Even if turnout far exceeds projections, only a small percentage of Iowa’s 3 million residents will participate in the event that plays an outsized role in determining which Republican candidate will face off against President Obama in November — and possibly lead more than 300 million Americans over the next four years.

Despite the national media saturation, the process by which the Iowa caucuses are run can seem incomprehensible even to politically attuned outsiders, and it is rarely explained in detail.

But some quintessential Iowa quirks notwithstanding, the Republican caucuses are rather straightforward.

Iowans who wish to participate on Jan. 3 must first find the voting site of their local precinct. The venues tend to change every four years, so even longtime caucus-goers are advised to double-check with one of the campaigns, the Iowa Republican Party website, or their local newspaper.

There are 1,774 precincts in this year’s caucuses, and many of the state’s rural outposts will see just a trickle of participants. On the other hand, some of the more populous counties combine their precincts into one location, which means that thousands of caucus-goers will gather at a single location.

Blackhawk County, for instance, is holding this year’s caucuses at the UNI-Dome, where the University of Northern Iowa football team plays its home games.

The gatherings are run entirely by the state Republican Party, which will deliver to each precinct a list of registered Republicans as of Nov. 14.

Once people start arriving at their caucus sites, they will be checked in and directed to their seats if they are already registered with the party. Non-Republican voters are allowed to register on site with the GOP upon providing a driver’s license or other photo ID with proof of residency and will be added instantly to the party’s registration rolls and can participate that night.

Seventeen-year-olds who will turn 18 by Nov. 6, 2012 are allowed to take part.

Refreshments are typically provided, and neighbors and friends will mingle before the session is called to order by a volunteer precinct captain.

The caucuses begin at 7 p.m. Central Time, but Iowa GOP officials and the campaigns themselves encourage voters to show up early, since the process typically starts on time. Michele Bachmann’s website, for instance, directs supporters to be at their caucus precincts by 6:30 p.m. and does not mention that the event actually begins a half-hour later.

After a few minutes of procedural business, the captains will move on to the main event: the Presidential Preference Poll.

Each campaign will then be allowed to have one surrogate speak on its behalf. These speeches, which typically last two to three minutes, are among the most important elements of the entire process and figure to be even more critical this year, given the especially high percentage of undecided voters.

“I hope to make a decision before I go in there, but a lot of people will actually go in there, visit with their neighbors not knowing what they’re going to do, and say, ‘Who do you support?’ ” said longtime Iowa Republican activist Becky Beach. “And what happens a lot is people who they are friends with or that they respect, they’ll vote with those people because they know them and like them.”

In the past, well-organized campaigns have placed volunteer speech-givers at almost all of Iowa’s precincts, providing them with talking points for closing the deal.

But in a year that has seen a much lower level of organizing than usual, not a single campaign has announced chairpersons in all 99 counties. Bachmann seems to have come the closest, as her campaign announced earlier this month that she has 91 counties covered.

Mitt Romney’s campaign will not say how many county chairpersons it has in place, though the remnants of the extensive organizing Romney did in the state throughout 2007 may prove invaluable.

At his Ida County precinct in 1996, Iowa GOP campaign veteran Tim Albrecht delivered his first caucus night speech on behalf of Pat Buchanan — while just a high school senior. According to Albrecht, the visual stimuli at each site can have a significant last-minute impact.

“You want to plaster that room with your signs and plaster anyone who will wear one with a sticker, because people like to go with a winner when they are undecided this late,” he said.

The candidates themselves will usually speak on their own behalf at one or two precincts in the more heavily populated counties.

Once the speeches have concluded, voting begins promptly.

Though methods may vary from precinct to precinct, each caucus-goer is typically handed a blank piece of paper on which to write the surname of the candidate for whom they are voting.

“In our precinct, I know this sounds cliché, but we passed around a red-white-and-blue sequined shoebox with a hole slit in the top, and you drop your ballot in there,” said Iowa Republican Party Chairman Matt Strawn, who plans to attend his local caucus this year but will not vote out of deference to his position.

In contrast to the far more complicated procedures involved in the Democratic process, Iowa Republicans do not maintain a viability threshold, and there is no second-choice realignment vote for candidates with little support.

Votes will be tallied in full view of attendees at a table in the back of the room, where each campaign is allowed to station an observer.

Decisions about misspellings are made by precinct leaders, but a liberal interpretation of voter intent is typically employed. There have been surprisingly few disputes over the years.

