This is off our usual beat, but yesterday morning's Washington Post included a truly remarkable number. It appeared in a graphic we can't find on-line, but here it is: In January 2000, four percent of Iowa's voting-age population took part in the two parties' caucuses. That was the last campaign in which both major parties held contested presidential races.
Let's repeat: Four percent of voting-age Iowans took part in the 2000 caucuses. Hence the difficulty of polling Iowa—and the sheer inanity of the way we select our White House candidates.
I can't find linkable data for 2000, but here's a comprehensive look at primary/caucus participation in 2004. In that year, 5.7% of eligible voters participated in the Iowa caucuses, while 22.8% voted in the NH primary.
At any rate, Somerby is right in his takeaway from this. Having a fraction of the voters in two arbitrarily selected, small, rural states exert such a disproportionate influence on picking presidential candidates is crazy (see, for example, Paul Waldman on this point.) When picking candidates for the most important federal office, it seems obvious that vote outcomes should mirror the vote preferences of party members across the country as closely as possible, rather than giving a few states -- and not even randomly selected states! -- near hegemony over the process.
--Scott Lemieux
