Helen Bradley
Staff Writer
We all knew 2020 was going to be a big year.
After every election, everyone automatically begins counting down to the next one and, after 2016, the country, no actually the world, has been waiting to see what happens next.
And, while final results won’t be known until November, the battle for the President has already begun.
Last week, the Iowa Caucus took place and wow what an event it was.
You may not understand the purpose of the Caucus or what it means for the election in November, and that’s okay.
It’s a confusing event that honestly has more value placed on it than it is really worth.
Caucuses are more for Presidential Candidates and their parties than for the public anyways.
Despite that though, the Iowa Caucus is viewed as one of the most important conferences in the primary election season as it is a large indicator of how candidates will do in future contests.
If this caucus really is a big indicator of the future election season, well, we’ve got a rollercoaster of a year ahead.
If you were to google “Iowa Caucus” right this second, you would find one word plastered across the headlines: meltdown.
If you ask me, describing the event as a meltdown is a bit of an over-exaggeration.
The Democrats tried something new and it failed.
It happens.
But what I think the app debacle did reveal to us is the state our country is in.
As soon as the app that was used failed and results were delayed, questions about the legitimacy of the results along with whether there was outside involvement or not arose.
Maybe society has become hyper-sensitized to the constant questions of hacking and influence within our elections.
The fact that an app broke down, which by the way is not uncommon when mass numbers of people try to access sites simultaneously, and we automatically think someone has hacked the results is infuriating.
We live in a democracy and democracies were built off of freedom, and yet suddenly it feels like our freedom is being ripped out from under our feet.
Our basic right to vote is no longer on solid ground and the media pushes this ideology that we can’t trust anyone or anything.
And you know what, I’m not surprised.
This is America today.
Freedom is what America was built on and is what makes America so great, yet every day we witness events that debase that freedom.
Walls are being built, citizens are being detained just for their skin color and innocent people are being shot dead while pursuing the precious gift of education.
Through all of this, when we should be coming together as one, we are creating larger divides.
A caucus is an event where people are meant to start coming together and establishing who and what we want for the future of our country, and yet we can’t even get through the first conference of the primary elections without throwing blame, creating suspicions and beginning arguments.
“This is not the caucus that Iowa Democrats deserve”, said Troy Price, State Democratic Chair, according to the National Public Radio.
But it’s more than that.
It’s not the caucus that the country deserved.
Email Helen at:
hbradley2@live.esu.edu
