I mentioned this in the comments of the results thread last night, but since there were over thirteen hundred comments on that thread (way to go, Race community!) I thought I’d post something on the front page as well.

I live in Wyoming, and a lot of political junkies are wondering and asking about our state today. According to a lot of primary calendars out there, today is the last day of our caucuses, and so naturally folks are wondering why they haven’t heard anything about the results. I’ve seen various different descriptions or attempts at explaining what is happening here which all miss the mark at some level – so I thought I’d clarify the convoluted process we use here in the Cowboy State to award our delegates.

Wyoming is not a primary or a caucus state – we are one of the few convention states left out there (kind of like West Virginia). In other words, regular voters have no direct say in who gets our delegates here. The leaders of the Wyoming Republican Party (who were chosen a couple years ago before the primary was even close to beginning) get together in County Conventions as well as in a State Convention once a year. This year when they get together, they will vote to award our delegates.

Making the process even more convoluted and confusing, just under half of our delegates will be awarded in our County Conventions. The remainder – just over half – will be awarded by the vote at the State Convention. So in a week and a half or so, the world will know to whom less than half of our delegates are going – and a month later, you guys will know who got the rest of them. Exciting times in democracy, this.

So what about these caucuses that people keep reporting? They are nothing but unofficial, non-binding straw polls taken at county meetings. They have no bearing on who gets to vote in the conventions whatsoever. Nobody attends them. Nobody cares about them. There is a reason that only 1,700 people total have voted in the “caucuses” thus far.

So now you’re in the know. Ignore the “caucus” results from Wyoming that get reported tonight and watch in a couple weekends to see our County Conventions. Then you’ll know where our delegates are actually going and who our state supports.

In the upcoming Michigan primary on Tuesday, the delegates will be awarded as follows:

• Two delegates for the statewide winner; and
• Two delegates to the winner of each of the fourteen Congressional districts in the state.

(If that seems odd to you, it is. And it’s because Michigan jumped too far forward, busting the RNC-approved calendar, so they are being stripped of half their delegates. Prior to that punishment, 14 delegates were to be awarded to the statewide winner and 3 each to the winner of each CD.)

At any rate, Michigan now looks like decently safe Romney territory once again after the electorate there flirted with the idea of voting for Rick Santorum. More and more folks – Larry Sabato, Nate Silver, Intrade investors, and others – are now overwhelmingly predicting a Romney victory there in four days. So now the talk has turned to trying to forecast how many congressional districts Santorum could win and still manage to salvage a decent showing out of the Wolverine State. There have even been those across the blogosphere who are suggesting Santorum could win a majority of CD’s while losing the state.

I’ll say this delicately: that is ludicrous.

The idea sounds good in theory: Romney draws most of his support from the Detroit area – Wayne and Oakland County and the surrounding counties in eastern Michigan – while Santorum draws most of his support from the more conservative western and northern parts of the state. So could Santorum have a shot at taking a slew of delegates by winning those congressional districts while losing the state?

Not a chance. I’ve argued that here before with regards to other states – and here are the numbers showing why.

First, I went back to the 2008 primary and looked at the county-level results from the McCain-Romney race in Michigan (green is Romney, blue is McCain):

After that, I grabbed the newly redrawn map of the Michigan congressional districts:

Then I overlaid the two and created a spreadsheet showing what would have happened had the delegates been awarded in 2008 like they are about to be in 2012. And guess what? Despite McCain’s strong showing in half the counties in the state, here’s what the congressional district breakdown came in as:

In other words, the final tally for delegates in 2008, using the 2012 system, would have been Romney – 26, McCain – 4.

There is no way that Santorum gets anywhere close to Romney’s delegate total in Michigan, because of one simple truth: whoever wins the state wins a vast majority of the congressional districts. It was true in California in 2008, when McCain won by 7% but swept the 53 congressional districts – and it is true in Michigan as well.

As you can see from the table above, Romney’s weakest CD’s are 1 and 6 — the upper peninsula and the southwest corner of the state. If Santorum wins any delegates, that’s where he will most likely pull them from. And that’s assuming Romney doesn’t run any stronger on the upper peninsula than he did in 2008, since he only lost it by 600 votes out of around 70,000 cast.

To get any more than those four delegates, Santorum will have to outperform McCain ’08 in CD2 or CD4, his next best chances. After those four CDs, it gets pretty close to impossible to figure out where else he has a shot. And even district 2 has Ottawa and part of Kent Counties – where Romney will be trying to run up the score.

