusing (a) legit developers and tech gurus whose worth and success is determined by the marketplace, with (b) developers and tech gurus selected by the DNC because they are diverse, trans, besties with Clinton operatives, whatever...
cancel the iowa caucus and redo it after all other states have voted.
3
Would love to see the results announced with some fanfare right before the State of the Union address.
1
The NYT ran an article about how many billions these tech companies have made off of Americans, government contracts. The democrats have begged for technology security for the elctions. Trump the con didn't approve money for this national intiative so each state is doing what they can .
So what do we have a country that refuses to protect the election and a GOP that is disengaged form the world.
This is a technology issue that once again reflects that Trump could care less about anything but having secret dinners with Facebook.
This should be a lesson to all that this corrupt government is not doing anything to protect the American people
Force Trump to get these technology companies to step up to the plate and do real quality testing on all these apps that they are selling to the public that don't work.
This is not the Democrats problem they purchased a product that they thought would work and it didnt. Just like all these other apps that steal information but do not work.
This says nothing about democracy, party alignment, or the beliefs of any candidate. It says a lot about how any new system needs thorough testing and user training before going live and how people that should know better rarely budget (time and money) for it.
As a volunteer on political campaigns for 25 years, this mess was predictable. In 2018, for the first time, we were asked to use phone/tablet apps to input data during canvassing with no training. Volunteers won't tell you they can't do that. They will just flub through it or not do it.
We were also told to "harvest" absentee ballots. That seemed a very bad idea to me, but I didn't argue with anyone about it. I just didn't do it. Some people did and that resulted in many complaints from voters about being intimidated into handing over their absentee ballots.
You can't control volunteers. They will devise their own work-arounds and there's nothing anyone can do to prevent that.
2
@Yellow Dog
You are absolutely correct and I've had the same experience here in Dutchess County, NY.
The canvassing app we used was so skewered towards gathering profile info to feed the state and national party data banks, that the basics of who would actually vote blue could be easily lost in the shuffle. Add to that the reality of all that data being sent daily via the internet to Democratic headquarters from several hundred individually hackable and vulnerable smart phones, and what you end up with is suspect.
In the 2017 local election here, the NY State/National party rep who brought us this app designed it so that our canvassers concentrated on reaching out to the "Persuadables". As everyone knows, there's really no such thing, so the bulk of volunteers' time was spent chasing the moon instead of going to established Democrat voters and pushing them to the polls. The result – we lost to the GOP in campaigns that could have been won.
Once again, it's the DNC that has its own agenda. They think they know better than local party members, and it's killing us!
1
@Dan Fannon
That is a very powerful example of what we are doing wrong. Please go to 538 and post this example to the article they published this morning about what went wrong in Iowa yesterday. That article is producing a dialogue that could penetrate the skulls of campaign consultants who are leading us into a dark alley. Thank you for this example.
The silver lining of this Iowa voting debacle is that it inadvertently has provided a way to amicably resolve the ongoing dispute between Iowa and other states who claim that it is unfair that Iowa gets to hold the first primary election: Iowa will still get to hold the first primary vote. But it will agree not to post the results until Super Tuesday. It looks like that’s what’s going to happen this year anyway.
2
Perhaps it's time to give up on Iowa. Let them sort it out. New Hampshire and the other early states will be the first clear message of the candidates' support and chances in November. It is what it is, and it doesn't matter that much.
7
The early state primary system needs to end after this nightmare. Iowa and NH have way to much power in shaping the rest of the primary. No individual state should have this much influence in shaping such an important nationwide contest. Start the primaries on Super Tuesday, Or better yet do the Democratic thing and have every state vote on the same day. Do that and all votes are equally important. The current system holds Iowa voters as more important than all others.
11
It's interesting that it seems the more technologically complex a system becomes the less able it is to deliver.
Why we've fallen in love with turning to electronics (a vulnerable system at that) instead of relying upon tried-and-true voting systems is beyond me.
Perhaps it's a generational conflict: those who grew up with computers in their classrooms and homes have no concept about the efficiencies brought by machines with moving parts; those machines that so many of us knew reliably for several decades and dominated how we did things long before the advent of a seemingly blind adherence to apps running our lives.
Where's the democracy in who makes the decisions about which technologies are used for our election processes?
To my mind what was needed for this caucus, and its results in Iowa, were good old fashioned hand-held pencils, ball point pens, paper, and mechanical adding machines.
After the caucus was completed, you get on the landline phone and call in the results. The next day there would be a winner declared to the newspapers, radios and television sets across the nation. The populace knows that it will wait until the evening news on Tuesday to learn the results.
No upset caucus goers; no shouting at precinct managers; no late-night calls in confusion to news organizations, no mayhem and anger, or worries about hacking.
Perhaps in elections, we need to return to the good old days when things were simpler and much more reliable.
11
@Cate OK, Boomer! Your suggestion, while elegant, is old-fashioned and out of style. Certainly the youth have come to teach us oldsters to use technology, even if it takes longer and produces more confusion and disputable results.
Maybe that is the point, if results can be argued later as flawed, they can be overturned through legal disputes and doubt. The perfect environment for propaganda to flourish. After all, it's winning the seat that counts, not representative democracy.
These folks couldn't organize a Sunday School picnic
@John White: If I'm reading your comment correctly, we agree on the point that elections determined by electronic technology adopted as the only means of doing our elections is running our democratic structures onto shaky ground? Somehow I have the idea that being older, e.g., a "Boomer" has become the newest category for unbridled hostility--and yet: look who the front runners are for Democratic Party nominee for president! Hmmm.
There is no perfect election system. The advantages of the caucus system are that it seems to generate more interest and much more involvement by the electorate, it tests the organizational and communication skills of the campaigns, it allows some measure of people’s 2nd or 3rd choices, and in Iowa it gives an early barometer of candidate viability.
It also comes with significant drawbacks. Enthusiasm counts a lot. Access to caucus sites is variable. In the realignment phase, probably not everyone understands or agrees with how their support has been reassigned. The local demographics may not be representative of the state, let alone the country (but exit polling can provide statistical corrections). And the possibility of transcription or reporting errors remains.
The critical error last night was an untested technical ‘fix’ to perceived problems from 2016. The Iowa Democratic Party will have a lot of explaining to do if they want us to have confidence in the final results they report. Campaign representatives as well as independent experts should have monitored access to the primary data. And there will doubtless be unexplained discrepancies in the data. But hopefully they will only be related to rare human errors and not to anything systematic or nefarious.
