Zigzagging Toward November

New York Times
5 May 2008

As the Democratic presidential contest slouches forward, the Republicans are wise to look ahead to 2012 and try to invent a better mousetrap than the jumbled primary system that they find occupying, if not entombing, the Democrats. The G.O.P.’s rules committee has offered a plan that attempts to find a better balance between “retail” politicking in smaller states and the inevitable big-money, heavy media campaigning in larger states.

The goal of a more measured and conclusive pace is well worth pursuing. But the scheme is already in doubt as Republican leaders in the larger states denounce it in advance of debate at the party convention in September.

Consider the crazy-quilt experience this year, in which a glut of states rushed forward to attempt a de facto national primary in February. Record turnouts have been followed by increasing confusion as various “showdown” votes roll forward three months later for the two Democratic finalists.

Twenty-year-old Democratic rules, rooted in arcane formulas about past Congressional turnouts, have awarded caucus and primary delegates proportionately, with, so far, a winner never quite winning and a loser never quite conceding. By now, the vaunted Democratic superdelegates are wary of their grand power to play Solomon by settling the competition in late August.

The Democrats cannot rewrite their rules in midrace, but voters must hope that some lessons are being learned and that appropriate changes will be attempted the next time around. In the Republican plan, the sticking point is that smaller states representing a quarter of the Electoral College clout would always vote first as a group (with, yes, Iowa and New Hampshire retaining their prom-queen status as separate openers). Three balanced groups of larger states would follow, rotating their positions in subsequent elections.

This, at least, is closer to a rotating regional primary system as proposed by the National Association of Secretaries of State — the model this page endorses.

Efforts to devise a better system may well founder in the tooth-and-claw state of politics, and with separate state parties and legislatures willing to freelance parochially this year against national party plans. Still, if only in the name of democracy, voters and candidates are entitled to dream of something better.

Iowa And New Hampshire: Same Old, Same Old

By G. Terry Madonna and Michael Young
27 December 2007

One definition of crazy is to keep doing diligently the same thing over and over when it's not working. By that definition America's presidential primary system is seriously loony, for with respect to developing a democratic process to nominate candidates for president, we have been doing the same thing over and over again for more than 60 years and it's not working.

The glaring evidence of that failure looms before us as the nation awaits the imminent Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary now scheduled for early January--both nomination events take place in small unrepresentative states that will largely dominate if not determine the rest of the primary process. Iowa and New Hampshire were supposed to be the warm up acts for the remainder of the primaries, but instead they have once again become the main event.

It is now too late to change this process for 2008. But it's exactly the right time to consider changes for 2012 and beyond. The time has clearly come for an overhaul of the entire chaotic process.

Two major options exist. One would produce a national primary while the second option provides for the adoption of regional primaries. A real national primary with every state participating on the same day has been proposed since at least 1916 when Woodrow Wilson advocated it. Its major strength is that potentially all Americans would have some role in the process.

Several versions of regional primary plans also have been proposed. Common to all the regional plans, a designated region of the country (i.e. northeast, south, west and central) would vote in alternate months beginning in February of the presidential year.

One regional plan, the so-called American plan would give small and medium states earlier primaries and larger states later primaries. A competing plan known as the Delaware plan would create regions by allocating each state into one of four population clusters based on population.

FULL STORY

N.H., Iowa Keep the Candidates' Attention

Wallets Open Wide Despite Changes in Primary Calendar

By Matthew Mosk
Washington Post
31 October 2007

PLYMOUTH, N.H. -- Just down the block from Anderson's Bakery and across from the local movie house with a flickering neon sign, a group of young men with laptops moved into a tan Cape Cod and announced their presence with a billboard out front: "Hillary."

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's storefront office in this New England hamlet (population 5,892) is one of 16 the New York Democrat has set up with paid staff around the state that is expected to hold the nation's first presidential primary. Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.), perhaps her strongest challenger for the Democratic nomination, has plans to open his own office in Plymouth, which will give him a base of operations in 15 locations. Between them, the two campaigns have more than 140 paid field staffers across the state.

The extensive spending here, as described by local officials and laid out in campaign finance reports, provides a look at how money is changing the way presidential hopefuls are approaching the pivotal early contests.

The decision by most of the leading presidential candidates to opt out of the public financing system that would have restricted their primary spending in New Hampshire to less than $800,000 has resulted in armies of paid workers trying to squeeze votes out of every corner of the state.

"The amount of money being spent in the early states are of an order of magnitude that we've never seen before," said Alan Solomont, who oversees northeastern fundraising for the Obama campaign.

The huge spending here has helped debunk the notion that an increasingly front-loaded primary calendar would diminish the influence of New Hampshire and Iowa. Democratic candidates have spent $2.4 million in New Hampshire so far this year on rent and staff alone. That is more than double the $1.1 million they had spent in the state at this point in 2003. The numbers are even more pronounced in Iowa, where Democrats have spent $4.6 million so far this year -- almost four times the $1.2 million they expended four years ago. Republicans have spent more than $4 million on rent and staff in New Hampshire and Iowa so far this year.

The glut in spending has come before most of the candidates have started to invest substantial amounts in the most costly aspect of a campaign -- television advertising.

FULL STORY

New Hampshire's turn as leader may be up

By Roger Simon
politico.com
24 October 2007

At this point, the presidential nominating calendar for 2008 is more easily deplored than described.

Somebody is going to go first. We know that.

Maybe it will be New Hampshire. Or maybe not.

Maybe New Hampshire will go in December. Or maybe not.

After that, it gets kind of confusing.

I went to the Christian Science Monitor breakfast Wednesday to hear Carl Levin speak.

Levin is the senior Democratic senator from Michigan, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee and an expert on both foreign and domestic affairs.

He talked very knowledgeably for more than half an hour about Iraq, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, missile defense deployment in Europe, CAFE standards (which, interestingly enough, have nothing to do with cafes) and the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

I didn’t pay any attention.

OK, I paid a little attention. I took notes (just in case any of it is on the final), but I had come for something far more important than things like war, peace and the environment.

I had come to hear Levin say bad things about New Hampshire.

Levin hates New Hampshire. Not the people or the foliage, just the fact that New Hampshire holds the first primary in the nation. (Levin also hates Iowa because it holds the first caucus in the nation, but he hates New Hampshire more.)

Levin has argued for years that New Hampshire is a small state that is not representative of the nation and it would make more sense for some other state — Michigan, for instance — to begin the nominating process.

By general agreement, the other 48 states allow New Hampshire and Iowa to go first because when those two states feel threatened, they go absolutely ballistic and vow to halt syrup and ethanol production and possibly form their own nation.

FULL STORY

December Primary in New Hampshire? It's His Call

Secretary of State Alone Will Decide, But He's Not Saying

By Joel Achenbach
Washington Post
Washington, DC
12 October 2007

The New Hampshire primary, crowded by other wannabe primaries and caucuses, may be shifted from January to an unprecedented date in early December. It all depends on the calculations of one man.

"I have a lot of discretion," said Bill Gardner, the 16-term secretary of state of New Hampshire, who is invested with what amounts to dictatorial power to set the date under state law. "We are prepared, if it needs to be early December, it can be early December."

FULL STORY