The results for each precinct are announced to everyone who is still on hand, and precinct chairs then forward their counts to the Iowa Republican Party.

The state GOP is likely to launch a website in the coming days, which it will use to announce the results as they come in on caucus night.

In 2008, the Iowa GOP tabulated and announced the outcome soon after the caucuses closed, and the party has enacted further improvements that it hopes will help it determine the outcome even more efficiently.

Unless the tally is extraordinarily close, the winner should have enough time to make a victory speech while most TV viewers on the East Coast are still awake.

The candidates who decide to continue their campaigns will then hop on red-eye flights to New Hampshire, where a one-week sprint in the first-in-the-nation primary state begins promptly the next morning.” Thank you Scott!

Kristina Schake

Even after Susan Sher left the White House last week to return to Chicago, we can welcome a new transplant to the Beltway: Kristina Schake, co-founder of communications firm Griffin|Schake, joins the administration as First Lady Michelle Obama’s communications director.

From a press release sent out this morning:

“I’m thrilled to welcome Kristina to the team.  Kristina brings a wealth of expertise that I know will make her a tremendous asset in the East Wing,” said First Lady Michelle Obama.  “Kristina has done extensive work throughout her career on child nutrition and community health issues, and that paired with her experience as part of a military family will bring invaluable insight to our work on childhood obesity and our efforts to support military families.  I look forward to working with Kristina on these efforts and more in the months and years ahead.”

Schake isn’t a stranger to working for powerful heads of state as she worked with former First Lady of California Maria Shriver among tackling obesity issues, “stem cell research and early childhood education a national priority and helped change California’s political landscape on renewable energy and civil rights.”

We can expect to see Schake around Capitol Hill starting in December.

photo via Griffin|Schake

If you’re planning on watching the day’s coverage, TheWrap highlights every major network’s planned schedules–including the overtly confusing ABC/Breitbart kerfuffle.  Don’t want to wait? Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight claims a 54-55 seat gain in the House by GOP from yesterday–the GOP only need 39 to take control. But as Andrea Mitchell said today during an interview with Gov. Haley Barbour (R-Miss), it’s still a 34 percent pro-GOP vote and appears to be a “firing” election rather than “hiring.”

Likewise from the New York Times, a prediction this could be a rough election day:

More than 500 House, Senate and governor’s races will be decided, if not by the end of the night, then over the course of the nail-biting days ahead as write-in ballots are counted and recounts are requested.

The looming questions of whether or not election results will answer growing concerns about the economy, a healthcare system repaired that may be smashed by a new Republican congress or whether or not the Tea Party are remotely viable are the big trinity of questions this year before 2012 crystal balls can be unveiled. Regardless, President Obama announced that he will have a live post-mortem announcement tomorrow afternoon (an interview President Obama taped with Ryan Seacrest will air today.)

In New York, Gothamist has a list of how to prepare to vote and a reminder to “TURN YOUR BALLOT OVER”  to vote on politician’s terms of service.

Did you know Toy Story 3 is actually working hand-in-hand with election day and Obama caused a rise in sissydom? Mystery author Andrew Klavan explains how in a LA Times editorial:

Last summer’s Pixar blockbuster — one of the best American films in a decade — was a similar rebuke, not perhaps to the Obama White House specifically but to its underlying ideas. The fact that the film was such an immense hit, earning back over half its estimated $200-million budget in a single weekend, should have served as a warning that Americans, though they might like the president personally, do not share his agenda.

And if you were wondering, yes, Obama represents Lots-O-Huggin’ Bear. What does Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich have to say about this groundbreakingly insane reading on a film about childhood dreams and friendship? On Twitter:

Really? REALLY? Please keep Toy Story 3 out of your politics.

I think Unkrich is right. In other Internet news, people are snapping pictures of their I Voted stickers on Twitter and earning badges on social networking check-in sites like Gowalla and Foursquare. Are you surprising #election is a trending topic on Twitter? Did you know it’s actually a sponsored trending topic?

So Poynter discovered yesterday when the Washington Post ponied up the cash to make it so. What does it do?

“When users click on that topic, one of the Post’s tweets will appear above other tweets with the #Election hashtag — giving the Post prime real estate to promote its coverage and updates.” It’s in effect a genius sponsorship idea. Elsewhere online, Politico’s near-constant coverage for the House Races, Senate Races and Gubernatorial Races.