Regardless, this is not a good look for the Democratic Party.
1
This demonstrates very well that the caucus system is obsolete and should be done away with. It worked fine when Iowa's voting population was in the thousands. But it's undemocratic and incapable of dealing with millions of voters. Just as the electoral college prevents democratic voting, having to argue about one's candidate prevents people from simply choosing a candidate and voting for them. The system is not fixable, it needs to be replaced.
185
@Dan Stackhouse
The people of Iowa will decide if their caucus process works for THEM. Clearly it did not generate information as quickly as the national press wanted, but the purpose of the caucus is to get people involved in politics, to talk to each other in a civil manner, in a group setting. That's the purpose of a caucus, which is a very different dynamic than walking into a booth and pulling a lever and then going home.
Iowa is a "small-town" culture. That culture doesn't fit well with a hyper, national, news machine that demands immediate gratification. Rather than decry the fact that group discussions do not generate results as quickly as the media wants, maybe the media should respect the fact that group discussions and meetings are important to our national political landscape and culture, and respect the caucus process that works for, and is part of the political tradition, of the people of Iowa.
6
Dear CC210,
That's totally reasonable, so long as Iowa will acquiesce to holding their caucus in June. Since they're first in the nation, they are going to get national scrutiny, and they should have a democratic system that works efficiently. If they don't want a democratic, efficient system, then they can go 30th or later, and then nobody will pay attention to their results.
19
The total population of Iowa is still well below a million. The caucus voters are still in the thousands. There is no reason that a few simple vote counts turned into chaos beyond the fact that Iowa is incompetent.
6
The future of voting systems is in the Pacific Northwest. THE model has existed for several years in both Oregon and Washington and the other 48 states need to replicate it.
Among other things, both states have eliminated the physical polling place; in effect, ALL ballots are "absentee," ensuring that all eligible voters have equal voting access regardless of their work schedules or life commitments.
Each voter receives their paper ballot and a postage paid return envelope almost one month prior to election day. And if you'd rather not use the US mail, you have the option of personally delivering your ballot at multiple drop off locations.
At any point after delivering your ballot you can go online and see a facsimile of your ballot to ensure that your vote was recorded exactly as you intended. And only you have access to it.
If there is anything ambiguous or unclear about your ballot or your vote, you will be contacted by the county election authorities to insure that your voter choices were counted correctly.
It is a vast improvement over any other system being used today and one that is easily audited in the event of something going wrong, from technical glitches to potential voter fraud, malicious hacking or anything else.
I urge all journalists and elected officials to take a close look at these real-life established examples of voting systems that DO work and prevent the ambiguity and suspicion that increasingly plagues far too many of our current day elections.
69
@Steve Absolutely! Doesn’t take a genius to figure out that paper ballots mailed in or dropped off are the most secure!
4
@Steve Northwest - california has gone the paper mail-in route. Don’t like it. Why should I trust the USPS? I loved going to the polling station and getting my “i voted” sticker. The polling places were everywhere and open 12 hours. Used to go with my parents when i was a child. They taught me the importance of voting. Fortunately, one can still drop off their ballots at a polling center but I now have to drive there as it is far from my house.
@Steve Northwest
I agree. Colorado has a similar system. Mail ballots for all. Drop off locations open two weeks before Election Day and many more voting service centers on the actual day, where you can drop off ballots, register same day or update your info; in addition to voting in person if you didn’t get a ballot or just like the ceremony. Ballots with little bubbles to fill in and very few electronic machines (with a paper trail).
We’ve also been a caucus state in addition to a primary, and while this can be an invigorating experience it is also fraught with problems. Long lines, low percentage turnout and general confusion about how it all works. So...we voted to go to separate presidential primaries and moved them up from June to Super Tuesday in March. Yay! And unaffiliated voters can choose to vote in either party’s primary.
But we still use the caucus for down ballot races to select who makes it on to the second primary ballot in June and selecting delegates.
Hopefully one day this should be one primary election. Voting shouldn’t be so darn confusing!
I feel bad for all the volunteers and voters in Iowa who went through this. Ugh
6
I do not understand what the fuss is about. Glitches happen. I am enjoying the fact that cable news channels are not covering Trump today. I was fearing that they would spend the whole day discussing what he is going to say (like we don't know already). Instead, they'll spend the whole day talking about the "scandal" of Iowa caucuses (that will of course be all forgotten about by next week). I flipped through the channels it this morning: every channel, including Fox, is covering it and even Trump tweeted about it. I hope that the Democrats time their results announcements so that they come out just before or perhaps even during the state of the union speech.
6
Hopefully, this will signal the death-knell for the outmoded, anti-democratic, and unnecessarily-complicated caucus process. At the very least, Iowa should lose its vaunted "first" status, which should be given to a state with a population more representative of the nation as a whole.
446
@Bob Sherman
Unfortunately, Hillary was more concerned with states more representative than Iowa, thinking it was a flyover state. Look what happened-
6
@Consultp Agree. All of the people ready to take Democratic attention away from Iowa assume it won't negatively affect support for Democrats.
That's a bet I wouldn't want to take, as long as the electoral college determines the outcome.
@Consultp She won the popular vote, that's what happened.
14
What a massive, inane waste of time and money by the state, by the media and by the candidates!
Tell me again about the "importance" of the Iowa caucuses in choosing a candidate and the significance of these results.
Please. I'll wait.
261
@AnneOf Thieves One benefit: this was also a grueling "stress test" of the candidates. I found the responses of the various campaigns revealing. Of all the candidates, the "grumpy old man" showed the most grace and humor under pressure. I'm afraid that we have all been given a cutout version of people, with various stereotyped labels to hang on each candidate, many courtesy of Fox news. Folks, just because you have heard something a million times, doesn't make it true. Go Bernie.
7
@AnneOf Thieves - The BBC news website this morning asserted that the winner will be the candidate that runs against Trump. I sent them an email - but will they retract this false and misleading statement? Doubt it. They are either woefully ignorant or trying to add drame
3
@Laura Weisberg The "grumpy" bit is courtesy of the Times as much as any other media outlet. Recall 2016 and the endless use of the adjectives grumpy, grouchy, etc. by all the op-ed writers? They have been at it again this time as well.
9
The risk is that many Americans see this and ask how the Democrats can possibly be trusted to run government if they can't even do this. On the heels of a completely quixotic attempt to remove the President, and with more than half of the Iowa caucasgoers apparently ready to support a Socialist, it is a very inauspicious beginning for Democrats.
