We were close to getting out of the 2024 caucuses without major broadsides on Iowa for being Iowa, but then the Associated Press went for it:
Iowa’s winter blast could make an unrepresentative way of picking presidential nominees even more so
But the winter weather, intimidating even for Iowa, will make an already unrepresentative process even less representative. Elderly Iowans, the backbone of the caucus, are wondering how they will make it to their sites Monday. Political types are mentally downgrading their expected turnout and wondering who a smaller, harder-core electorate will favor. All this gives longtime critics of the caucus even more reason to be critical.
It would be nicer to not be doing this in January, for sure. Blame the 2008 arms race that nearly pushed the caucuses into 2007 and the earlier creep for Super Tuesday. The weather is going to be a huge factor, especially when it comes to county plows on rural roads.
Meanwhile, Politico has a piece worth reading even if I disagree with the premise:
The Iowa Pizza Chain That Explains How Our Politics Became So Dysfunctional
Situated in Iowa, a place where presidential politics dominates, Pizza Ranch became patient zero in our national divorce, when candidates and consumers started to patronize places where they felt welcomed and agreed with the ideology of the owners.
While Pizza Ranch’s owners lean right, the locations are convenient, and in urban areas, there are other options. It can be hard to get a place that can accommodate dozens of people, and likely a sound system, and not interfere with a place’s normal business, and not run up rental costs. Paradoxically, it can be easier when a candidate can draw enough people for a school gym or community center (or larger).
The story also claims 70 Iowa Pizza Ranch locations is “nearly one in each of its 99 counties” but with three locations in Polk and two in Linn, it’s just two-thirds.
Whether Pizza Ranch, or any location in Iowa, will be on 2028 candidates’ radar is yet to be known. The national Democrats’ expulsion of Iowa from first-in-the-nation really will be felt then if the calendar isn’t reverted.
UPDATE: The AP misspelled the town of Humeston in its story on the final rallies before the caucuses.