In case you missed it this weekend, a tiny rally was held on a tiny piece of land in downtown Washington, DC. And then The Rally To Restore Sanity And/Or Fear blew up in the faces of the very folks covering it, while those attending the event laughed and swayed as if at a revival.

The general air around the event, spanning the multitude of signs via DCist, was a mystery. People were unsure what they were exactly attending–until the Roots and John Legend took the stage to calm all 200,000 (or 210,000 or 215,000) attendees’ fears. While the event, co-hosted by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, played out as a “rally by the numbers” from a benediction to awards ceremony. But Stewart’s actual keynote (not the one involving John Oliver as Peter Pan) hit a rather sore spot for the media:

This wasn’t the message that most outlets were hoping for it seems as David Carr for the Times wrote:

It was a beautiful day on the Mall, and who doesn’t like kicking the press around, but speaking of ants, media bias and hyperbole seem like pretty small targets when unemployment is near 10 percent, vast amounts of unregulated cash are being spent in the election’s closing days, and no American governing institution — not the Senate, not the House of Representatives, not even the Supreme Court— seems to be above petty partisan bickering. Mr. Stewart couldn’t really go there and instead suggested it was those guys over there in the press tent who had the blood of democracy on their hands.

Yet in a mid-term election year that even Politico teases to be filled with jokers and clowns, how can the media not be held responsible? Judging by the turn-out that TBD cobbled together, it seems like the main reason that people are huffy about Stewart’s speech is his audience. Mainly because he had the entire audience in front of him plus through Comedy Central, Twitter and every other form of media consumption we have these days.

If not proved by the insane turnout at the Daily Show’s taping on Wednesday at the Harman Center in DC, maybe the Beltway Gang’s other favorite staple can prove it: polls! Over at DCI, Dan Meyers contemplates a recent Rock The Vote poll:

Let’s look at previous midterm elections and voters that were 18-24 years old.  In 1998 turnout among them was 18.5%.  In 2002 it dropped to about 17.2%.  And in 2006 it rose to 19.9% — up almost 3% points.  Participation is higher, as it is in most segments, in presidential election years.  In 2000, 36.1% turned out.  2004 came in at 41.9% and most recently, in 2008, a spike to 44.3%.  2008 was the highest turnout among 18-24 year old voters since 1972 – the Nixon landslide – with turnout at 48.3%.

This year’s estimate: 77 percent. Meyers goes on to couple this with emerging media trends in social networking and communities developed through meet-up culture, which encourages people to not simply say they’ll vote but make sure they will. The social check-in app Foursquare has created a new badge–”I Voted”–for election day so users can show off via Twitter or Facebook that they’ve checked into an election location and voted.

If the “youth vote” remains on a steady rise, then it almost becomes proof positive that voters will keep it up as they enter their next polling place demographics of “home owner,” “married” and “employed.”

Despite explaining health care reform, the economy and even a ceremonial mug presentation, the takeaway from President Obama on The Daily Show? Dude.

Jon Stewart’s moment of off-the-cuff reference to the commander-in-chief was just one of the great moments during the 31-minute interview that aired last night on Comedy Central as part of the Midterm Teapartyganza coverage that The Daily Show is providing live from DC this week.

After coming out to insane applause and presented “Mug Force One” by Stewart, the questions for the economy and midterms came out flying at Obama. Throughout the interview, the tone wildly shifts from Stewart’s own skepticism hidden as jokes to the types of blunt responses that the President has issued at previous Town Hall style debates since September.

And yet, this wasn’t the softball interview that a number of on air anchors claim it was.

Politico runs with Jon Stewart Getting Serious: “Stewart appeared set on proving his independence from Obama and the White House, choosing to advance the critique from the left that Obama — who appeared, at times, chastened — had been too cautious and moderate in advancing and selling his presidency.”

Of course, as avid watchers of The Daily Show know, Stewart isn’t a softball interview when he wants to be. He famously demolished MSNBC’s Chris Matthews during an otherwise mundane book tour and was responsible for ending CNN’s 23-year old debate show Crossfire in 2005.

The infamous “Dude” remark came after President Obama remarked “Larry Summers did a heck of a job,” citing an unintentional cultural reference to George W. Bush’s infamous praise for former FEMA Deputy Director Michael “Brownie” Brown’s handling of Hurricane Katrina.