136
@Herr Andersson Not at all to excuse the failure, but last time it was the Republicans who need two weeks to sort out the official results of the Iowa caucus. And that only decades after blowing up the mideast with a war of choice initiated on false pretense, and planned without any idea of what was to happen after the first 30 days. You have a short memory.
31
@Herr AnderssonIn for the 2012 Iowa caucuses, it took more than two weeks to declare the winner on the Republican side.
Quixotic indeed...
12
@Herr Andersson Um, the process is for both parties if I understand it correctly. And the state is run by a Republican. So I think we have lost faith in elections, not a party, here. but hey, what ever.
10
Iowa Caucuses= World's Most Expensive Game of Musical Chairs.
6
@Alejandro Garcia
It is just a great way to socialize and get together and see and talk to your neighbors.
The irony is that Trump is the most incompetent figure in American politics- he just hides and covers up and blames and blathers his way out of the messes he makes- just as he bankrupted his businesses, he is bankrupting the government and messing up the world- history will blame him, and he will lie till the bitter end- but luckily for Trump he doesn't read history and unlucky for us, he makes history
3
It's a good thing that Nevada will be using the same app, because there's no way that this can happen twice, right?
...
RIGHT??
5
But didn't the Russians tell Americans how great this app wasn't?
Our Russian Czar Father Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin promised our Siberian President Donald Trump that he would help to make the American 2020 elections safe and secure for another Trump victory.
This feels and looks and smells and sounds like the American ' deep state', the Ukrainians, Hunter Biden and the angry restless vengeful ghost of John McCain plotting against Donnie Trump.
3
Utterly incompetent, hapless Democrats. Trump and Republicans will play this and the impeachment fiasco to the hilt. Four more years, folks.
5
Sounds like many of the precinct captains, rather than even attempting to take the training, simply decided not to use the app and literally phone it in. The training should have been required and there should have been a passing grade prior to being assigned those responsibilities.
You failed, Iowa, and you failed miserably. Unbelievable.
1
Democrats can't even rig an election with success. Hilary Clinton staff members wrote the app running the show, so...
6
I'm not a conspiracy theorist. I believe Lee Harvey Oswald killed JFK. I believe men have landed on the moon. But there is no way I'll believe any totals that comes out of Iowa today.
2
I was a database and web programmer for 20+ years (now retired).
95% of the tech consultancies are scammers - they eat the lunch of the non-technical "managers" that hire them.
It's really pathetic and laughable to watch the consultancy sales people in the meetings scam the non-technical big wigs.
What you see in Iowa is the result. Iowa Democratic Chairman Troy Price got reamed by a tech consultancy spouting nonsense such as "Agile development" and "No code development".
LOL, just use paper you fool!
15
@kenzo I was thinking the same thing. Clearly no one with any technical support leadership was involved in this, not unlike the rollout of healthcare.gov.
@kenzo
But it was the DNC that pressed the Iowa chair to use the app. Check out the NYT article on Shadow.
Iowa - so over this state!
2
And this is how it starts? Watching from overseas, all I see is a truckload of ammunition being handed by the DNC to Trump to spray out on Twitter. Come on Democrats, between these stupid 'own goals' and your incessant infighting, you're going to hand this to the GOP on a plate.
4
@Eagles ... Shusssh! If you don't say it, they won't figure it out!
Iowa needs to be kept locked in the basement for the safety of others.
1
I think this is a much bigger issue for the media, which needs the data to have something to write about, than do ordinary voters, who are perfectly happy to wait a day or two for the results.
It's the media that is treating the lack of prompt results as a national emergency.
6
It is much more likely that this debacle is a result of the usual culprits: not understanding what it takes to develop an app, test it, roll it out, educate users, etc.
However, the possibility of hacking and outside interference can not be discounted quickly and in a manner of hours.
Just as it would take many days of forensics to determine what went wrong with the app as a piece of software, many days are required to fully determine whether a hacking attempt occurred.
To say that there wasn’t any hacking shows again that the Iowa Democratic Party does not understand tech!
7
Enough of this. If any Democratic leader within the party fights to keep Iowa as the first state to vote, then everyone should vote that leader out too. We can no longer sit back as these “leaders” contribute to the problem.
11
Maybe we should let California run everything.
@Eric
Well I don’t know what you mean by saying California must run everything; but as the most populated state in the USA, with countless backgrounds, it should definitely vote on the first day. I think that would give a clear indicator of where the Democratic Party is leaning. Seeing the images coming in from the caucus’ showing almost a 95% white majority is a failure to democracy.
Unreal. Hopefully this debacle is the catalyst for a reformed primary system that relegates Iowa to the end of the queue.
17
The biggest crime after this debacle would be if Iowa was allowed to continue as the “bellweather” in any presidential election in the future.
This state has been stealing from the process for decades, and it’s time for the recalibration.
29
@Timmy F
Who makes the decision as to
how Iowa votes in the primary?
How can we from other States
put pressure on Iowa to join the
current century and just who is it we can write letters to about this
antiquated system trying to use
tech they don't understand ?
1
It may be that Iowa has some saboteurs within the ranks; people who did not want the app or the roll-up to succeed. Now there is no such thing as certainty, so if they get 85% satisfy, then use those outcomes.
1
With the world watching, one might have expected the app to perform the task. Alas for Iowa. Not so. With the nationwide attention to vote manipulation at this very moment it sure looks bad and amateurish.
2
And we should care about the Iowa Caucus results why?
A totally unrepresentative state with a caucus system similar to musical chairs does not rise to any level of importance simply because it goes "first."
Nothing to see here. Please move on to a meaningful state primary - no, not New Hampshire.
11
So after 2016 you are suggesting the midwest doesn’t matter.
@Eric - I'm suggesting Iowa doesn't mean anything in the Democratic nominating process. To suggest otherwise with a broader brush is to aggrandize a caucus which is nothing short of, as a columnist today noted, a game of Capture the Flag. We're better than that.
1
This situation shows how vulnérable our voting systems are. Many states do not have paper trails. Voting machines can be hacked. There is no federal oversight of our election procedures. Many many people no longer trust our elections. And, we are all waiting for the next Russian interference and how they will control our democracy.
1
Banana software. Expected to ripen on the way to the customer.
