casey.com

Caucus Day at last! How would it turn out? At first disapointed to find that my favorite wireless coffee shop was closed on Mondays, I instead found the breakfast that I’ve been looking for at Dottie’s cafe. While I was eating, a few orange-hatted Dean colleagues entered the diner and didn’t sit down for their coffee until they had worked every customer in the place. OK, so I was gonna get to that after my coffee, really.

Even though traveling here to help the campaign, I have to make a living too, and I spent most of the day online and getting caught up on work. By late afternoon, I set out for St. Mark’s Community Center, caucus location for Dubuque’s 18th Precienct, the one I walked on Saturday. Visitors are welcome to attend and observe caucuses, and I was eager to see the culmination of this campaign effort in the unique political drama that is a caucus. It didn’t disapoint.

But first I needed to spend a bit more time for the cause, so I stood outside on the cold street corner, waving a Dean sign high above my head, shopping for honks of support.

Inside, the basement of St. Mark’s was very crowded, but not uncomfortably so. I grabbed a seat as out of the way as I could, and sat back to watch. I was impressed with how informal it all seemed. Voters sat in groups, roughly together by candidate. There were a total of 131 eligible voters attending, and the doors closed at 7pm, locking in that total amount. Based on this number, the level of ‘viablility’ was set at 20 supporters, and after initials counts of support, only Gephart’s 12 supporters failed to meet that plateau. Given the opportunity to re-align, most of them went to Kerry, a few to Edwards.

There were two voters who declared themselves to be ‘uncommitted’ upon their arrival, which proved to be like declaring yourself to be chum in a shark pool, as each of the precient leaders for the various campaigns set upon them in an effort to pull them to their candidate. They went to Edwards.

Final tallies and delegates:

candidate/votes/delegates

Kerry/43/2
Dean/40/2
Edwards/27/2
Kucinich/21/1

After the caucus, I headed to a local bar to watch the results on CNN. There I met Marty, a Democrat from nearby Galena, Illinois. We talked politics and hit an Irish Pub in Galena together. Gavin the Bartender is from Ireland, and he’s looking forward to his first opportunity to vote this November as an American Citizen. We talked politics over a few beers, and Gavin proves to be very knowledgeable and eager to participate. I was struck by his enthusiasm to participate in our system, and felt sad at the thought that it’s something that so many American’s have lost. I came to Dubuque to participate in a deeper way myself, and to follow trails leading back to a distant Irish ancestor of my own. I did both, and was also reminded by the Caucus goers I watched, and by Gavin the bartender, that there are still people who care and take part, and they’ll be the ones to decide who wins and loses.

My support for Howard Dean hasn’t waned. His expectations got ahead of the voters, and his third place finish is a reality check. The Iowa field has thinned by one with Gephardt’s exit, but New Hampshire will bring Clarke and Lieberman into the mix. We’ll face a whole new episode of Primary Survivor next week in New Hampshire.

It was a cold morning in Dubuque today. The Telegraph Herald put the day’s expected high temp at a bitter 17 degrees. Yesterday was overcast with icy sidewalks, but today the sun was shining, not that it offered anything more than light today.

The word was that Tom Harkin, Iowa’s popular Democratic Senator, would be at Dean’s Dubuque Headquarters today to rally us Storm Troopers for another day on the streets. The HQ was abuzz with activity, as volunteers moved tables, hung streamers, and prepared a stage from which Sen. Harkin could speak.

During my eight years working in the United States Senate, I had plenty of opportunities to see many Senators at work from a front row seat, and my opinions of them would grow or suffer. My opinion of Senator Harkin only ever grew, he’s a smart and impressive politician, and I was thrilled when he recently announced his decision to endorse Howard Dean. He spoke to us about that decision, about how he couldn’t sit on the sidelines, and about how after his review of the field that he felt Dean had the best chance at sending George Bush packing. It was a rousing speech that achieved it’s goal of pumping up the orange-hatted volunteers for another day of retail politics.

Pairing up again with my partner Rick from yesterday, and another volunteer from Wisconsin named Robert, we’re assigned to go to the westurn suburb of Asbury. It’s really bitter cold outside. After we divvy up our first batch of streets and I’ve walked a couple of block, I noticed an unusual crackly feeling on my face. It was beardsicles. With each breath I exhaled, more moisture would collect and freeze immediately on my mustache and beard, my own personal facial ice machine.

