Iowa08: Archives

BRENT STEVEN WHITE writes:
A friend and I were talking a few days ago about my upcoming trip to the Iowa caucuses. She expressed interest in my trip, but she was curious why presidential primaries started in a state that is not as large or powerful as, say, Illinois or California. I didn’'t have an answer.

The more questions she asked, the more I realized that I needed to learn a lot more about the process of electing our president. And even though candidates campaign months before January 3, the real race begins in Iowa.

Politics has been an interest of mine since I was a young teenager delivering newspapers. It was an absent interest, however, in high school, as I was focused on other things such as music and traveling.

Moving to Chicago changed that. It’'s impossible not to develop an interest in politics living in Chicago. Local politics is infectious. Living in Chicago for the past couple years has inspired me to become a more active citizen and taxpayer.

This inspiration led directly to my decision to attend the Iowa caucuses. I drove through Iowa two and a half years ago when my father helped me move from Portland, Oregon to Chicago. The drive took four days—four long days. I remember Iowa being very flat, sparse, and very green. The cities seemed sleepy, but I’m sure that will change on January 3.

Brent Steven White is a undergraduate journalism student from Portland, Oregon.

Brent Steven White writes:
At the Obama headquarters in Davenport, Iowa, Illinois Senator Dick Durbin appeared very busy, making calls and campaigning for his friend and fellow Illinois state senator. But I didn’'t arrive to see a high-level politician. Andrew Nelles, a fellow Columbia student in the photography department, and I arrived with the intention of trailing a group of canvasing Obama supporters, everyday-type people.

We figured it would make an excellent story to document people going door to door as they try to persuade people to caucus for Obama. We planned on packaging it in a multimedia format, telling the people’'s stories by narration over a slideshow of photographs. We were excited to start working on it.

Our idea was shot down, however, by both the woman managing the Davenport headquarters and her press secretary. My attempts to explain that Andrew and I had traveled from Chicago to document the Iowa caucuses and the methods people use here to get their neighbors out to caucus weren'’t received well.

In his campaign, Obama promotes hope, change, and a “new, fresh” kind of politics. He wants to bring Americans together and close the gap that'’s been created by the Bush Administration’'s polarizing policies. At his campaign headquarters here in Davenport, however, my friend and I weren'’t welcomed into their world.

We were told we couldn't trail along because it would “distract the volunteers” and that they “wouldn't focus on their jobs of getting people to caucus.” I explained we would only ask questions to the volunteers when they were walking between houses and that we wouldn't interact with them while they were petitioning directly to support Obama. Despite my enthusiasm and pleas, the press secretary, a rude and curt man, wouldn't accept our request.

Maybe he doesn'’t realize that it’'s this kind of divisive attitude and approach toward creating communication between people that has been destroyed in the last eight years. Obama may promote hope and change, but it seems some within his campaign here aren'’t ready to be that audacious.

Brent Steven White is an undergraduate journalism student from Portland, Oregon.

BRENT WHITE writes:
The day of the caucuses I became severely ill. The day after it got worse. But I stuck it out. I seem to have a tendency to become ill while traveling. But each time I do I remind myself it's likely that I'll never experience what I'm doing again, and that I'd regret staying in bed.

I'm glad I didn't stay in bed. Attending this year's Iowa caucuses has made me examine our electoral process in ways I haven't before. It's made me appreciate living in a democracy. Voting is something many of us don't do, especially those of us under the age of 30. Others who do it, it seems, often take it for granted.

But watching these people in Iowa take caucusing so seriously made me realize how important it is to be mindful of electing public servants, especially those whose power reaches beyond neighborhoods and communities.

Americans have different ideas of what it means to be "patriotic." When I'm thinking about that word in the future I'll think of a cold January night, where 800-some Iowans gathered in a large middle school gym to stand up for the presidential candidate of their choice.

Brent Steven White is an undergraduate journalism student from Portland, Oregon.