3
@Andreas Very well stated Andreas
We are a mockery, chase and all other banks have never given me Jeff Bezos balance, fed ex and ups can track millions of packages, and never mix up my package with my neighbors, and we can’t make a good sound foolproof system, that can track the most important process in our democracy
11
It is easy to make a fool proof and easy to operate system. In fact democracies around the world use versions of these applications that work well. The real question is why the people in charge chose to go with a beta app with no track record, testing, or training. It’s almost as if they intended to produce chaos where the results could be hacked and a DNC favorite put in. Like they did in 2016, for those of you who read history.
Blaming technology is silly. Technology provides accuracy and efficiency. Technology could have prevented them not being able to release their poll because humans forgot to mention Buttigieg. Like any event, a wedding, an opera, a sports game.. there is practice, there is a rehearsal, there is quality assurance. They didn't even TRY to make sure things didn't go wrong by making sure everyone could install the app, had some basic training, do test runs, have some consultants on standby, issuing phones that were preinstalled. This is very basic event planning and the organizers are just irresponsible and negligent same as with the failed poll.
5
@SG
give me a break, this app was made by a technology firm, that was paid. I want to see their GOP contract where they did no test,quality control. Stop blaming the people and learn some facts
2
Irresponsible? Or intentional?
@Tony Yea? What technology firm? There are huge quality differences for who you decide to hire and whoever hired them, whoever is in charge of their technology, should be partly held accountable. Stop trying to shift the blame. "Coding issue", right.
Either if it was Sanders or Buttigieg , they must feel left down by this delay., which shows quite an amazing level of amateurism... It is supposed to be the night on which the presidential race really starts and candidates gain momentum or start their decline... Let's hope the delay has nothing to do with the probably poor results for Biden... It could be a way to hide that fact for a while and reveal it as soon as everybody is already busy with the next state....
1
@Len
Why are we blaming the people and not he company who created this flawed app? Probably it was developed by a GOP funded software company.
The company probably was well paid for doing nothing
Blaming Iowa is really not looking at the root of the problem. Our election system has been broke for a while and we have an administration in Washington which is incompetent. The Trump administration is so devoted to shoring up Donald Trump that it is neglecting the infrastructure of the nation that includes the voting system. Evidently it is Homelands job to vet new election systems but they did not do their job. And this is how the world ends not with a bang but a whimper.
5
@Sandy It's not Trump and his administration ( I did not vote for him). It is the Dems spending all of their energy on planning for various impeachments and then sending every bit of energy trying to carry the last one out to prevent an election. When not that, campaigning for the next election. Just vote Trump out in a few months. Get some real work done.
If the Iowa caucuses are anything like the Washington State Democratic caucuses of late, it’s ridiculous to think that they represent any remote connection to the actual voters. The caucuses are crowded, chaotic, confused, and are ultimately just attended by a small fraction of the population.
1
Can't EVERY democrat agree that it doesn't matter who opposes trump in November, we WILL vote for that candidate!
6
@Stacy K Absolutely not! I will not vote for a corrupt senile old man, Joe Biden. That would be unconscionable.
First we remove Donald Trump then we work on the Democrat party. They have been an embarrassing mess for far too long. If it wasn't for Donald I am not sure I would be voting for them.
1
The digital world should be as far removed from US elections, at any level, as is humanly possible.
22
An untested vote reporting app failing on election night? You could've counted on that.
9
And the company that developed the app is called Shadow?! Shirley you jest!
8
@Bill - don’t call me Shirley!
1
Definitely hacked. We need to get Giuliani on this right away. The Bidens are behind this. I hear the actual results are actually on a server called "Cornstrike" in the middle of an Iowa field. I hope the governor of Iowa can do us a favor, though. It will be very important for him to announce an investigation.
16
This is hysterical. The Democrats spent 2 1/2 years spewing Trump Russia collusion then Mueller burst their bubble, then impeachment same thing, now this mess. This is the icing on the cake, you can't write stuff this funny.
10
@P McGrath
Sad, but truly funny.
1
The following comment is not a joke, please ask for guidance to Mexican electoral authorities. Mexico has the best electoral system. Not kidding!
1
In 2016 we put a thumb on the scale - both the DNC and the New York Times jumped on the Hillary bandwagon early and fully and hacked emails showed that both colluded with the Clinton campaign. Now we are not only biased toward the choices of the elite, the insiders, and the American intelligencia and we are not only insular and biased toward our view if what "should be" and what identities should prevail - we're also inept
4
@TJ
Who any media outlet supported 4 years ago has absolutely nothing with what happened in Iowa last night. An antiquated way to vote via standing in a room to be counted has failed. In the 21st century, this would be ridiculous if it weren't so dangerous.
@TJ
Spot on.
I don't expect too many articles from this viewpoint to make it in print in the Times.
Who was cheated last night?
1
OK. I get it. [Messing]-up 2016 isn't related to [messing]-up 2020. I guess you're right, and I suspect I can survive four more years if Trump while the Democrat knowitalls defend all these blunders wrought from conceit and self absorption... but I'm not sure we can survive another term of Trump, and I wonder who the GOP will stand up to follow him while we are just so sure it wasn't the Times picking Hillary in 2012 and then sending her campaign the "interview" questions in advance. And it couldn't have been that the DNC was overtly ridiculing her opposition and driving donations her way. It couldn't possibly be that we abrogated the open and fair primary process in favor of insuring that our chosen candidate prevailed - open and fair primaries dont select the best candidate, party insiders do. And being inept at counting votes from a few hundred thousand of our own doesnt mean we arent effectively standing up opposition to Trump. The world's problems are all created by the Donald and I like that narrative- we all seem to
2
Banks do not often make mistakes that are not in their favor. Somehow bills for stuff that I purchase find their way to my inbox with unerring precision. Americans know how to keep track of the stuff that is important to them. Elections, when the demographics are trending against the GOP, seem to be particularly hard to get right. Perhaps somebody is more interested in keeping power, than they are in getting elections right?
4
“I don’t even know if they know what they don’t know,”
- Mr. Bagniewski
I'm pretty sure this observation can extrapolate across the spectrum. We haven't only realized that we are lost looking forward. We've also realized that we've been had all along.
8
This might be a good thing. Might cause other states to make sure their systems are working properly. One can hope.
8
@Emma Ess They had four years. It is a disaster.
The app sounds like a great idea. It's unfortunate certain users were not briefed on how to use it. Surely a young/tech literate person attended a caucus and could have helped tap "log in"?