So all of this to say: had Santorum held onto his lead in Michigan, he would have had a great shot of winning many of the Congressional Districts. Now that Romney is back in the lead, however, the Senator should not be counting on many delegates out of the Wolverine State. And this Michigan maxim holds true for other states that divide their delegates proportionally as well. Something to keep in mind, anyway, as you play with delegate calculators and as you read (and post your own) predictions about the upcoming primary contests.

(You can download a copy of my Michigan spreadsheet I used as the basis for this article here.)

In the game of political chess, Romney may have just won a small victory.

There was a debate scheduled for March 1, co-hosted by CNN and the Georgia GOP, to be held in Atlanta. The Romney campaign weighed their options and decided to bow out of the debate as a way to, as Taegan Goddard put it, “deny Santorum publicity” in the run-up to the Super Tuesday contests. It was a gutsy move, as it could have afforded Santorum an open and unchallenged opportunity to attack Romney in a nationally televised debate.

Well, this afternoon the Santorum campaign blinked and announced that they, too will not be participating in the Georgia debate. With the top two candidates out of the debate, the head of the Georgia GOP announced the debate will still go on as planned — but one has to wonder if it will, in fact, be held. It may not be worth it to CNN to even air a battle between Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich. Now that would be a bizarre debate.

Almost lost in all of this hoopla is the fact that the final Reagan Library debate, planned for March 5 in California, has also been canceled. That means that effectively, the debate in Arizona in six days will be the final GOP debate before Super Tuesday — adding to its already growing importance.

Be sure to check out the link at the top of Race 4 2012 for the latest GOP debate and primary calendar.

UPDATE: Ron Paul’s campaign announced that Paul would not be participating in the Georgia debate, either, and CNN has just announced that the debate has been canceled.

CNN has just given us political junkies a powerful excuse to give productive work or school days the middle finger: their interactive GOP Delegate Calculator.

You can choose who wins each state, who gets how many delegates, and watch the totals along the side as you go. So here are the questions for you to play with: does Romney get to the magical 1,144? Does this end in a brokered convention? Does anyone else other than Romney have a realistic shot at 1,144?

Each scenario you build yields a different link to share, so make your scenario (click the link above), share your link with everyone in the comments, and explain a little of what you did. Let’s see what our community can come up with!

More than any other day in the 2012 GOP primary thus far, today is the day for spin.

Oh, sure, there were spin rooms after each debate. There was spin after Ames. There was even a little spin attempted after the first five primary contests. But everyone knew largely what those results meant. Everyone knew who flubbed debate performances (see Perry, Rick) and who mastered them. Everyone knew what Ames meant (see Pawlenty’s record fast dropout — some more spin may have actually saved his candidacy).

Tonight, however, is the first night of the primary season that features multiple states at once. And it’s the first night since Iowa that Rick Santorum, running third place nationally and in most other states, actually has a chance to win something. The candidates have all chosen to focus on different states. Add to all that the fact that there’s not even technically any delegates up for grabs tonight, and you have a nebulous picture that nobody quite knows what it means.

Enter the campaign spin machines stage right.

Part of the confusion as to what the results will mean about six hours from now are the expectations games each campaign is being forced to play now. Romney is the once-and-present national frontrunner by large margins over Gingrich. He is expected to nab the nomination now rather easily with his huge Florida victory and majority take in Nevada. He’s got the endorsements, the organization, and the cash. So the expectations bar is set high for his campaign. He ought to win all of these contests tonight if all of that is true. But he probably won’t. Why? Well, he has chosen to not compete in Missouri – a calculated and targeted decision to not waste resources on what the media is calling a “beauty contest”. Instead, he spent a half day in Minnesota and several full days in Colorado. It’s clear his main focus in his strongest state of the three, Colorado, where he is aiming to put up more big numbers on the scoreboard in what will be one of the most hotly contested swing states come November. However, this strategy leaves room for Rick Santorum to make a surging comeback by winning Missouri and potentially taking a surprise victory in Minnesota, where he has spent more time and made more effort than Romney. The Romney campaign is already trying to tamp down the necessarily high expectations by releasing memos to their supporters and to the media explaining why these three contests don’t really matter in the big scheme of things. That’s pretty telling, and indicative of a campaign who thinks they will lose at least two states tonight. Even though Romney will remain the clear favorite after tonight regardless, he had to have hoped not to have a speed bump along the way like tonight may prove to be.

