Iowa Caucus

Well for anyone not on facebook, here's a bit of what it's been like to be in Des Moines caucusing in the Iowa caucus:

Complete and utter chaos. Welcome to Iowa.
That was how the meeting of my precinct closed. And the caucus most certainly was. Everyone (470 people!) packed into a high school cafeteria. The assembled group included the governor and attorney general of Iowa. First, all 470 of us had to count off, which took at least 20 minutes. I was 182. And then the "electioneering" began. I started off at Kucinich. He had 12 supporters initially, but by the first count was down to 5. 71 people were required for "viability" so after the first count I had to decide where to go instead. Several supporters of other candidates headed over to try to persuade us to come to their groups. Then a plot began to emerge. All of the non-Hillary non-Obama supporters were asked to join together to make Edwards viable (he needed about 19 more people). And it worked. He became viable.
After 15 minutes of this "discussion" I joined the Obama horde. In the end my precinct gave 5 delegates to Obama, 2 to Edwards, and 2 to Hillary. Now my whole family is watching the results from the other precincts roll in on TV.
I can't believe that this crazy process has such an enormous effect on how American chooses a president. America.
More on general info about the Iowa caucus here if you're interested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iowa_caucus