With all the furor leading up to the Iowa Caucus tomorrow, I haven't felt compelled to talk about the months I spent in Iowa in 2007 finishing my book. Two common reactions that I fielded from people around DC after telling them my plans were:"Are you going to the writer's conference out there?" or "You're going to be right in the thick of it when the Caucuses roll around!" Politics and higher learning are such a huge part of being in the District, so it's not surprising that's where the mind goes. But honestly, if I wanted to be in the thick of politics, why wouldn't I stay living where I can take a short Metro ride and be right in front of the White House?
First off, let me tell you about Iowa, (or Shenandoah, where I was). The people were nice and the community is strong and I've never been in a town that is as deserted on Sundays. From it's greenest greens to the knocked-up women, it's an undeniably fertile place and you will NEVER have better corn or pork than in Iowa. Anyone that's had either will agree.
But, oh lordy, it is white! It is nothing less than completely amazing to me that Obama is doing so well there. There are far more black people on the dais at an Iowa Barack Obama rally than I saw in the whole five months I lived there.
I know it's not fair of a dilettante such as I to speak of the perceived bias that voters in Iowa may have against someone named Barack Hussein Obama, much less a black man with that name. But I spent much of my first 26 years in Southern Delaware and the Eastern Shore of Maryland and I have been made intimately aware of the biases there, and Delaware is the freaking UN compared to Iowa.
Barack Obama- be it the man or the rhetoric- has already done the impossible, in my opinion.
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