To quell misinformation, shouting, long callback times and confusion on phone lines.. Imagine..! if there was a central place where official accounts could send out short statements in real time? That people could check? Or even an instant mail delivery service? I hope some of those get invented soon.
Wondering whether an email survey like google forms or surveymonkey service would have worked better. No app testing or smart phone required, infrastructure already built. No sign in. Do these caucus leaders not have emails? How are they all organized in the first place?
Simply check a few boxes. Then the data is made into pie charts for you! wow!
Apps are great. Phones are great. But sometimes we already have solutions. (And yet, some people wonder about the capabilities of a septuagenarian leading the country..)
2
@uhhh
That's right. They should have just called Google. They'd be over there in a second, take care of everything, and do it for free as a civic duty.
@uhhh
Google survey. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiggghhht.
Have you seen the pix of the caucus participants? They are all 65+. These people probably still use rotary phones!
"I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat."
Will Rogers
Amazing how, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Time to do away with the caucus (aka, CHAOS) in Iowa and move to regional primaries.
27
@BigFootMN
In 40 years of business I have found that many times "votes" provide a poor solution when "consensus" is required.
State legislatures have lost the art of coming to a reasonable compromise through debate by letting ballot propositions establish legislation with NO debate and no constructive compromise.
I think Iowa (however flawed this reporting app) is noble in allowing voices to be heard and people to be swayed to change their opinion instead of joining yet another tribe and vote up/down - leaving MOST voters disappointed.
1
@BigFootMN
why have primaries at all? We have polls, daily, what more do we need? The election is a long way off and voters don't look back to the Iowa Caucus when they cast their ballot.
Iowa should no longer be the first State. Nor should it be followed by New Hampshire. We need a State more representative of the Demographics and one that is neither Red or Blue. Then, all primaries need to be closer together.
13
@Philip W If we take away their moment in the spotlight and the candidate events that lead up to it, do not be surprised if their state ends up voting more consistently red. We need to think this through carefully.
@Philip W
We need a national primary that has a ranking system built in so that everyone in the country has a chance to vote for whichever candidate they want without some "special" state being able to eliminate what might be a first choice in another state. A limited time to campaign, like in Canada, would also stop this multi year campaign fiasco.
While the software world throws big words like Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning etc., the need of the hour is still very fundamental. We need core software development skills to make software that is well performing, takes cares of the needs, and is robust with good quality.
This Iowa fiasco reminds me of ACA fiasco. Both born out of poor planning and poor software development skills.
5
They should have the Russians develop the election software. They are recognized experts in testing and rollout. Or wait, maybe they already have...
This mess underscores the desperate need for real electoral reform. There is nothing in our constitution requiring caucuses. Lets stick with primaries where ballots are cast and counted. Better yet, since political parties are not constitutionally required or their number limited, let's just forget the media horse race, the big money campaign advertisements, and private funding, guarantee every candidate equal public funding and media time and cut the entire election season to 6 weeks.
20
@Al M
I'd rather see parties propose a consensus platform, then nominate candidates who support the platform (at all levels of the ballot) and see if their value proposition wins votes.
The primaries separate candidates from the party (and there should be MANY parties, not 2) and then nobody takes any responsibility.
If there had been no primaries, don the con would NEVER have been the GOP nominee, and perhaps the horror of the last 3.5 years would have been avoided.
1
In other words amend the constitution to make elections efficient and fair, which would allow the Democrats to win. Be sure to bring this idea up when the Republican king comes to town. He enjoys a good laugh.
1
Two things:
1. Republicans aren’t the only people undermining American democracy.
2. Systems only work when the people in charge of them want them to work.
If the people in charge didn’t ensure, a month ago, that everyone had downloaded that app, been taught how to use it, and then done a trial run, they were either incompetent or not interested. Any excuse for that not happening (or defaulting back to phones) is unacceptable. But what else is new when you’re undermining elections?
27
Organizing a set of small caucuses in a small state is not a hard job. The fact that this failed spectacularly can only be attributed to intention. Someone wanted this to fail and made sure it failed. And that person is probably Russian.
1
@Bobotheclown The only thing that failed was the use of the reporting app. All the voting was on paper ballots, and is secure.
The result is delayed, and nothing more. I hope Bernie wins though, because if he loses this one his most ardent supporters (okay, cultists) will believe "the fix is in". And the Russians will be ecstatic.
Testing and Training. The source of nearly all IT rollouts that fail.
3
Suggestions to fix the problem:
1. Replace Dem. national chairman Tom Perez. He's not up to the job.
2. Get rid of this "trickle into the contest" method of national delegate selection: Iowa first, then New Hampshire, then South Carolina & Nevada, etc.
Instead, hold four super Tuesday primaries in a combination of states that, when put together, add up to 100% of the total delegates. It would look like this:
25% on 2nd Tuesday in February;
25% on 2nd Tuesday in March;
25% on 2nd Tuesday in April;
25% on 2nd Tuesday in May.
By Memorial Day, all delegates would be chosen. The Democrats could have their convention in July, and have
90-100 days to campaign before the general election in November.
Rotate the order of the four groupings every 4 yr. cycle.
3. The Democratic National Committee has to take hold of the entire process and say to the states: "We certify your results in order to award the delegates. If you do not follow our requirements, we will not certify."
As it stands now, each state decides when and how they will run their caucus or primary.
That's good for the early states because they get outsized media coverage and commerce, but it's not good for the candidates or the national party or the remaining states waiting for the calendar to get to their event.
4. Show the Clinton people to the door. They are old news, and they need to be removed from influence.
48
All of your ideas make a lot of sense. That is why the Democrats will never do them. I think you identified the problem with #4, get rid of the Clintons. They were always Republicans anyway and their idea of a Republican lite Party has been proved to not work.
4
@Biff Or perhaps six regional primaries, one every two or three weeks apart, for geographically compact campaign travel and a reasonable amount of time for directly connecting with voters. Absolutely rotating each cycle.
It would be hard to find four less representative states for the first real voting than Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada.
3
'Chaos', 'Disaster', 'Failure' - really? Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the goal of this process to create a space for citizens to cast their votes, to accurately tabulate those selections, and then proportionally distribute delegates who will then make their selections at the DNC in mid-July? I understand the delay has frustrated people, but doesn't that say more about our insatiable desire for instant gratification than it does about the process. Assuming the final results are accurate, what difference (other than to people who overly - dare I say obsessively - follow political coverage) does it make whether we get the full results Monday evening at 9:30 pm or Tuesday afternoon? A mistake (or series of them) occurred - it happens; we deal with it and move on. If I didn't know better, judging by peoples' reactions I'd assuming something truly terrible happened. And yet, this 'disaster' of a process that has sparked anger and frustration for so many appears to have done exactly what it was designed to do.