As before, many people aren’t home, and we leave a door hanger with information about their caucus location. The weather seems to work to my advantage at some doors that are opened. When people hear I’ve come all the way from Virginia just to knock on doors and encouraging Iowans to vote, they seem to feel I deserve at least a hearing. And my beardsicles must give me a particularly pitiful look. Often I’m invited inside to step out of the cold, and when I do, the fast temperature change causes my glasses to fog up quickly. I’m my own walking atmosphere.

Step by step, door by door, we work through out walk lists. Talking to people, leaving them information about Dean and about the Caucus. The cold can’t slow us. By late afternoon, we’ve knocked on about 300 doors. Exhausted, cold, and hungry, we loaded up and headed back to headquarters with great satisfaction for our work accomplished today.

A burger and beer is my reward at a local brew pub. I see the end of one football game, and the beginning of another, before heading back to my room to peal off my frozen clothes and hunker down for the evening.

The Caucus is tomorrow. Tonight’s TV poll says that Kerry and Edwards have surged ahead of Dean and Gephardt. But finally, tomorrow, the only real poll that matters will take place. And it won’t be the media pundits deciding the winner, it will be Iowa Democrats, it will be real voters. I feel good in knowing that I reached as many of them as I could.

Thanks to my far reaching wireless net connection from across the street, I was up late (2am, that’s 3am EST time) getting a bit of work done. Breakfast today continues my taste test of the various granola-type breakfast bars I picked up the other night. I found the Banana Power Bar to be slightly more satisfying than yesterdays Oatmeal Crisp bar. One more tomorrow, then maybe Monday I’ll reward my work with a REAL breakfast.

I get myself together and equip my bag with the stuff I think I’ll need today; clipboard, pen, etc… and step across the street for the stuff I KNOW I’ll need today, a large coffee. The sidewalks are again a bit treacherous with icy spots, and I pause on my way down Main St. to admire Dubuque’s historic clock tower.

At the campaign headquarters, I head downstairs and join a training for volunteers that was already underway. We learn the basics of staying friendly while learning the information we’re seeking, ‘Are you going to caucus on Monday?’ and ‘Who do you support?’ We got divided up into groups, given our precient packets, filled our bags with door hangers, literature, and bumperstickers, and set out to find our neighboorhoods.

I’m partnered with Rick, a volunteer who has come here from Oregon. We quickly find our neighboorhood and divvy up the streets to start our canvass. I approached my first door with some apprehension. Will these poor people, who’ve be deluged by direct mail and phone calls from seven campaigns, welcome yet another knock on the door? Will they ask me questions I can’t answer? Will I really be doing any good here? Knock knock… no answer. Knock knock. Leave a door hanger. Whew… that was easy.

Although many people aren’t home, the door hanger I leave behind will let them know a Dean supporter had been there and encourages them to go to the caucuses on Monday night. Besides those that aren’t home, there’s another group of people that just expresses disinterest. They haven’t ever caucused and they’re not about to start now. It’s hard to imagine living here and not participating in the important early role Iowa plays in launching every campaign for President, but not everyone is ready. One lady angrily tells me, “I have almost a year before I need to decide who to vote for”, disregarding the fact that she’s leaving it to others to whittle that choice down for her.

But by far, among the knocks that are answered, the individual is welcoming and willing to listen. Many haven’t caucused but say they might, others say they will but that they don’t know for who yet, and some say they’ve made up their mind but they’ll still take and read our literature. With each door that is answered by someone like this, it’s even easier to move onto the next one. Rick and I finished our precient in about three and a half hours. I had mentioned my wireless Internet cafe to him when I saw the iBook in his car, and he was eager to make that our lunch stop, which it was. Over my sandwich, I enjoyed carrying on several IM chats with friend, sending them greetings from Dubuque.

Back to the hotel to regroup, I took an unplanned nap. Today’s walking has caught up with me, and at my age, sometimes naps just happen.

I headed back to campaign HQ and spent an hour re-organizing the walks lists that didn’t get completed today. I don’t know yet if I’ll go out again tonight and find where my fellow storm troopers are unwinding or if I’m in for the night. Too soon to say, stay tuned 🙂

I stayed in the wireless Coffee/Pizza place until they closed. Back in my hotel room, just across the street, I’m happy to discover that even five floors up I can grab a week signal from their wi-fi access point. Some slight re-arranging in the hotel room and I’m in Dubuque wireless heaven!