But much like anything that comes to DC, it’s all about how the political wonks and needy are treated. Case in point: the weather was awful yesterday and (as is customary, even at their New York studio) people were kept in line outside of American University’s Harman Center. This lead to groundbreaking and enterprising reporting from the crew at Fishbowl DC, including the birth of a new hashtag: #dailyshownightmare.

If you ever wondered why people in the Beltway can’t have nice things, it’s primarily due to having to wait. No one in DC can ever wait or turn off their Blackberries without casually mentioning who they work for, who they are or complain about not being given access they so deserve. Cases in point.

Graham Moore at the White House with actress Rita Wilson and mother, FLOTUS COS Susan Sher, at the screening of HBO’s The Pacific.

Susan Sher’s son, Graham Moore, makes his HuffPost debut!

Graham Moore, is a first time novelist, but to Washingtonian he is the younger son of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Chief of Staff, Susan Sher.
Moore’s first  novel, The Sherlockian, will be published in December by 12 Books, home of the great Christophers — Hitchens and Buckley.

In the mean time, he tackles the premiere of the BBC series Sherlock, which started airing last night on PBS and its website.

Over at the Huffington Post, Moore couldn’t be happier with the glossy tabloid take on a classic literary figure:

The writers of Sherlock have certainly done theirs. They’ve taken pieces from the original stories and cleverly updated them to the modern day. A plot point that once hinged on a pocketwatch now rests on a cell phone. Instead of taking ads in the daily paper, Holmes sends text messages. (Though from the amount of texting he does in this episode, I really hope he got the Unlimited Plan. Those surcharges will be murder on a guy without a discernible source of income.) In a modernizing twist that seems truly unnerving, Watson’s return from the war in Afghanistan in the original stories is here updated to… the war in Afghanistan.

Let’s forget the Midterm and focus on the more important news: National Journal’s relaunched itself today. The gist of Atlantic Media’s relaunch? Unified newsrooms!

Yes, NJ has combined CongressDaily and The Hotline into itself to form another political media hydra to wage war (and share links with) Politico, CQ-Roll Call and The Hill. But there’s also focus on original video content, faster web production and the new new cover story interview with President Obama 2.0.

The full release is after the jump.

Washington, D.C. (October 25, 2010) The new National Journal is here.

Today, National Journal Group launches its new online presence, redesigned publications, and expanded content with a special edition of National Journal magazine and the relaunch of NationalJournal.com.

In a now-unified newsroom, National Journal brings together the intelligence, insight, and depth of Washington’s most trusted brands – National Journal, CongressDaily, and The Hotline – and infuses them with the speed, currency, and agility of a new digital-first platform.

“At the new National Journal, we don’t accept the notion that speed and depth are mutually exclusive,” said National Journal Group Editor-in-Chief Ron Fournier. “With a unified newsroom, more than 40 new topflight journalists, and redesigned products from top to bottom, we’re going to deliver the high-quality information our audience needs to know, whenever, wherever, and however they need it.”

So what’s new?  Below are some highlights.

• A completely relaunched online news site providing free, 24/7 high-quality coverage of the politics, policy, and people who make Washington tick, aimed at a national audience of political news consumers.
• A daily “Top 10″ Need to Know Memo, highlighting the day’s most essential pieces of need-to-know information across the policy and political spheres.
• The Need to Know Video , an exclusive video regularly updated with interviews and reporting from National Journal’s newsroom on the storylines Washington leaders need to follow.
• The Daily Fray, a regularly updated aggregation of the “best of the rest” – political stories from across the web, powered by the popular Atlantic Wire site.
• Crisply redesigned online and mobile sites providing rapid, intuitive access to National Journal content however, whenever, and wherever users seek it.
  

• A dramatically enhanced subscriber experience online, maintaining all the content, context, and utility that National Journal has always provided, now expanded with richer, deeper, and more constantly updated coverage of five “vertical” issue areas – Health Care, Energy & Environment, Economics, Budget & Taxes, and National Security – and three “horizontal” beats – White House, Congress and Politics.
• Reporting and analysis on these and other critical issues from one of the largest and most talented newsrooms in Washington, including Major Garrett, Beth Reinhard, Michael Hirsh, Marc Ambinder, Yochi Dreazen, Susan Davis, Jim Tankersley, and Ronald Brownstein.
• A daily Need to Know Memo for each “vertical” and “horizontal,” cutting through the clutter to provide subscribers with only the most essential information and analysis for their targeted issues in the coming day.
• Up to 80 original reported stories and analysis pieces per day.
• A muscular search function providing access to decades of National Journal content.
  

