The reason the Iowa caucuses rarely produce the party’s eventual nominee is not because Iowans are wacky white Christians, as some in the media have claimed, but because caucuses are ridiculous ways to choose a presidential candidate. It is a process that empowers the pushy and loud, much like a Manhattan co-op board meeting, but, unfortunately, not like anything envisioned by our founding fathers.

Instead of arguing for hours in public with partisans in order to cast a ballot, voters are supposed to put on their shoes, fight off the Black Panthers on the way to their precincts, vote in private and go home.

So the fact that the Iowa caucuses avoided giving the gold to Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul or some other sure-to-lose candidate shows that Republicans are dead serious about beating Obama this fall. Even in Iowa, the only Republican with a chance of doing that won.