Chill out people, it's just the Iowa caucuses. If the events of last night increased your blood pressure, caused you to get frustrated and angry, or resulted in you to obsessively looking up results, maybe the real problem isn't the process of the party, it's you...
8
One more reason no one moves to Iowa.
Actually, this is the best possible result.
We already knew many candidates are running about even, some a few points up, some a few points down.
The idea that there are only "three tickets out" of Iowa, for such narrow margins, was a ridiculous idea born from sports reporting (you can win a football game by one point in overtime; this psychology should not extend to the choice of Iowa caucus "winners")
The Democrats should be emphasizing their shared goals rather than having political operatives swiping at each other and attacking each other's purity simply for different policies that are designed to address the same problems (in contrast to Republicans' slogans, Republicans who have blocked solutions to the problems for decades.)
5
Why can't they have a primary? What a mess this is!
4
I guess Mike Bloomberg won, as he was not foolish enough to spend his time or money in Iowa.
25
Bye bye, Iowa. No more you going first, and no more caucuses for anyone.
8
Sometimes the DNC reminds me of the Washington Generals.
It was the Russians. Putin and his buddy, Donald Trump, got together and decided to hack the Iowa Democratic Caucus app. This is the time to impeach Trump. He did it again. He and his friend, Vlad, got together and tampered with the caucus vote in Iowa.
@Francis Walsingham,
I realize it was sarcasm, but in all seriousness there's a zero chance Russian hackers can understand how Iowa caucuses work.
Is this for real?
How many people were the phone diddling Candy Crush Saga while they waited for results? Or sent pix of thier dinners to friends?
the Dems have had months, no YEARS to perfect last night. Yes it's an archaic practice not suited to 2020, but they KNEW it was coming, and that the caucus system, like the electoral college, is STILL the way we vote in this country.
It is incomprehensible to me that an "app" failed, and has now given MORE power to Trump to gloat and gleefully point out how this handful of sad candidates can't even get a caucus result.
I can't stand Trump, but he is 100% correct in this case. It's not sportsmanlike to gloat, but the Dems handed him this on a silver platter.
Even if the Iowa caucuses figure very little in the scheme of things, it is ridiculous and embarrassing.
Trump is going to win in 2020 because of nonsense like this.
Even Bloomberg moved into the 21st century in his own campaign. He at least it attempting to go head to head with Trump's sophisticated machine.
3
Isn't time to move to a mail in paper vote across the entire country? Isn't it time for one person, one vote? Let's get rid of all this baloney and stupidity and wasted resources and wasted time. low tech paper votes. One per person. Whoever wins the most most, wins the election.
1
Was this app developed by the same organization that developed the initial ObamaCare insurance signup app? Or maybe developed by Schiff's impeachment team? Good grief, what a choice presented to us in November ... Trump or whoever happens at the time to be driving the Democratic clown car.
3
I live in Oregon. We vote on paper ballots and mail them in and it works beautifully. We have a reasonably high voter turnout and our results are known within a reasonable time-frame. And, of course, since we don't use voting machines, nothing can be hacked. Maybe the rest of the nation should be voting this way. Caucasus are really so 1895.
86
@lynchburglady - '...since we don't use voting machines, nothing can be hacked.'
True, no hacking is possible, but don't get too comfortable with your paper-based ways. Remember Stalin's words: "It's not the people who vote that count, it's the people who count the votes."
5
@lynchburglady 1972....
@Doug And if Stalin were alive today, he'd be all in on using computers. So much easier to corrupt, as his political grandson Putin knows.
2
Umm...this isn't even democracy with a small "d".
Back in the late 70's, a CIA analysis team, reported that the U.S. did not have to lift a finger for the Soviet Union to implode. It did. We forced them into an Arms Race they couldn't possibly sustain. Now, Putin is chuckling as he watches the American Empire slowly implode...his relatively inexpensive interference, U.S. socioeconomic factors, and the infamous American Adolescent Narcissism will result in essentially the same denouement...so sad.
17
Seems to me rather than embracing technology, it makes more sense to stay with paper. Getting it right--especially this election--is more important than what technology might offer.
41
I would estimate 0.03% of Americans understand what a "caucus" is. Let's forget Iowa and move on to the next utterly unrepresentative decision-maker: New Hampshire.
167
@Red O. Greene
they may not understand a caucus, but the DO understand ineptitude displayed on a grand scale that was amplified ten-fold by Trump.
6
@Red O. Greene it's as representative of New Hampshire as anything needs to be
@Red O. Greene We know now! What a wake up call.
Part of the problem was that some people went home before the second ballot was done (where people supporting non-viable candidates would chose from the list of viable candidates). So the actual vote totals were messed up.
15
@Walter Frampton That is permitted. Those people are still included in the total number of attendees used in the formulas. They do not have to choose another candidate.
2
Ok ... and that was foreseeable....
The problems of the Iowa Caucus app are a symptom of a larger problem, poorly designed "enterprise" applications. The state of software development is a shambles of unnecessary complexity and bad programmers. Software development is still an art. There is some science involved but the quality of the final product is all art. Programmers are taught the syntax of a language and that's about it. There are many people who can compose a coherent sentence but that doesn't make them good writers.
103
@J.I.M. My goodness, thank you! Sad I needed to scroll down for this comment, this is the only take we should all be in agreement on after Iowa. This isn't an Iowa-only problem, this is what we get when we put everything in the hands of the tech industry and over-complex development. If this is what we're experiencing after Iowa, a state where everyone in each building should know what the results are, and the results can be called in via phone at the end of the day, how can we have any faith in the general elections, where multiple crucial states have dubious, at best, electronic voting systems. Why do we NEED to go down this road? Let's stick with paper ballots, the damage the last 2 decades has been done, no one should believe that brand spanking new and shiny voting machines are going to help us save our democracy.
37
@J.I.M. Right. De=geek the election process. This will make it harder to undermine.
1
@J.I.M.
Respectfully disagree. Though I would rather see paper ballots because of hacking, the fact is that this Iowa debacle broke rules and standards firmly in place since COBOL programmers in the 1970s.
It's the software equivalent of surgery without sterilization.