• A vividly redesigned magazine written and organized to deliver both comprehensive coverage and distinctive insights on Washington’s most pressing issues.
• A revamped “Inside Washington” at the front of the book, including the Digest (a two-page review of the week in politics and policy) the Political Insiders Poll, and weekly columns from Ron Brownstein, Matthew Dowd, and rotating voices from the experienced National Journal newsroom.
• Deep, timely, and thought-provoking full-length features that will shape the long-term trajectory of the Washington conversation.
• A comprehensive new back-of-the-book “Need to Know” section, featuring tightly written, forward-looking briefings across each of the major issue areas and institutions of Washington life.
  

• CongressDaily is now National Journal Daily, taking on a new name, a new look, and an expanded mission, adding broader political coverage and analysis without losing an iota of the policy utility on which its subscribers depend.
• Critical granular reporting within topic areas featuring the detailed policy content and utility prized by Daily subscribers.
• Broader, cross-cutting analysis to identify trends, “connect the dots” and examine the overall direction of Congress and the legislative outlook.
• Expanded political coverage, including the plugged-in insights of the National Journal Hotline team.
• Expanded people coverage, providing daily insight into the leaders and decision-makers who set the course in Washington.
  

• Streamlined access to Hotline’s expansive news, tools, and commentary for political professionals.
• A brand-new look for Hotline On Call, the indispensable source for up-to-the-minute political reporting and evolving wisdom for the permanent campaign.
• The Independent Expenditure Tracker follows the political money to show where parties and outside groups are placing their priorities.
• The Political Calendar brings a comprehensive daily look at what’s happening on the campaign trail.
  

The new National Journal is live now at NationalJournal.com.

The special relaunch edition of National Journal magazine is released today, featuring an exclusive interview with President Obama, a provocative portrait of Vice President Biden’s role in the administration, and a candid conversation about the future of the Republican caucus with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.  The issue also includes sharp briefings on issues ranging from negotiations with the Taliban to the reluctant economic rescuers at the Federal Reserve, from the looming battle over a national ocean policy to another over legislative redistricting, and much more.

“The relaunch of National Journal is an exciting day for Atlantic Media,” said Atlantic Media President Justin B. Smith.   ”We look forward to hearing all our reader feedback and continuing to build our digital-first operation.”

Jon Meacham

The collective shout of joy from political reporters around the Beltway is well deserved: Jon Meacham’s an editor once again.

The ex-Newsweek editor joins Random House as Executive Vice President and Executive Editor according to a press release published today via the AP. Mike Allen fleshed it out a bit more in his Playbook citing the new role will start in 2011. More important?

Washington now has a powerful new friend in New York publishing. Meacham will have a big checkbook and a huge appetite for great political books, but with high standard (will only take on three or so books a year, which means lots of retail attention to the authors he chooses to work with). A longtime observer of the New York/Washington literary world, when he heard the announcement: “Meacham just became arguably the most influential nonfiction editor in American letters.”

Meacham’s own catalog at Random House includes American Lion on the life of President Andrew Jackson, which also took the Pulitzer Prize.

Yesterday marked the end of Howard Kurtz’ tenure at the Washington Post and his The Daily Beast debut.

At the end of his final Media Notes, Kurtz writes, “I confess that I enjoyed David Carr’s New York Times line about my job switch prompting the most gasps since Dylan went electric in 1965. But that ain’t me, babe. While I would not have made such a leap even two years ago, it is an evolutionary move, not a revolutionary one, as we all grasp for ways to sustain and reinvent journalism.”

Kurtz will remain in the hosting reigns for CNN’s Reliable Sources, so this is more like when Dylan found out he could publish instantly on a blog rather than plugging into an amp. At Tina Brown’s Beast, which has now publicly announced an end to a proposed merger with Newsweek according to the Wall Street Journal, Kurtz will take on the newly minted Washington Bureau Chief role.

Fittingly Kurtz ran his first Beast article yesterday with a topic he has experience in: How The Media Blew The Midterms. The lede?

“The media narrative by now is set in concrete: The voters are teed off, rising up, mad as hell and ready to wreak havoc.”

Already Kurtz is out to flex his claws into something a bit more fierce–shall we say, “talons”–when it comes to his new home.
photo: NBC/Meet The Press