TV Stats: I’ve been keeping a running tally of whose commercials I’ve seen on TV. In two days of morning and evening tv I’ve counted the following:

Dean: 8
Kerry: 5
Edwards: 5
Gephardt: 2

In a timely bit of reporting, today’s Washington Post has an article about the politics of hunting votes in Dubuque, check it out…

The Many Chasing The Few
The Washington Post, 1/16/04

I see Dead Caseys. Not really. The ones I’m looking for are all safely underground, but I still like graveyards. What’s the point of a headstone if no one comes to see it? Ever since I learned that there were relatives, regardless that they’re slightly distant (from my Great Great Grandfather’s 2nd marriage), I’ve wanted to come here. Having met and hung out with my half first-cousin twice-removed, Beverly, it was time to find the ones I didn’t get here in time to meet.

It was a sound night’s sleep, and I woke up to again hit my slow dial-up connection, again wade through a mountain of spam, and get some morning work done. Once cleaned up and ready to face Dubuque, I hit the coffee shop across the street. At another table a woman is working on a laptop while she nibbles her muffin. Could it be? Do I dare to hope? I open up my Powerbook and it happily hones in on a high-speed wireless connection. I like this coffee shop!

I spend more time working, reading email, writing my first blog entry, and then call Ken and Bev to see if they’re game for Day 2. They are and they come and get me.

First stop, Mt. Olivet Cemetery, final resting place of Mary Casey Paul (Michael Casey’s 2nd wife) and one of the son’s she had with Michael, Patrick the fireman. Not having received a response to the letter I wrote previously looking for plot locations, we arrive with no idea where they might be, and no sign of life at the cemetery office. I wander a bit, as do Ken and Bev, but it’s cold out and the brute force hunt doesn’t look promising. At a school across the street, the office secretary happily looks up the cemetery’s phone number and I call but get an answering machine. I leave a message. Back to hunting, my cell phone rings and the guy remembers my letter and directs me to the basic vicinity where he thinks I’ll find the relatives. Confident I’m now in the right ballpark, I’m still having little luck and getting discouraged. Will I strike out two days in a row?

No! I won’t. There’s Mary Casey Paul! It was a flat stone, very overgrown and covered in dirt, and I have no idea how I spotted it. I go and fetch Beverly from the car to bring her over to meet her grandmother. Although she’s lived her whole life in Dubuque, Beverly says she’s never once been here before and she’s obviously moved to come now. I grab some snow to was the stone off, and take some pictures.

With that success, I continue the hunt to find her son Patrick. I’m hunting and hunting and hunting, nothing. I call the cemetery guy back and ask him if he can help again, and he tells me that Patrick is in the same plot as Mary and that if there’s no stone it may be he just doesn’t have one. Patrick was the Chief of the Dubuque Fire Department. His name is listed on the Iowa Firefighters Memorial, having died in the line of duty at the scene of the Hub Clothier’s Fire in 1952, and I’m not buying that he was buried in an unmarked grave. On a hunch, I try a whole different section. Ken and Bev follow slowly in the car, while I hunt up and down rows. Bingo! There’s Pat and his wife Carmelita! Nice to my half Great Great Uncle.

From the cemetery we go and start a driving tour of Dubuque. It’s always great to have a local show you around a new town, and Ken and Bev are excellent tour guides. They know every inch of this town and have a story for each one. It was really great. We saw the building that used to be Patrick’s fire house, and the shop that used to be Beverly’s salon. We viewed the Mississippi from high on the Bluffs, and from down by the riverside where dozens of eagles could be seen soaring and fishing between large floes of ice.

We go next to the Library, and after hunting and finding Casey trails in Dubuque City Directories, Kev and Bev leave me behind to carry on. I spent about an hour there. No major discoveries, but some evidence of Casey shadows from long ago.

Walking home, it’s starting to rain. The Dean Headquarters is on Main Street, as is my hotel, so I figure I’ll pop in to get a head start on tomorrow. I should know better than to think that I’ll pop in and say, “I’m here to volunteer tomorrow”. They didn’t hear that last word, and sat me right down to get to work preparing precient walking maps for use by volunteers the following day. But most importantly, I’m given my ‘Iowa Perfect Storm’ knit cap which is the tell tale icon of Dean volunteers in Iowa. After about an hour or so, I’ve finished organizing Precient 4 into six walking maps. I head out into the rain, frozen onto slippery sidewalks, and come back to my favorite Dubuque wireless Internet coffee shop (they serve pizza and beer too!), and that my friends catches us up. I’m taking my last swallow of beer, and signing off.

