Oops, That’s Going to Leave a Mark – More on Iowa, and It Ain’t Pretty
Shadow. No, not the one caused by the sun, the one founded by former Hillary staffers Gerard Niemira and Krista Davis. Shadow is the company that developed the app that blew up last night making Iowa Dems look like idiots. Oh, and the IDP (Iowa Democratic Party) paid Shadow $63,000 for the privilege of being made to look like idiots. It gets better. Shadow was also paid over $42,000 by Mayor Pete’s campaign, $1200 by the Biden campaign, and $37,000 by Kirsten Gillibrand’s DOA campaign for software licenses and data. It gets even better. Shadow rushed this new app into deployment in TWO MONTHS. And even better, the IDP turned down Homeland Security who had offered to check it for security flaws.
The IDP blames a “coding” problem, but still maintains that the “data and paper trail” are intact. Are all state Dem parties run by morons?
Sadly, I’m not sure I would trust Homeland Security so long as it is under the Drumpf administration — or any other Drumpf-headed office — to affect any kind of security check. In other words, I have NO trust in this administration.
1Naming that company “Shadow” is as telling as Lev Parnas’ “Fraud Guarantee.” You get what you pay for.
2Look. So a few people screwed up. That is no reason for all this hand-wringing and histrionics. After all, it’s the Iowa caucus we’re talking about. It’s a ridiculous, non-democratic process to begin with. Let Iowa fix what Iowa messed up and let’s move on.
3@tom – “a few people screwed up”? The GOP is making hay right now over the chaos in Iowa. I don’t think anyone is “hand-wringing” or “histrionics”. Especially me. I’m just call Shadow and the leadership of the IDP stoopid.
4Perhaps we finally have the catalyst to jettison Iowa’s outdated caucus and to their importance in the primary process relegated to a more appropriate spot.
5Iowa could have used low tech like:
1. paper ballots.
2. Multiple voting sites so people could easily get there.
3. Manually count the ballots.
Why not hold all caucuses at the same time? Let’s get it down to two candidates and get on with it.
Sam @ 5 – I happen to agree with you that the Iowa caucus is outdated. It’s not a reflection of the real population of the US.
6“Are all state Dem parties run by morons?” Probably.
But bless their souls, our state (NV) Democratic Party is at least responsive to our complaints. The caucus format can be fun, if you have the time. Time, that’s exclusive to way too many people. Then there’s the issue of overseas military, disabled, elderly, etc. So this year there’s early voting and absentee ballots in addition to the caucus for the political gladiator types.
Less than 3 weeks to caucus time 2/22, so will see how well our state Democratic Party responds to this early Iowa warning about Shadow. It’s a question of who the DNC hates most in NV, the local Party or the voters. With a history of dealing with Gaming Control and the mafia, our lawyers are not in the least impressed with the DNC. While the voters here do not line up like ‘good little sheeple’ on the prairie to be fed whatever the DNC cooks up. Ask Harry Reid. We had to be threatened by Republicons crazy Sharron Angle and crazier Sue Lowden (barter with chickens for your health care), before he saw any respect.
Our phones have been buzzing wildly the past 72 hours. Will be interesting to observe any decisions and outcomes. “2/22, only the Shadow knows …” *
* h/t to my Grandpa
7We really screwed the pooch last night. It kinda helps explain why we have Joni Ernst as a Senator. On the other hand, there ARE paper “ballots” to count. They just weren’t prepared to count them if the new system failed. I hope my local Party leadership is counting the candidate preference slips they made such a big deal about us filling out last night.
The claims that this is an attempt to rig the caucus give way too much credit to folks who couldn’t pull off the simple act of counting, and then reporting the totals.
We are definitely the Will Rogers* Wing of the Democratic Party
*”I’m not a member of any organized political party…. I’m a Democrat.” Will Rogers
8It is times like this that I’m reminded that one of the reasons we vote for President in November but the winner isn’t sworn in until January is because it took that long to get the results. We have been conditioned by our cable news, App culture to expect and demand immediate results.
I know Iowa is a mess but, how are y’all going to feel about this when Iowa Dems release the caucus results about 15 minutes into the State of the Union?
9Hopefully this will shut down all the vote from your smart phone folks.
Dumb idea to use an app – the losers can scream hacker!
Really dumb idea to roll one out without testing.
Incredibly dumb idea to have caucuses at all. Why not ranked voting?
10First which do people prefer?
11The republican caucus of ‘2012 where first Romney was declared winner, then santorum and finally ron paul?
Or waiting for an eventual single winner?
That being said this level of incompeetence seems to be a reoccuring act of stupidity for D party’s.
At one point the Wa. State d chairman decided to change the accounting/reporting software in the after the election cycle had started. The thuglicans purposely lied and a financial stake could have been driven through its heart but technical errors of new software offset thuglicans criminal activity so a slap on the wrist for both.
That chairman “retired” into a nice starter castle/gated community.
Time be rid of Iowa and New hampshire first positions.
Why should states who’se demography looks more like the US in the 1800’s have a disproprtionate weight on choice of candinates in the 2000’s
Plus enough with the expensive sirens call of technology even after repeated evidence of its failure to ensure security of the vote.
Repeated failures, hacks and dubious results over the last 20 years should be enough for any one but the most gullible rubes to stop pouring money in to this rat hole. Send your money to liberian prince instead better chance of it paying off.
This whole system is atrocious. Candidates have to establish ‘viability’? Then count again? After horse trading? The rules read like something pre-designed for a screw up. Now they have one.
The totals are supposed to be released at 4PM, I am betting we won’t hear anything until later and that will be that it gets delayed until tomorrow.
12I have to thank Iowa for being brave enough (and smart enough to do it now, before the major election, but when all the attention was focused on them) to risk the embarrassment and PROVE we must use ONLY uncorruptible voting methods – like good old-fashioned paper and pens.
13No, all state parties are not run by morons. But they do tend to be run by extreme partisans, who tend to act in ways that could make them indistinguishable from morons.
We can’t afford any of this.
14Note all the hand wringing by some Democrats and the radical both siderist media over the caucuses having counting problems.
My how quickly everyone forgets that the GOP caucus in 2012 took two weeks to report, then called for Mitt Romney, then reversed and re-called for Rick Santorum.
Everything the Democrats have to do must be perfect, while the GOP gets passes on everything.
15what James (15) said.
Episode 9,012 in Everything Is Hillary’s Fault, broadcast by EJ only on the days ending in y. Tune in tomorrow for our next episode, showing how, because a deli where Hillary once ate a sandwich has had some bad Yelp reviews, shows conclusively that Hillary is systematically downgrading food quality for Democrats.
16/s
I think we can write off Iowa as having any sort of political mojo. What a waste of time and money! Lets just hope that none of the other primary states have signed up with the stupid company that birthed this damn app. And by the way, how is its stock doing?
17maggie, NV signed up. Fortunately our Democratic Party led by William McCurdy II will not be using the Shadow app at our 2/22 caucus. Quick decision. Smart decision. But expect reporting delays; it’s the nature of the beast with the caucus format.
Encouraging side note: William McCurdy II is the Nevada State Democratic Party’s first African American Chair and the youngest Chair in modern party history at 31 years old.
18Well here we are Wednesday afternoon and still almost third of votes still not tabulated.
I don’t know where to begin, this is so awful. Sadly I think Republicans have ore real world business experience on the part of their leaders. The Dems bought into the BS this firm gave them and the leaders bought it. Local staff was NOT apparently even trained on it.
Anyone heard when they even think they might have a full count? Maybe July?
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