John Edwards Caucus: Part Two

After delivering the money shot (a story about a young girl whose insurance company finally decided to pay for her surgery, and then she died a few hours later), the Son of a Millworker made his way through the crowd, shaking hands with everybody, and stopping to take a picture with Bob and his lovely family. The Senator, I'm sure, never wants to see Bob again because that means he either 1) lost, or 2) wins and sucks so bad he faces a primary opponent.

This tall, well-dressed lady was very nice to us as we were getting crammed into the staircase. She asked James if we were from the neighborhood, and he said no, we're up here from Missouri to work for John Edwards. We thought she might be important, because she was chit-chatting with Elizabeth before John came in, and then we got smashed into the staircase. In the process, James uncomfortably rubbed up against her, who just happens to be Mari Culver, the first lady of Iowa. Whoops!

While the Senator was making his way through Bob's house, the media assembled on Bob's exceptionally shovelled sidewalk. Edwards came out, took some questions, blah blah son of a millworker, blah blah big drug companies aren't going to negotiate their power away, blah blah fight for middle class, y'all know the drill by now, so let's just get on the bus. And like that, they were gone.

And we're still in Mt. Pleasant. This is me and James, so fired up about taking on big corporations, bringing American jobs home and getting some universal health care in case I get hypothermia in Iowa. Edwards' stump speech ain't Two Americas, but I'm ready to fistfight a whole gang of greedy corporate people! Let's go out and canvas this motherfucker!

Oh, dammit. This is a view down Avenue K in Mt. Pleasant precinct 3 at about 12:00, the day before the caucus. It's three degrees outside and the wind is blowing. In some areas, there's over a foot of snow on the ground. Hard-packed snow that's been there for two weeks. We've got two whole precincts to cover.

Matt gave us a couple of manilla folders with names and addresses of "supporters" and "leaners" that we're supposed to remind to caucus. That really means that we've got a bunch of names of people that might have one time kinda sorta said that they might vote for John Edwards. We're supposed to deliver these really expensive brochures (about $3.50 a piece) and a DVD, "The John Edwards Story," narrated by former Democratic Congressman, the guy who played "Cooter" on The Dukes of Hazzard. Seriously. Yeah, Bill, Oprah — but we're armed with Cooter talking about Grandpa Millworker who hauled his paralyzed leg to the mill every morning.

By the time we finished canvassing at 5:30, we covered much of western Mt. Pleasant, including the area around Iowa Wesleyan College (Go Tigers!). Matt called us at about 4:30 and told us that we didn't need to finish. The weather had dropped below zero, the wind chill was at about -15, my pen had literally frozen, and we had been walking for about six hours. Well, except for the half hour we spent digging the car out of a snow bank when we got lost at the end of a subdivision. We went ahead and finished, though, because we feel that strongly about "change."

After thawing out at the Hampton Inn, we got up the next morning and headed to Camp Pothitakis. Thankfully, Greg and Lara assigned us to Keokuk to hand out door hangers. Easy enough. We walked Keokuk 1, the precinct located on the bluff overlooking the lockes on the Mississippi River. It's the kind of neighborhood filled with giant Victorian houses that have seen better days — like, back during the Chester Arthur administration, when Supreme Court Justice Samuel Freeman Miller lived there. Now the neighborhood is filled with old money, old hippies and just plain old people. Hopefully, this is Edwards country.

We've found the base! The Keokuk Labor Temple was lined with Edwards signs. That must have found out that he's the only major Democratic candidate who wants to aggressively amend NAFTA. Let's just hope they make it out of the Halfime Sports Lounge to caucus.

Canvassin' ain't easy. It's a balmy 20 degrees in Keokuk on Caucus Day. My mood after nine hours of walking in sub-freezing temperatures has me seriously thinking about suing John Edwards if James falls down these steps. A little of your own medicine, trial lawyers!

This is Keesh and Kelly, sorority sisters from Springfield, Illinois who were canvassing Precinct 1 for Obama. We heard that Hillary and Barack workers were sabotaging each other in Council Bluffs the night before, but Keesh and Kelly were really nice — they offered us a ride back to our car, and then asked if we wanted to go to the Obama watch party at the Methodist church that night. We just wanted to get the hell out of Keokuk and try to catch the end of the Orange Bowl (Rock Chalk Jayhawk!) I really hope Keesh and Kelly made it out of Keokuk alive.

Click here for Part 3.