Vertigo!

This is what a jury looks like when it isn't buying the defendant's final argument

NYT photo (in the Strib)

The photo accompanies a story that reports that one of the reasons that the caucuses in Iowa are considered important is that voting for a candidate requires a "commitment of several hours." I think that's overblown, both in terms of the time and its meaning.

It appears that four in ten people intending to attend the caucuses have not finally made up their minds:

"It'll depend on my prayer and my gut," says Troll, 50, a stay-at-home mother of five from Grimes, Iowa.

Delaying a firm decision is not an uncommon action in Iowa. A Des Moines Register statewide survey released over the weekend found four in 10 likely caucusgoers who had a first choice for the Republican presidential nomination were open to changing their minds.

For at least some voters in Iowa, it seems that going to the caucus is a little like the cows coming home every evening to be milked -- it's a habit, and a civic one at that -- but it's not because they're willing to march over hill and dale and all along the dusty trail for the one true candidate who speaks to them.

Incidentally, the candidate who is making the young man in the photo throw up in his mouth -- just a little -- is Newt Gingrich.