Iowa Caucuses: Report from a Democratic Site

As the Iowa caucuses get under way, we hear from NPR's Linda Wertheimer, who is visiting a Democratic caucus site on a school campus in Nevada, Iowa. The town of more than 5,000 people is a little east of Ames, in the center of the state.

Wertheimer says many people at the precinct site are attending their first caucus, and that there's sort of a party atmosphere, with two basketball games, cheerleader practice, and a lot of people in the cafeteria. She says people are saying it's a little bigger than the last caucus there, a few years ago. There's a tremendous amount of interest in this one — people are liking their candidates, they thought "it's close, it's exciting," and so they're here, Wertheimer says.

Some attendees said they had never gotten involved in caucusing before because it didn't seem like something they wanted to do, but this time, it seemed very important, Wertheimer says.

A lot of women told her they're pleased to be able to come caucus for the first woman they though might be president — Hillary Clinton. Other people talk about being very happy to come and caucus for Barack Obama because he will bring change, because they like his plans for the country. But they also say they'll be happy to vote for some of the other candidates if their preferred ones don't win.

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