Here's what the Democratic National Committee doesn't understand about the Iowa caucuses

Some Americans see the Iowa caucuses as the cockroaches of the presidential nominating season: Hardly anyone likes them but they are extremely hard to kill.

There’s a bit of truth to that, despite my well-known affection for the caucuses. They can be annoying, especially to those who don’t understand them. But far from being undesirable pests, the caucuses perform a valuable function not only to our state but to the country. There’s a kind of nobility in their persistence, despite the best efforts of many powerful people to crush them into the dust.

Usually, the threat comes from other states, which perennially try to push their way into the early rounds of voting. They rely on the slippery notion that their votes “won’t matter” if held later in the year. (Never mind that in 2016, it took until June for Hillary Clinton to clinch the Democratic presidential nomination. All but seven states and the District of Columbia had voted by then.) Iowa has always dodged these predictable sorties by simply moving the caucuses as early as necessary to stay first in line.