Talk Elections

Tentative, of course, but gives you a good sense of what went on:

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Colors are the usual Atlas standard.

The one purple county is Jefferson County, which voted for Paul.  (It's the home of a Transcendental Meditation Community (& John Hagelin) which tends to swing the county in caucuses.  In 2004, Kucinich came a very close second.  Apparently they voted Republican this time).

Is the purple county a tie?

The one purple county is Jefferson County, which voted for Paul.  (It's the home of a Transcendental Meditation Community (& John Hagelin) which tends to swing the county in caucuses.  In 2004, Kucinich came a very close second.  Apparently they voted Republican this time).

Wow... John Hagelin and the Natural Law Party... that's a blast from the past.

Anyway, Fox should let Paul in on the debate.  He got 10% which is more than enough to be qualified for a debate.

Ron Paul R[love]ution!

Vote Ron Paul - endorsed by loonies of all kinds!

Paul also got second in one of the Northwestern counties - and there's no cult up their to prop him up.

If we're talking about Sioux County, then the answer to that is "yes there is. Oh yes there is. The difference is that it's a majority of the county's population".

Nope - Osceola County. Huckabee got 31%, Paul 26%, Romney 20%, McCain 14.5%, Thompson 7%, Giuliani 1.5%, Hunter... um... 1 vote.

Republicans?

Bush's third strongest county in Iowa. Also has a sizeable dutch reformed presence, though nowhere near Sioux County levels.36% Reformed Church in America
29% Christian Reformed Church in North America
of the total population that is.
...taking the split between mainline Dutch Calvinists and extreme fundie Dutch Calvinists with them to the New World.

Last I checked, as a Calvinist myself of the Presbyterian variety, we're pretty mainstream.

Can someone with the time and desire put together a table of say Top 3 finishes in counties for the candidates? The map's great and all, but other than the one blue county, I can't make heads or tails of most of the map due to my colorblindness.

He's talking specifically about Reformed Church Calvinists. These are the people supporting parties like the Political Reformed Party (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reformed_Political_Party) in the Netherlands, which didn't allow female members until 2006.

Fairfield, IA is the seat of Jefferson county.  It actually voted 46% for Obama in the Democrat primary, much higher than the state average.  Also, yes its share of Ron Paul voters was much higher than the state average.  Isn't it also the home of an orthodox Jewish community?   Or is that potsville? 

Well, the caucuses are indeed a bizarre phenomenon.  I imagine fraud must be very easy.  There were thousands of people in my room.  I was never asked for an ID of any kind.  Just told my name and they looked me up and handed me several slips of paper.  There were thousands of people in that big hall.  I found my way to the Ward5, Precinct2 table and waited a very long time for the speakers (Ron Paul, a former Louisiana Governor, fringe GOP Presidential Candidate Hugh Cort, etc.), then the 35 or so folks from my precinct were all gathered around that table and they asked for the yellow slip of paper (which I presume is mostly to collect email addresses so they can later ask for donations), then asked for the pink slip of paper (presidential preference poll), and then the precinct chair, a 70ish woman who moved and talked and walked very slowly, set that stack of pink papers on the table and walked away.  In a huge room bustling with thousands of people, the only person guarding those pink ballots was a very small septegenarianette!  Anyway, I understand they later asked for donations, then voted on some other issues, but I left after the pink papers were collected.  Two and a half hours was quite enough for me.  (5:40 to 8:10 I was there)  At least there was a cafeteria where you could buy weak coffee for 50 cents, and cookies for a quarter.  And I did get to meet Ron Paul though.  Shook his hand and asked him some questions.  He was a little dweeby, but disarming. 

I still can't find an official count from my precinct, but it was all too easy to see how everyone was voting, so here's my best unofficial count for my precinct:

Romney:  20
Huckabee:  19
Thompson:  5
Paul:  3
McCain:  1
Hunter:  1
Giuliani:  1

Anybody know where I can get the official tally?

The PC(USA) is a "mainstream" church, but PCA and OPC are standard conservative. PCA especially has been having impressive growth lately.

I'm a member of a PC(USA) church and my sister is a member of a PCA church, and as far as I can tell there is little difference. The only difference in structure I can tell is that PC(USA) allows female elders and PCA does not. Neither her nor I aimed to be in our respective branches of Presbyterianism, we just found a Presbyterian church where we moved to and they were affiliated as they were.

Also, PC(USA) is the one that is currently having its membership bickering over where gays are okay or not, a debate that will never come up in PCA. The northeastern and Pacific membership of PC(USA) have brought up the gay issue in national conference twice and twice it has been handily defeated by the rest of the country. I've not heard much of it lately but if they bring it up again, it's likely that the two sides will just split into separate churches, which is typical of how Presbyterian politics works.

Which of those is the mainline and which is the extreme fundie? I'll guess the simple Reform Church is the mainline.

Yes. The two have roughly equal membership in the US, by the way.

Strange, I've never heard of the latter before.

There was also some rural county where Giuliani tied Hunter, lol. And how did Huckabee win Polk County? Strikes me as odd.