California moves up primary, confirming front-loading trend

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York became the first candidate since the program began in 1976 to forgo public financing for both the primary and the general election because of the spending limits that come with the federal money. By declaring her confidence that she could raise far more than the roughly $150 million the system would provide for the 2008 presidential primaries and general election, Mrs. Clinton makes it difficult for other serious candidates to participate in the system without putting themselves at a significant disadvantage.

fishin wrote:

First off, you are mixing systems here and they aren't compatible. If we went to non-partisan primaries as LA runs their elections then there wouldn't be any conventions to hold the run-off in. The convention concept would go away - conventions are, by their nature, entirely partisan.

Secondly, I disagee with your assesment of how well an LA style system would work nationally. To run for Gov. of LA for example, you shell out your $1,125 and gather 5,000 signatures on a petition. It also requires that 500 of those signatures must come from each of the 7 congressional districts within the state. To apply that nationally the candidate would need to cough up $50,000+ in fees and gather a minimum of just under 220,000 signatures on petitions spread out from all congressional distrcts nationally. In effect it would be creating a national pre-primary. Gathering 5,000 signatures in 7 congressional districts is one thing. It would cost candidates significantly more to collect them from all 435 districts. And all of that is just to file the paperwork to run. They'd have to do that before they can even start soliciting campaign contributions.

Not only have you missed the point, you have quite possibly missed the point by a larger margin than anyone has ever missed any point before.

I did not mention the Louisiana electoral system in order to advocate its use in place of the current system -- I have no idea how you could have made that error. Rather, I simply mentioned it (along with the French method of electing presidents) as an example of an electoral system that employs a runoff.

fishin wrote:

A minor candidate right now can focus all of their funds and energy on one or two states and try to increase the funds that come in to their campaign as time goes on. Buying ad time/space in New Hampshire or Iowa is significantly cheaper than buying time on the national networks. Under a national system they wouldn't be able to do that. They'd have to have all the funds up front.

Under a nationwide primary they could also focus all of their funds and energy on one or two states. Dodd could focus on Connecticut, Richardson on New Mexico, Huckabee on Arkansas, etc. The difference is that they could all focus on states that they had the potential to win, rather than on Iowa, which they probably can't. Furthermore, these minor candidates would give voters who support them a chance to vote for them, rather than having the voters of Iowa and New Hampshire knock them out of the race first.

I thinik I got the point just fine.

Even Dodd wins CT (47 delegates), Huckabee wins AR (6 delegates), Richardson wins NM (28 delegates). That leaves all 3 of them with less than 1% of the total delegates and, in any reasonable system, out of any future consideration for that cycle. And that assumes that they win every delegate from each of those states.

You haven't convinced me that, knowing that sort of result is going to some up in the end, candidates are going to jump into the race to begin with. Instead of the voters of New Hampshire of Iowa knocking them out of the race, "the system" discourages them from ever entering the race. I just don't see where anything is being gained here.

First of all, I don't know where you got the delegate totals from.

The figures Joe has used yield 99 delegates out of more than 4300--so that is still an insignificant number, and still supports the sense of Fishin's contention.

California has moved its presidential primary ahead four months, from June to Feb. 5. Twenty other states may follow suit, creating what some pundits have dubbed Super-Duper Tuesday. If that happens, experts predict money would rule and pro-family issues would be the victim.

Meredith McGehee of the Alliance for Better Campaigns told Family News in Focus that the wealthiest contenders will control the elections. [..]

Brad Miller, director of the family policy council department for Focus on the Family, said the new primary schedule limits campaign stops in smaller states.

"It would be an unfortunate thing for South Dakota, North Dakota, Indiana, Colorado," he said, "to not get visits from these candidates to hear in person what they believe about the key issues that are important to those folks who live in the heartland."

Less attention to these issues might leaving conservative voters apathetic, Miller warned:

"That will equate in a failure of conservatives to win substantial gains in the next election cycle."

The more interesting scenario to contemplate is the one getting no attention: What if all the early nominating contests prolong the race, rather than settle it? To win the Democratic nomination, you need a simple majority of its roughly 4,300 voting delegates--that is, you need the support of around 2,150. But that's easier said than done, because not all delegates are actually awarded during the caucuses and primaries. Almost one fifth of them are superdelegates--party insiders and leaders who are free to support whomever they choose. That reduces the number of delegates actually at stake during the caucuses and primaries. And, if you do the math, you'll see that a successful candidate must win about 60 percent of those in order to lock up the nomination without superdelegates.

What makes this all particularly interesting is that the primaries don't award their delegates on a winner-take-all basis. Many are assigned by congressional district, with delegates awarded proportionally--so most states will award delegates to more than one candidate. If the result of the early primaries is to divide votes in roughly equal before a consensus emerges, getting to that magic 2,150 threshold could be difficult--because, by the time a frontrunner emerges, there wouldn't be enough delegates still at stake to hit that total.

In a larger field of candidates, each with an independent financial base, a front-loaded contest could conceivably push the nomination decision all the way to the convention itself--producing a brokered convention, just like in the old days. Candidates would start wooing superdelegates and the supporters of other, more marginal candidates. (Under convention rules, delegates selected in primaries are bound to vote for their candidate on the first ballot; after that, they can choose anybody they want.) It'd be a full-employment act for campaign consultants and operatives, not to mention pundits.

It seems less probable in a race likely to be dominated by two candidates. Instead, the more likely outcome of a split decision on February 5 would be to increase the importance of later contests--places like Oregon and West Virginia. Talk about unintended consequences! As Salon's Walter Shapiro, a veteran campaign observer, notes, "It would be splendid irony if the White House dreamers devoted April (a month without a single scheduled delegate contest) and May to shuttling from Portland to Charleston to Indianapolis, as those places proved that voters who laugh last laugh best."

Setanta wrote:

The figures Joe has used yield 99 delegates out of more than 4300--so that is still an insignificant number, and still supports the sense of Fishin's contention.

And my point is that 99 is still bigger than 0, which is the number of delegates that minor candidates typically bring with them to the conventions under the current system.

California has moved its presidential primary ahead four months, from June to Feb. 5. Twenty other states may follow suit, creating what some pundits have dubbed Super-Duper Tuesday. If that happens, experts predict money would rule and pro-family issues would be the victim.

Meredith McGehee of the Alliance for Better Campaigns told Family News in Focus that the wealthiest contenders will control the elections.

In the conversation between Joe and Fishin' I sympathise with Fishin's argument, and that's even without taking Joe's unwarranted condescension into account.

Fishin's point referred to candidates who could expect to get at the least "favorite son" support in the way of delegates. I don't know to whom you refer when you mention "minor candidates," but Fishin's original contention was based on the performance of candidates who would at the least get those "favorite son" delegates, and who might, without a single national primary, have the opportunity to gain other delegates by performing well in the primary process.

OK, fine, Joe . . . but why Jack Ripper?