Rick Santorum, on the other hand, has got to be feeling pretty good about the hand that fate dealt him for tonight. True, none of the contests really matter as far as delegate counts go, but they will be worth something to Team Rick just to show they can actually win somewhere other than Iowa. If Rick does capture Missouri tonight – which he likely will do, since Romney is not contesting it and Gingrich isn’t even on the ballot – his spin team will be out in full force attempting to make the “beauty contest” as important as possible. And if he manages to overcome the Romney organizational machine in Minnesota… well, that victory will be a lot easier to spin as a huge net positive for Rick. In fact, that may be the best case scenario for Santorum (and the worst case for Romney): Rick winning two states outright tonight. His campaign will try to spin that into some positive momentum heading into Arizona and Michigan in three weeks.

As for Newt Gingrich, well, his campaign’s spin machine will be working overtime for a while, attempting to spin away the fact that Gingrich will likely lose not only to Romney, but to Santorum in at least a couple states tonight. Newt appears to all but have given up on the three contests today, and is instead off campaigning in the Super Tuesday state of Ohio (holding five events there today while Romney is in Colorado and Santorum is in Minnesota this afternoon and Missouri this evening). It makes sense, really, for Newt to skip over the next several contests. He has no chance of winning Colorado, Minnesota, Missouri, Maine, Arizona, or Michigan. So he is focusing on his final desperation firewall: Super Tuesday. Meanwhile, he has not begun running the positive campaign he vowed in his bizarre post-Nevada press conference; rather, he has continued taking it to Romney every chance he gets. He is attempting to build some sort of positive momentum for himself and negative momentum for Romney in the Super Tuesday states before Romney ever gets to them.

And what of Ron Paul? Let’s just put it this way: Ron Paul came in third place in Nevada. His entire campaign moving forward was to rack up delegates in the caucus states, and Nevada is a state tailor made for his libertarian message. The Paul campaign had organization set up there months ago and he still placed behind Gingrich. The Paul spin machine would have a tough job on their hands after tonight if anybody really thought Ron Paul was a serious candidate. As it is, however, everyone knows Paul’s gameplan: stay in the race until the convention in order to bring as many delegates as possible and have a say in the party platform. He knows he can’t win, everyone else knows he can’t win, and so we’ll give him his delegates from tonight and continue on.

The order we receive the results tonight will be interesting as well. We will begin the night with a potential Santorum victory in Missouri, where the polls close at 7:00 pm Central Time (8:00 eastern). At the same time the polls in Missouri close, the caucuses in Minnesota begin. The Minnesota GOP expects to begin releasing results around 8:15 Central Time — which is about when the Colorado caucuses are slated to begin (7:00 Mountain Time). The Colorado GOP expects to be reporting results as late as Midnight tonight — and so most people will be in bed when the news of a probable Romney victory finally get released.

All of which is even more reason the spin teams will be out in full force tomorrow morning.

Here’s a clean piece of screen to discuss the results as they trickle in. Most polls are now closed in the state; those in the Central time zone will be closing in one hour.

The latest exit poll from Drudge shows Romney’s lead expanding to 49-33 over Gingrich.

Polls across most of Florida are now open as of 7:00 am eastern time (the rest will open at 7:00 am central time).

As of yesterday afternoon, 600,000 votes had already been cast (308,416 absentee ballots and 283,250 early voters). That matches the total number of votes cast in the South Carolina primary.

Consider this your open thread for the day – it will be updated as time allows throughout the day. Polls close at 7:00 pm eastern/central time.

—–
Update #1: 8 1/2 hours until the first polls close

Here’s a compilation of all the final polls coming out of Florida — someone will have a little egg on their face when the day is over:

InsiderAdvantage: Romney +5 (36-31)
PPP: Romney +8 (39-31)
War Room Logistics: Romney +10 (40-30)
Mason-Dixon: Romney +11 (42-31)
Quinnipiac: Romney +14 (43-29)
NBC/Marist: Romney +15 (42-27)
SUSA: Romney +15 (41-26)
Rasmussen: Romney +16 (44-28)
Suffolk: Romney +20 (47-27)
We Ask America: Romney +22 (50-28)

RealClearPolitics Average: Romney +13.0
Pollster.com Average: Romney +8.5

—–
Update #2: 6 hours until the first polls close
Today isn’t only the Florida primary, fellow political nerds. It is also the filing deadline for the year-end FEC fundraising reports. We’ll be back later tonight with an official Q4 fundraising leaderboard, but here’s what we know so far: Huntsman’s daddy pumped $2 million into Junior’s campaign via his Super PAC; Rick Perry raised less than $3 million in Q4 (!) and blew through his entire cash on hand totals during the December leadup to Iowa; Gingrich’s Q4 haul neared $10 million.

