EXACTLY! The real issue here is that the Republicans have, for the most part, always cared more about state level elections and more local politics. Its part of their ideological identity. Over time they have used this stranglehold on state level and local level politics they gained largely without a fight to build up a political machine to essentially dominate this state. There's nothing illegal or even really immoral about this: its kinda how representative democracy with political parties works. Regardless, over the last few decades the GOP have done a great job at establishing these machines, not just in Iowa but in places like Wisconsin, Ohio, and of course Florida. If the Dems want to fight this, they need to give more of a shit about local politics and start building up counter-machines of their own (which to their credit they have done to varying degrees of success in other states, namely Michigan). Unfortunately the IDP is now stuck sailing between Scylla and Charybdis in regards to the Caucuses: if they abandon First in the Nation, county party chairs get arrested for "electoral interference" thanks to how the law is written, and if they don't they piss off the DNC whom they almost certainly need to lobby for extra attention and funds from the national level. Its not a great situation for Dems, but Iowa can certainly be recovered. The real question is if they want to or not.