1
Total lack of critical thinking skills for the entire country to watch live. How could this app not have been tested months before and a back-up system in place in the event of failure. Last night put the Iowa caucuses to bed for good.
340
@Jacquie
A tarnished relic of the past and good riddance. Iowa's importance has always been overblown, and next time some other state with a normal primary should lead off.
60
@Jacquie It feels good to be able to latch onto this as justification to demote Iowa, and that will happen. But the real failure was another blind investment in the promise of tech. Will that lesson be learned? Anyone?
47
@Blair The APP was put together quickly in 2 months and not even installed on phones until the day of the caucus where many couldn't download it. It obviously should have been tested in a local election before rolling it out to presidential candidates.
The APP wasn't needed since the system in place since the 70's had worked seamlessly.
17
I suspect that this kerfuffle in Iowa is not the only time we will find our various voting systems are failing. The older generation often runs the elections, and can be less familiar with computers, apps, and newer ways to confirm numbers ("Just telephone in your numbers, please.")
With worries about hackers, memories of the Russian involvement during last presidential election, and the hotly contested election to come, it's going to be a very rocky road ahead for us all.
Too bad we don't have someone to sort it all out! This is when we really do need an intelligent and impartial leader.
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@nanfahr I would worry less about the older people who run local elections, and more about the younger, bright-eyed, fresh-faced people out of Harvard Business walking into the Democratic Party offices trying to sell them their new app, and I say that as a younger person myself.
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The model for 21st century elections already exists in both Oregon and Washington. They've figured it out and the other states should be replicating those well-designed systems.
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@nanfahr really.? You talk about older people less familiar with apps and then a couple of sentences you mention hacking??? I am a tech worker in my 60s. Been around long enough to know how unreliable software is and how insecure. My mother is in her 90s and uses social media every day. So please spare us the incompetent older person trop
Tell me why this state, that is not representative of the country’s demographics, gets to have such a monumental effect in choosing our presidential candidates. The process of caucusing seems out of the 19th century. No wonder it failed so badly when technology was added to it.
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@Beth Isaac They don't. It's just the first test. Super Tuesday and the rest of the "Super days." Iowans don't pick the Presidential candidate. The rest of the country does when they vote. Everybody knows that they are small state. In some ways the caucus system is akin to ranked-choice voting, which all sorts of people see as some sort of panacea, though it could lead to having a winner no one considered the best candidate. They caucus system hasn't failed; the technology did. There's a big difference. Correlation is not causality.
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I spent years as a volunteer who referred to myself as a "petition mechanic", "election day mechanic" and generally a NYS election lawyer without a law degree. I'm good at parsing the intricasies. When I saw at about 6:30 EST last night that I could not grasp how the reporting was supposed to work with the astute Steve Kornacki explaining it to me I knew we were heading for trouble. Iowa needs to be desanctioned by the DNC. If the Iowa party insists on continuing to hold caucuses candidates who go there to campaign should be banned from televised debates.
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Someday we will rediscover that the simplest way to do things is often the best. To base a system like this on untrained, diverse people using their own smartphones is crazy. Unbelievable.
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@gkimball How many don't even own a smart phone?
Please, take technology out of this. As a Precinct Committee Officer in Seattle in 2016, the over 100 people who showed up from my precinct met outside (too many to fit into a classroom), had a vigorous discussion and reveled in the democratic steps that honored our votes. We announced our result, selected delegates to move on to the next step, and the caucus attendees went home after elected representatives for each candidate signed off on the final tally. I turned in our results and the supporting paper votes to the committee in charge of that for the school. They had a process in place to ensure their tally for all the precincts was accurate and then forwarded that. Our state's results came out in a timely fashion and were not only accurate but verifiable.
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@gkimball Uhhh... not sure how "diverse" they are.....
It’s time to:
a) Get rid of this entirely undemocratic process
b) Reduce the undue influence afforded to tiny states
We need a single, nationwide primary day and then on to the election itself, not this multi-year slugfest that sows discord and disunity.
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@David Exactly! In Mexico we have that system, in Canada they have that system. Let me remind americas that you have a president that was not elected by the mayority. The worse thing this will give 1 a 2 points in rural ignorant America.
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@David I am with you completely on your proposal. As for the first points you make, they are in some sense embedded in the Constitution and it will likely take a Constitutional amendment to eliminate the Electoral College, if that is what you are suggesting.
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@David
Add a rating system to that national primary and I'm with you 100%.
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This disaster is a warning. Cyberspace security measures must be in place before the elections to mitigate the dangers of hacking.
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Too late. The software everywhere is already hacked. Nothing has been tested and no one has been trained. Just like Russia wanted it to be.
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@Mel Enriquez Or paper ballots.
How secure is your bank account? Your credit card? Your password? Think Jeff Bezos phone.
Paper ballots. Hand counted.
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@Bobotheclown
Putin knows big corporate money is in charge, he can't beat that.
"Training" is a waste of money, in the gig-economy.
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There’s never enough time to do it right, but always enough time to do it over.
@Richard Just ask Boeing....
Maybe it wasn't such a good idea for Democrats to spend all their time and energy demonizing Trump rather than doing their job.
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Why?
Did it interfere with His finding the two thousnd or so kids y’all took from their parents and stuffed into cages? You know...the ones Trump didn’t bother to keep records on, many of whom are still lost?
No sparrow shall fall, indeed.
2
Your boy's job is to Twitter.
All day.
Every day.
I've never seen paperwork on the Resolute desk, just his stupid pronouncements that he Sharpies.
So tired of winning.
So Mr. Bagniewski took it upon himself to second guess the state party's instructions and instruct his precinct chairmen to just "call in the results" without presumably having informed the state party he was doing that. His poor decision making, multiplied many times over throughout Iowa, resulted in a crush of calls to an under-resourced state party phone bank. Thanks Mr. Bagniedwski! Heckava' Job there! Maybe in four years Mr. Bagniewski might try following simple directions; or better yet, Polk County Democrats will elect a new county chairman.
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You gotta admit, it is a little odd that first the DMR poll was cancelled and now the caucus results are tanked. All I can say is if Biden comes out in first place, we should all think about what kind of “democracy” that we are actually living in.
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The DNC got caught rigging this primary for Hillary last time. I guess cheating is something both parties can do.
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@Michael Anthony That's scaremongering. There is a paper trail of every caucus-goer's vote, and the candidates have their own tallies. Caucuses are far and away the most transparent voting system.