Oh, and according to a new “study” released this morning, the Florida campaign over the past week has been measurably the most negative in modern political history, with 92% of the advertisements being attack ads. Yikes.

——
Update #3: 2 hours until the first polls close
This is the Hour O’ Exit Polls, folks, so post ‘em when you see ‘em. CNN, ABC, and the NYT should be releasing some information, among others.

The Drudge siren announces some (leaked) exit poll results:

• Romney – 46%
• Gingrich – 32%
• Santorum – 12%
• Paul – 7%

Other numbers:

• 70% identify as conservatives;
• 37% said Romney ran a more unfair campaign, compared to 34% who said Gingrich did;
• 45% said electability was the most important factor in choosing a nominee (experience – 20%; character – 17%; being a “true conservative” – 13%)
• 67% said the debates mattered in who they voted for;
• 40% are age 65 or older

Update: NYT exit poll numbers peg the race at a 44-30 lead for Romney, the same 14% margin that Drudge is reporting.

A source inside one of the GOP candidate’s campaigns tells Andrew Breitbart that they have seen numbers indicating a 47-34 Romney lead — a similar margin.

Romney is winning seniors by a 15% margin over Gingrich.

Tomorrow is the decisive Florida primary. It is also another turning point in the race: tomorrow, it becomes mathematically impossible for a late entrant into the race to earn the 1,144 delegates necessary to win the GOP nomination. Frontloading HQ does the heavy lifting with a handy chart and a post entitled, “I’ll See Your White Knight and Raise You a Filing Deadline: Why It’s Too Late For Entry Into the Republican Nomination Race”.

The money quote:

If the list is constrained more simply to the states where filing deadlines have not passed, the total delegates open to a late entrant drops to 1157. After Tuesday, when Kentucky’s (and Indiana’s petition — see footnote 17 above) deadlines pass that total will drop below 1144 to 1066.

After tomorrow, a candidate can only get on the ballot in enough states to get 1,066 delegates. A late entrant to the race has always been an extreme longshot, but now it is mathematically impossible. Sorry, George Will, Bill Kristol, et al.

But what about a brokered convention? Could someone jump in and deny Mitt Romney the ability to get to 1,144? Theoretically, yes. But here’s what Frontloading HQ has to say about that scenario:

But here’s the thing: Who is that candidate? Let me rephrase that. Who is the candidate who can not only successfully enter the race late, but who can also marshal the organization necessary to cobble together enough delegates to take the nomination or throw enough of a monkeywrench into the process and still maintain support in the party to win the nomination at the convention? Let’s think about this for a moment. There are people in this race now actively seeking the nomination (and who have been running for president for quite some time) who cannot get on the ballots in some states. And we are expecting someone to come in and immediately be able to beat these deadlines, organize write-in efforts and uncommitted slates of delegates to get within shouting distance of 1144 or a lower total held by the frontrunner.

After tomorrow, we can finally put to rest the wild fantasies of a White Knight run by the likes of Jindal, Jeb, Christie, or Ryan. Sorry, dreamers.

For the first time in modern political history, the first three states have chosen three different winners in the Republican primary. (Which means, also, for the first time in modern political history a candidate has won South Carolina after losing both Iowa and New Hampshire.)

I’m beginning to think Newt is actually a zombie, reanimating over and over again when people write his political obituary. For sure, the sane elements of the Republican Party have been wishing for his political death ever since last summer when a vast majority of his campaign staff quit in disgust of a man who couldn’t organize his way out of a paper bag or maintain a focus or vision for longer than it takes Barack Obama to say, “Look…”

My friends from the left side of the political spectrum are literally celebrating tonight in glee over Newt Gingrich’s victory in South Carolina. And it makes sense. Newt Gingrich’s approval rating sits at 27% among Americans at the moment. (Apparently, all 27% live in South Carolina.) Nominating this guy would be a nightmare scenario for the Republican Party, not just in 2012 but for many election cycles to come. Just as we were negatively branded ‘the party of George Bush’ in 2006 and 2008, we would be branded ‘the party of Newt Gingrich’ in 2012, 2014, and probably into 2016 (unless the all-star lineup of benchwarmers we’ve got now actually decided to get in the race next time and made a positive impression on the American people — but even with that they would start at a disadvantage).

