WyoDemCon08 opens May 23 in Jackson

The countdown begins for the Wyoming Democrats' state convention in Jackson May 23-24.

Actually, the countdown began March 8 at all 23 county caucuses when delegates were chosen. Laramie County has 55 delegates, split among Sen. Obama and Sen. Clinton. The presidential preference vote determined the split. On March 8, 941 votes were cast for Obama, 588 for Clinton. I'm an Obama delegate. There's a batch of alternates for each candidate, although I'm not sure how many. My wife Chris is a Clinton alternate.

Activities in Jackson will begin Friday at 9 a.m. with candidate training. Because it's 430 miles from Cheyenne to Jackson, anyone involved in these meetings will have to depart on Thursday. Unless they have their own corporate jet -- we'll leave that to the Republicans. Most of us won't be able to take off until Thursday after work or Friday morning. The opening reception is at 6 p.m. Friday. The fun really begins on Saturday morning, with registration starting at 8 a.m. and the proceedings at 9 a.m.

There's a lot riding on this gathering of Democrats in the nation's least populous state. We will choose 18 delegates and four alternates to the national convention. Some of those spots are already spoken for. The WyoDems use a "two-tiered delegate selection process." You can read the details at http://www.wyomingdemocrats.com/ht/d/sp/i/1015876/pid/1015876. I'm not in the running for a spot because I'm going to DenDemCon08 as a blogger and maker of ridiculous abbreviations.

This afternoon, Chris Farrell of the Obama campaign is going to brief us on our roles at the state gathering. Sen. Obama's organizers have been very active in the state all year. Gov. Dave Freudenthat cited those skills as one of the main reasons he became an Obama supporter. I've seen the names of those organizers who staffed "Wyoming for Obama" involved in the campaigns in Montana, Colorado and other Western states.

See you in Jackson. And then on to Denver.