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This episode demonstrates how infantile the idea of 'caucus' is. If Iowans want to be first counted, this method needs reform.
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This delay in the results and overall mess in the Iowa Caucuses, is not merely a technical problem or the malfunction of an app. It is a worrisome and ominously symbolic representation of the Democratic Party's situation and current state of being
A party that is scattered, leaderless, divided and consumed by factions and partisan snipping. A balkanised political entity preoccupied with political correctness, virtual signaling, tokenism and a head scratching self-imposed test of moral purity.
The slate of remaining candidates, with a few exceptions, is bland, uninspired and seriously crippled by an inability to make an impression with voters at large or inspire anykind of excitement beyond their immediate supporters.
This does not bode well for the Democrat's chances in the 2020 General Election. Whoever the Democratic nominee will end up being, that person will face a volatile, unpredictable and increasingly unhinged Donald Trump, as well as a deeply and bitterly divided country.
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Why did the Iowa Dem party allow an unvetted, untested app to be developed and then deployed?
Why didn't users receive training?
Who developed this app and who did they work for before taking employment with Shadow, Inc?
Is this incompetence or corruption? My first guess is the former but the latter would hardly be a surprise.
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@El Chapo
My thoughts exactly.
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@El Chapo
Agree. The failures and incompetence here are so egregious that even the lamest backwater consulting group knows better. And there were bound to be professionals on the caucus team raising red flags in advance when they saw no pilot, no signoff, no phased rollout and no redundancy.
Iowa, like the rest of the country, went through all the fire drills leading up to Y2K. Many involved in this knew better.
@El Chapo
Maybe a criminal investigation would be a good idea.
It looks as if the Trump plot to undermine Joe Biden has been successful.
As mentioned in the article, this is a state issue and not attributed to one particular party, but I would suspect the President will use this as an opportunity to blame Democrats for incompetence.
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@Walter Ingram
As he should. Just like the monies spent on the Obama Care website and the result was something a kid from middle school could design.
@Kirk Land You have missed my point. In 2012 Mitt Romney was declared the Iowa winner, to be overturned to show Rick Santorum the real winner. It is the Iowa caucus system that is in question.
Just like you Trump will accuse the Dems of being at fault, when that is far from the underlying problem. Your dis of the Obama web site is an irrelevant old right wing talking point that is meaningless.
Corn, Steve King, and now lousy apps. Is this America at its best? I hope not.
14
Mississippi used to be the most embarrassing state. Iowa is giving them a run for their money.
Brand new Gallup Poll out this morning on Trump approval........
- "President Donald Trump's job approval rating has risen to 49%, his highest in Gallup polling since he took office in 2017."
- "The 42% approval rating among independents is up five points, and ties three other polls as his best among that group"
- "Sixty-three percent of Americans now approve of the way Trump is handling the economy, up six points from the prior reading in November. It is the highest economic approval rating not only for Trump, but for any president since George W. Bush enjoyed stratospheric job approval ratings in the first few months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks."
https://news.gallup.com/poll/284156/trump-job-approval-personal-best.aspx
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@InvestAndProsper
Anyone but Trump! Well, if the Dem's could produce...anyone.
I'll put on MY baseball cap (a perennial cellar dweller) and scream, "Wait til next year!) ...in this case wait four years...
Please shoot me.
Not a great start out of the gate. Trump and his sons are already tweeting about the "fix" and Dem incompetence. The candidates are in limbo as I'm writing this, and all of us who want to see Trump gone are shaking our heads.
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Again the clear winner in Iowa was Donald Trump. Trump was born lucky. As Will Rogers, with lasso in hand, once quipped, “I’m not a member of any organized party, I’m a Democrat.”
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@Freedom Fighter It's true. Look at everything he's gotten away with his whole life while others go to prison their careers and lives ruined as he marches on to commit more crimes and cause untold damage. Every time we think he's in peril something happens and he's back on top. Highest national approval numbers today putting him at 49%. This man has some sort of uncanny luck that defies logic. Either that or he sold his soul to the devil.
3
Let's get over ourselves, ok? It's a handful of people in the big picture and we have to wait an extra day or so to find out what they think. It's hardly a disaster, or some huge disgrace for the DNC. Sheesh, with everything else going on, this is what we have to get upset about?
No matter who, vote Blue.
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@Rosiedeuce, voting only counts when votes are counted. Which is not the case here.
5
What you don’t understand is that the correct verified totals will NEVER be presented. We will never know who won the Iowa primary, we barely know who was running. And this is just the beginning of the insanity as Democrats attempt to display their competence at government. They are a bunch of children playing at politics and they have no skills or strategy. Welcome to the social media generation.
@Rosiedeuce : Why? If "Blue" can't get it together to competently tabulate Iowa votes (they either can't count, can't organize a tabulation center, or can't supervise a vendor contract for a basic data compilation service) when they know how closely they are being watched, why humor them with any support. Only a fool would give money to this effort.
These people can't even count and they want to own the monopoly on US healthcare?
No thank you.
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I think the Times and many of its readers may be overreacting.
Yes, it would have been nice to read the results with my morning coffee and bagel. But Iowa has a backup plan and a paper trail. The results will be solid when released later today. That's what really matters.
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@Liz Hi. I'm from the future, here in "later today" land the results are not in fact solid.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news here.
1
Forget Iowa - they are the canary in the coal mine for the Democratic Party.
Let's get on with Mike Bloomberg for President, Amy Klobuchar for VP. The only and urgent point is to beat Trump. The Democratic Party is in chaos in so many ways. Party infighting, ugly scorn for our fellow Dems. Please! Let's get together, Folks!!!! We are defeating ourselves. For real. This election is ours to lose.
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The Democratic Party died in 2016 when they forced the most unpopular candidate in the country onto the ticket because she was a woman. Yesterday’s chaos is the dead cat bounce that proves they are dead. Trump is already the default winner because no sane person can choose this Democratic clown convention over anything.
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We have a process. It is called democratic process. It can be messy but that is that is the game. What you are proposing is not democratic.
9
@kbw Bloomberg skipped these states focusing resources on Wisconsin Michigan as well as super Tuesday, states where Trump has effectively been campaigning unchecked because candidates spent a year and a half crisscrossing Iowa. This is such a bad look for Democrats after all the hype. Bloomberg is already one step ahead to face Trump but Bernie Sanders will likely derail that outcome and Dems will lose. Heartbreaking.
5
No adequate preparation here. What a mess.
13