The message gets muddled and headlines will not talk about the winner or losers, but about the screwup. This totally blunts momentum building from the results. Sure, there will be still a bump, but it might be considerably reduced.

The campaigns have data from precincts, where they had a well trained captain that organized the caucus (which is helpful in drawing in voter from non-viable candidates) and who noted the results. Which probably is happening mostly in the precincts where they did well. Or  the other way around: in precincts where they had a captain who took notes they probably also did better. This means all the data the campaigns hold is probably biased in favor of their candidate. And some very rural precincts probably had no captain from any campaign.

And ah yes, a total jokes. Republicans will use that a lot: "These guys want to run a government, but can't even organize a caucus!"

BTW, here are the numbers that Sanders campaign shared. It covers about 40% of the precincts.

At this point, it doesn't matter which Democratic candidate got the most votes last night. What matters is that...

1) Turnout levels on the Democratic side were reportedly comparable to 2016, while by contrast Donald Trump enjoyed record-high turnout for an incumbent president.

...AND...

2) The Democratic Party's inability to confirm results the same night as voting, which has never happened in the case of the Iowa Caucus before, and the chaos that has naturally resulted, will cast further doubt about the honesty and integrity of the Democratic Party as an institution in the public's mind regardless of who is eventually declared the winner.

These are signs, people, and they're not good ones. This early evidence suggests that the older independents I've spoken to about this election are right (again): none of these candidates can defeat Donald Trump.

The best indicator I saw last night out of the entrance polls was that youth participation in the Iowa Democratic Caucus was up compared to 2016. This, however, appears to be offset by a proportionate drop-off in participation among older people. Look at Trump's record-high turnout for a seated president to figure out where the latter went. This is important because the Democrats' big victory in the 2018 midterm elections was owed not just to an increase in youth turnout, but also to the fact that, overall, Democrats nearly tied Republicans in support among voters over the age of 65 owing to fears among older people about the Affordable Care Act being weakened or eviscerated. This early evidence suggests that the Democrats will be unable to replicate that scenario in the upcoming presidential election regardless of who they nominate.

In other words, this outcome indicates that Trump is likely to be re-elected no matter what. That's what really matters here.

The Republicans took over two weeks to announce the results of their 2012 Iowa caucus. It's no big deal. But it proves this system should have been scrapped long ago.

Besides, if 2016 levels of turnout is bad, I'm not sure why anyone believes the loser of said primaries back then would have been elected against Trump.

Not necessarily.

The low turnout might also simply come from being overwhelmed by the sheer number of candidates and thus rather not vote than vote for the "wrong" candidate. I mean, did we ever had still so many candidates running when the primaries began?

Or lots of people liked Pete and Warren, but didn't bother to show up, because they thought Biden or Bernie already had it in the bag.

I would like to see sources on your first point because I've haven't seen really anything on overall turnout levels for our side yet.

It's still too early right now to write off the general to 45, Iowa is one state. The DNC's handling of this caucus is horrible and exposes the corruption of the establishment democrats and their desire to keep the status quo, their influence and power over the American people. And yes you're right, this act of theirs and these signs can spell doom for Democrats in the general (the DNC really opened up a path to victory for 45 here) but it can also be a catalyst for a lot of people to want an anti-establishment populist who understands what is wrong with the system in place. 45 ran on the same thing in 2016 and fooled a lot of good people who wanted the "swamp drained" to vote for him. Now that he's been revealed as a fake populist to his voters that didn't keep his promises and with a low approval rating nationally there's a BIG opportunity for a win for the left.

Although I must say, before this I thought Sanders, Biden, Warren, and even Pete could win the general, I can now only see Sanders pulling this win off for us. After all, if the American peoples' trust in the Democratic party should fall as you say, who better to be the president than someone who isn't a Democrat :p

It might be tough but if we play our cards right we can win big. 

I know the full count isn't in yet, but I really like the results so far. Pete, Warren, and Bernie are all good candidates. It's nice to see them all doing far better than initial polls said they would. Biden doing so badly proves that he really is the Milquetoast candidate that nobody really wants. I really have to wonder how Hillary would have done in Biden's place, or if in 2016 it was more than just Hillary vs Bernie. Would Hillary have lost votes to other centrist candidates in 2016, had they ran?

P.S. Yes, I know there were other people running in 2016, but those guys were the Tom Steyers, and Tulsi Gabbards of the 2016 cycle.

Be careful, we have NO results so far. All we have is inofficial data from campaigns or from newspapers having gathered stuff from some recincts or from entry polls. This all can have some indicators, but I wouldn't call it results.

And Tom Styer might be more a factor than you think: He has substantial polling in Nevada and South Carolina and Bloomberg currently proves you can buy votes with advertisements, that can Steyer pull off too as he also has a lot of money. So better not counting Steyer out yet.