Stay tuned…

So Ken and Bev grab me at the Airport. We exchange quick niceties, like you would when meeting any relative for the first time, and jump in the car to head into Dubuque. I’m staying at the Julien Inn, a historic hotel on main street that was one Al Capone’s favorite place to hide out when things got too hot in Chicago. Rate for a room with two double beds…$59/night. I could have been put up by the campaign, but I’m to old to find myself bunking with some college kids or on the sofa of a local Democrat. A guy my age needs some room and some solitude.

Anyway, after a quick check in and drop off of my bags, we head down to the new River Museum down by… well… the river. You see, the River Museum also happens to hold the collections of the local Historical Society. And the Historical Society holds the records of the county courthouse. And a previous search of indexed naturalization records leads me to believe that on October 26, 1886, my Great Great Grandfather Michael Casey just may have walked into the Dubuque County Courthouse and said, “I love America!” or something like that. At least, some guy named Michael Casey did.

We’re lead upstairs into a distant office among piled boxes and dis-mantled exhibits, where on a metal shelf in the back, there are stack of courthouse books with crumbly brown pages and tattered bindings, that document many thousands of newly naturalized Americans, minted right here in Dubuque between about 1840 and 1930 or so. It’s a powerful feeling to flip through the pages of such a book and scan the names of these immigrants, and see the countries to which they renouced any allegiance. But alas, the only book we find with the date we’re hunting for Naturalizations contains no Michael Casey.

Defeated, we head back into town and grab a nice lunch, and from there cross the Mississippi into Illinois and Ken and Bev’s home in East Dubuque where we spend a very pleasant evening getting to know each other, looking at photos and family trees, and sipping some Coors Light while nibbling shrimp.

Back at the hotel, I suffer through the download of hundreds of backed up spam email messages at a painful dial-up speed, do what work I can, and soundly crash at 11:30pm.

It’s been a long and hectic week. When I arranged my flight, departing Washington National Airport at 8:57 am on Thursday, I completely disregarded that this would put me smack in the morning rush hour. And the weathermen were calling for snow, during the commute. I figured I’d need to get up at 5am, to leave by 6am, to arrive at the airport by 7am. The only problem was, it was already 3am and my work/packing/preparation seemed far from finished.

(look here for pictures, more to come each day)

Zoom forward, happy ending (start), I woke up on time, there was no snow, and the traffic didn’t keep me from making my flight. Once I was happily secure in my seat, I was able to enjoy two needed hours of sleep on my way to Chicago.

Quick turnaround in Chicago, to catch my flight to Dubuque. Why am I going to Dubuque? Well, my recent compusive hobby of genealogy has revealed that there is a branch of my family tree in Dubuque that I didn’t know existed just six months ago. Combined with the urge to participate in this election in a more hands on manner, rather than just watch it on TV from home, well… Dubuque just called out to me, and I answered.

An interesting pair of passengers sits just in front of me on our small plane. One, a young man who couldn’t be much older than 19 or 20, wearing his desert fatigues, and obviously going home. The other, a more grizzled looking old man, hearing aids, glasses, beard, wearing a green military jackets and a hat that says ‘Swift Boats Vietnam’ that has a ‘Veterans for Kerry’ pin on it. I don’t mean to snoop, but it’s hard not to catch snippets. The young man says he’s based just 15 miles from where Saddam was captured, and that he’s looking forward to a 15-day break. His leave doesn’t actually start until midnight that night, so his travel from Iraq to Dubuque isn’t taking away from his leave time. He mentions that on the previous leg of his flight, the pilot came back and bumped him up to an empty seat in first class. I like that pilot.

The older vet is obviously going to Iowa for the same reason I am, to work for a candidate to try and replace the current Commander-in-Chief who sent this young man abroad. But they don’t talk politics. The talk military life, vet to vet, food, letters, leave. When we arrive, the old vet tells the younger one that he’ll stand up and block the aisle so he can leave unhindered. With the few people on the flight, it’s an unnecessary but kind gesture.

Dubuque is a very small terminal, and Bev and Ken Foell don’t have any problem recognizing me. I grab my bag and we load up in their car.

Stay tuned, more to come.

Chris