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Tuesday, January 3, 2012

2012 / At Large It's a Beautiful Day in Des Moines

Posted by Paul Constant on Tue, Jan 3, 2012 at 10:11 AM

Sure, it's so cold that I think the inside of my face is chapped, but it's a beautiful day in Des Moines—sunny, crisp, no snow on the ground. It'll be interesting to see how caucus attendance turns out tonight. Ordinarily, Iowans have to caucus in the middle of a blizzard, so I'd expect a high turnout. If attendance is down or even with the average, that means the Republican base is not enthusiastic about their options.

Something I did not expect about Iowa: On my three-mile hike to downtown from my flophouse, I saw not one yard sign promoting a candidate. Neither did I see a single bumper sticker. I half-expected something resembling the Republican Convention floor all over the city, but if you didn't pay attention to the news, it could be just any old Tuesday in Iowa. I have heard a couple of radio ads, both for Michele Bachmann, but if you keep the TVs, computers, and radios off, everything seems positively normal.

Comments (8) RSS

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Coverage of this sure beats talking about Obama signing even more of our civil rights away last week. Well, he "reluctantly" signed them away but still...

Posted by Cato the Younger Younger on January 3, 2012 at 10:38 AM

It's a lovely capital building, shiny golden dome and all..

How weird to see no snow on the ground in January! Aaaaand now I'm in full-on nostalgia mode for me old college days... ah Drake...

Posted by merry on January 3, 2012 at 10:58 AM

Have you already burned though your $10 per diem?

Posted by Free Lunch on January 3, 2012 at 11:19 AM

@2

No snow on the ground in Iowa on the 3rd of January?

That is not right!

Posted by Big Matt G on January 3, 2012 at 11:55 AM

It's not that uncommon for there to be no snow on the ground in January. What is uncommon is that it was in the 50's there just last week when I was sawing up Mother Vel-DuRay's Christmas tree for her.

And Paul, that's not the bar at the Hotel Fort Des Moines. I mean, the capitol is pretty an all (I was there on a field trip in third grade!) but isn't it time for a drink?

Posted by Catalina Vel-DuRay