A caucusing I did go...

...and it was nothing less than amazing. I've been to caucuses in the St. Cloud area ever since 1994; the first caucus that was held after my arrival here, and this was by far and away the most attended. Ever.

Some random observations and thoughts:

Conservatively speaking, there were no fewer than 800 attendees (my feeling is that there was closer to 1000 there); to the point where they needed to open up extra space in the auditorium at St. Cloud Apollo high school to accommodate for the crowd. In previous years, the attendance was closer to between 200 and 300.

For a year when Republicans are supposedly on the ropes, there was a helluva lot of excitement in the air. When the huge crowd was asked for a show of hands of how many people were there attending their first caucus, nearly three quarters of the people there responded in the affirmative! In other words, there was an overwhelming majority of people there who were first-time caucus attendees!

I took on my usual role of precinct convener; while there is usually a turnout of 6-8 people in Ward 4, Precinct 7, tonight there were 27 of us.

As expected, the Paul-bots were out in force, and consisted mostly of college-aged students, and there was more than ample talk of conspiracy theories, illegal wars, etc.,. In my precinct alone, Ron Paul was tied for first with Mitt Romney (my choice); however, again, there were a number of college-aged kids who participated.

On my drive home, I called into the NARN to give a report; while listening to other reports from around the state while on hold, I was hearing similar stories of unheard-of turnouts of excited Republicans.

As I'm typing this, I'm on the phone with Gary Gross, who informs me that McCain is pretty much cleaning house around the entire nation. While this is certainly not good news from where I sit, I am at once heartened by the fact that adherents of the Republican party are riding the crest of a wave of energy that will, with proper nurturance, carry over into a tsunami of activism that will propel Republicans into victory come November. Not only was there a turnout of epic proportions; I was equally taking solace in the fact that nearly all there were speaking a common conservative language; that is, small government, strong defense (except for the Paul-bots), strong borders, and a strong American culture.

It is my estimation that if McCain does indeed turn out to be the GOP nominee for the top of the ticket in November, he will have a lot of angry voices with which to contend if he tries any further boneheaded shifts to the left.

Consider me one as one of the delegates from the great state of Minnesota who will take great pleasure in leading that charge.

That's all for now... I'm off to bed.