Parker Hodges | Posted 7:34 a.m. Feb. 8 While political pundits continued to chew over Super Tuesday and what it means to the presidential race, at least one Minnesota pundit looks at what the fallout means in state politics.
G.R. Anderson Jr., writing on minnpost.com, takes a look at the winners and losers on the GOP side here in Minnesota. His conclusion? Gov. Tim Pawlenty may have been the biggest loser on the Republican side following a Minnesota caucus with record-breaking turnout. Find out why.
Parker Hodges | Posted 12:44 p.m. Feb. 7
Did you caucus Tuesday night? With a reported 268,000 Minnesotans turning out -- roughly 10% of the electorate -- it's a good bet a majority attended for the first time. And they generally found snarled traffic, parking problems, lack of ballots and general confusion.
That has at least two legislators ready to introduce a bill to scrap the caucus and turn to a primary system, which acts like a traditional election with polling place that are open all day. Get the details in this Star Tribune report. (Registration unfortunately required.)
Beth Pearlman | Posted 11:49 p.m. Feb. 5 Caucus veterans say they've never seen anything like it: even before the doors opened at 6 p.m., traffic jams, overflowing hallways and bewildered voters were welcomed Minnesota caucus night 2008.
Apparently the Inver Grove Heights police department did not anticipate rock-concert level attendance because traffic police did not show up until around 7:30 to help clear the gridlock.
State House Representative Rick Hansen estimated the total crowd in the southern suburban caucus to be about 3,000. Four years ago he said it hovered around 700. He theorized that "people are hungry for change."
This was a first caucus for most of the people streaming into Simley High School, location for all the caucuses in the single state house district.
Most came not knowing what to expect, and left not quite knowing exactly what hit them. The hallways were jammed with voters jockeying for position near the huge wall maps, trying to figure out which of the classrooms held their precinct's caucus.
Sprinkled throughout a blog page of the "Politically Connected" site of the Star Tribune were reports of early caucus goers forming long lines in the cities and suburbs.
Over at kare11.com, the station goes one step further and has a story about how caucus goers are finding traffic jams heading to take part. The story also says Minnesota's Secretary of State said visits to his web site's caucus finder has surpassed 100,000.
A check of Google's search information finds that the search term "Minnesota Caucus" -- which has been climbing steadily throughout the day -- was listed as the fourth hottest search phrase on Google at 7 p.m. The term "mn Secretary of State" ranks at No. 25 on Google. Yes, that's all Google searches.
One Falcon Heights voter phoned in and said, "When they ran out of paper ballots, they just took ordinary pieces of paper, tore them up and told us to write down who we favoring."
A St. Paul voter also phoned in, reporting, "It is huge. One guy told me he hasn't seen it this busy in 40 years. It's just packed"
While political pundits continued to chew over Super Tuesday and what it means to the presidential race, at least one Minnesota pundit looks at what the fallout means in state politics.
G.R. Anderson Jr., writing on minnpost.com, takes a look at the winners and losers on the GOP side here in Minnesota. His conclusion? Gov. Tim Pawlenty may have been the biggest loser on the Republican side following a Minnesota caucus with record-breaking turnout. 
Caucus veterans say they've never seen anything like it: even before the doors opened at 6 p.m., traffic jams, overflowing hallways and bewildered voters were welcomed Minnesota caucus night 2008.
Apparently the Inver Grove Heights police department did not anticipate rock-concert level attendance because traffic police did not show up until around 7:30 to help clear the gridlock.
State House Representative Rick Hansen estimated the total crowd in the southern suburban caucus to be about 3,000. Four years ago he said it hovered around 700. He theorized that "people are hungry for change."
This was a first caucus for most of the people streaming into Simley High School, location for all the caucuses in the single state house district.
Most came not knowing what to expect, and left not quite knowing exactly what hit them. The hallways were jammed with voters jockeying for position near the huge wall maps, trying to figure out which of the classrooms held their precinct's caucus.
