Not too long ago I was listening to Michael Reagan on the radio lamenting that everyone is moving their primary to February. He said that since his father, in the 1976 election, was able to make a good showing in one state he was then able to get better funding to campaign more strongly in the other states. Of course, Ronald Reagan didn't win in 1976, but Michael attributes his father's ability to win the presidency in 1980 to the fact that Ronald Reagan made such a great showing in 1976. Now, most states will be decided in a very short period, so there is no chance to come back from an initial weak showing. I think that the artificial dichotomy of a two party system is a bad way to do things anyway, but having all the primaries at once is even more broken than ever before.
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If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us in peace. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen! - Samuel Adams
The system is broken, and does give the advantage to a candidate with high name recognition or big fundraising support. It doesn't allow the public much real opportunity to get to know the candidates, or to see how they handle the stresses of a prolonged Primary campaign. Ironically, it makes the Iowa and New Hampshire results even MORE important.
I think the parties need to adopt a system of rotation, and spacing out the primaries. Let Iowa and NH keep their traditional roles as first, in early February. Then add a few more states scattered around the country a few weeks later. Then do that again a few weeks later. Rotate the states' positions every four years, so no one group of states is always earlier. With one exception--keep the big prizes of California, New York, Texas, and Florida for last every time. Being able to win big in a big state would keep a candidate that was behind in the race, and it would allow time to do some fundraising before you have to compete in those big markets. This would give lesser known candidates a better chance, and the people more say. The conventions might actually become important again! And the candidates would have proven themselves better.
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I'm not voting for Ron Paul because it's not expressly prescribed in the Constitution.
Medved was just talking about the primaries and saying that he thought the upcoming election is really going to be great, because there's no clear winner yet, and so there will be a great deal of discussion. I don't like the fact that a lot of states are moving up their primaries, but if states split over the candidates the later states may actually be in an enviable position, their primaries may actually end up meaning more...
One thing I love about Medved is he tries to put a positive spin on most things the media spins as negative. (I don't always agree with him, but it's nice to have the choice.)
--Ray
-- Edited by rayb at 15:44, 2007-03-16
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I'm not slow; I'm special. (Don't take it personally, everyone finds me offensive. Yet somehow I manage to live with myself.)
