I didn’t get to catch too much of the GOP convention last night (my wife exerted executive control over the remote control, and I was busy playing with my new iPhone), so there isn’t much I can say about last night’s shindig. (I am hoping to catch Sarah Palin’s debut this evening, however.)
But, I do note that I failed to mention one interesting, but disappointing, thing that took place during Monday’s abridged session. Quoting Real Clear Politics:
One item of business the delegates did complete yesterday was finalizing primary dates in 2012. And if you thought that this year’s contests began too early, then this rule change is for rule.
While Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina will remain the first three states to hold primaries, with no other states allowed to hold its primary before the first Tuesday in March, those three states cannot hold their primaries before the first Tuesday in February.
Well, that’s an example of treating a symptom, rather than the disease.
You’d think that after the mess of this year’s primary circus, the major parties would exercise a bit of thoughtful exercise about how primaries might be more sensibly scheduled, in order to balance these seemingly conflicting concerns:
- Certain states want the prestige (and commerce) which arise from having an early primary.
- Less well-funded/well-known candidates want the opportunity to make an impression on the public through small states, rather than drowning in the costs of advertising/campaigning in larger markets.
- The public wants its votes to be relevant, rather than being presented with ballots showing the presumptive nominee and challengers with no mathematical chance of winning.
All the GOP has done is push back the potential primary calendar one month – an improvement over this year’s circus to be sure, but not one that addresses the core challenges.
I’d still love to see a rotating regional primary system, like this one I described a few months ago.
The Dems, at their convention last week, only agreed to look at the subject, and report back in a few months. So, I guess I can still hope to see some improvement in 2012.
