WP editorial, "Primary Scrum": Should Congress step in to insure a saner primary process in 2012?

[DeepModem Mom]

Primary Scrum
The scramble to schedule early presidential contests
Friday, August 24, 2007; Page A14

THE PRESIDENTIAL primary calendar is starting to look like a school lunch line full of unruly second-graders, elbowing each other to get to the front of the pack. Florida is stepping on South Carolina's toes; Michigan is angling to leap-frog ahead of New Hampshire. This mess is unfortunate but unfixable, at least for 2008 -- or, perhaps more accurately, 2007, since the voting may well start this year. Indeed, under these ugly circumstances, the best outcome may well be holding the first primaries earlier rather than later. Thanksgiving in Iowa, anyone?

As much as officials in Iowa and New Hampshire want to avoid pushing their events into 2007, the worst part of this front-loaded process isn't that it's happening so soon but that it's occurring in so short a time, with many contests squeezed into several weeks between early January and early February. At least 33 states have scheduled contests before March 1, up from 19 in 2004 and 11 in 2000. At least 18 states plan primaries or caucuses for Feb. 5 alone.

The result of this compression is to enhance the power of the best-funded candidates and reduce the ability of the lesser-known candidate who does well in an early contest to capitalize on that showing, raising money and garnering support in primaries down the road. With the road so short, there's not much time to do that, even in the age of Internet fundraising.

There is a better way, and perhaps the silver lining of the 2008 scrum will be to encourage a saner process for 2012. One lesson of this year's events is that the parties don't have the clout, and individual states don't have the incentive, to impose a rational system. It may be time for Congress to step in. Last month, Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) proposed the establishment of a system of rotating regional primaries. Under their plan, Iowa and New Hampshire would retain their traditional first-in-the-nation status. Then, on the first Tuesdays of March through June, states in four regions -- their place in the order would change every cycle -- would hold their contests. This arrangement was proposed by the National Association of Secretaries of State in 2000; it was endorsed by a bipartisan commission on election reform headed by former president Jimmy Carter and former secretary of state James Baker. It's a sensible solution to an increasingly serious problem.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/23/AR2007082301928.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

[Kagemusha]

1. Uh excuse me, right off the bat: isn't this issue a state issue?

What say does Congress have in it?... This article seems to assume that Congress has a constitutional right to do this. I'm not convinced, based on my layman's understanding of the electoral college and the Constitution.

[DeepModem Mom]

2. Same question here! nt

[rodeodance]

3. I do not think it is healthy for the candidates-physically and mentally to this

LONNNNNNNNNg season!