NYT-Iowa Hopefuls Wrestle With a Great Unknown: The Choice of the Undecide

THE VOTERS
Iowa Hopefuls Wrestle With a Great Unknown: The Choice of the Undecided
By RICK LYMAN

Published: January 16, 2004


TORM LAKE, Iowa, Jan. 12 — Diane Hamilton, a longtime Democratic activist here in rural Buena Vista County, came home this week from a four-day Mexican vacation to find her mailbox stuffed like a piñata.

There were impassioned letters from Howard Dean, Richard A. Gephardt and Dennis J. Kucinich; a handwritten note from John Kerry's county chairman; a gleaming full-color pamphlet from John Edwards; three pamphlets from Mr. Kerry and six from Dr. Dean. The stack on her kitchen table was two inches high.

About what she had expected.

Ms. Hamilton, who has organized all 19 of the county's caucuses for next Monday night, knows that the candidates are increasingly eager to appeal to that huge reservoir of Iowa voters who remain undecided, a group in which she finds both herself and her husband.

"Usually we know way ahead of time who we're going to support," Ms. Hamilton said. "But this time it's terrible. We waffle. We like Gephardt. We like Kerry. We like Edwards. A lot of people are like us this year. They can't make up their mind."
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more: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/16/politics/campaigns/16UNDE.html