However… I’ve told my friends tonight not to celebrate too much. Mitt Romney will still, ultimately, win the nomination. Fourteen days ago, when everyone thought Mitt Romney had won Iowa by 8 votes, I wrote this here on Race:

if Romney doesn’t finish off Gingrich and Santorum in South Carolina or Florida, he will finish them off on Super Tuesday, March 6. The race will not go beyond that date. Romney is set up to sweep the February caucuses and primaries and, more importantly, is the only one left in the race with any semblance of organizational structure.

Of course, Gingrich and Santorum may be able to stop Romney in Virginia… oh, wait…

And ten days ago, after Romney’s huge win in New Hampshire, I wrote this:

South Carolina does still represent Romney’s biggest challenge to date. Gingrich still looks remarkably strong there even after a couple of incredibly rough defeats in Iowa and New Hampshire. Romney’s lead in most SC polls is in the single digits. And a massive onslaught of negative advertisement is heading in Mitt’s general direction. There is the possibility that someone upsets Romney in South Carolina. If they do, then Romney’s competitors get an extended lease on life until Super Tuesday. If they don’t, this race will be over on Jan 21.

I stand firmly behind both of those predictions. And it’s not difficult to understand why. In terms of money, Gingrich raised just $9 million in Q4. Romney has more than twice that much just in cash on hand totals (Gingrich’s cash on hand totals are likely to be roughly half that $9 million – or less – after factoring in the millions he paid in campaign advertisements that didn’t help leading up to Iowa). Romney raised over $24 million last quarter and has no debt; Gingrich, on the other hand, is still toting around over a million dollars in debt. And it is incredibly difficult to imagine Gingrich’s fundraising picture being bright as he placed fourth place in Iowa and fifth place in South Carolina.

Of course, his fundraising will get a boost now that he has won South Carolina. But it won’t be enough to match Romney’s advantage in the area. Newt will have to be very selective in choosing which parts of Florida to compete in; as has been mentioned on this blog by many different authors, Florida has eight different media markets and costs well over a million dollars to competently run a single TV ad. Newt will find it difficult to play statewide like Romney will — and setting out a coherent, organized, and focused strategy has never been anywhere close to one of Gingrich’s strengths.

So Gingrich has that working against him. He also has Romney’s strength in Florida working against him as well. Gingrich was able to turn a 3- to 5-point Romney lead into a 12-point Gingrich victory in South Carolina. (The largest Romney’s lead ever got on the RCP average was 8 points.) But that was a small lead in a state that everyone knew at the beginning of last year would be one of Romney’s most difficult. Now we pivot to Florida, which Romney nearly won four years ago — even after losing Iowa and South Carolina. In fact, in the last three polls there, Romney has leads of 22, 24, and 26 points. Even with a surge of momentum from South Carolina, Gingrich will find it difficult to cut down those size of leads. More importantly, Romney has built a campaign infrastructure in Florida that is simply and objectively second-to-none. His statewide organization is impeccable, representing much more time, effort, and resources than he ever invested into South Carolina.

Beyond money, Romney’s strength in Florida, and the organizational mismatch, Gingrich also has something much more important working against him: the Republican Party hates him. Perhaps not the Church of the Loud and Angry Conservative primary voters, but the actual Republican Party machine will now pull out all the stops to end Gingrich’s career once and for all. As the esteemed Larry Sabato put it tonight:

Expect a flood of establishment endorsements for Romney before Florida. Republicans that might have to share the ballot with Newt in November are terrified.

And for good reason. Newt is about to find himself to be the loneliest winner of the South Carolina Republican primary history has ever known. Now that Gingrich has shown himself to be capable of actually winning something rather than just making a whole lot of noise, the Party will coalesce around Mitt Romney to stop him, just as they coalesced around John McCain in the final days of the 2008 primary season. Expect a rash of endorsements now for Romney, which equals a rash of new surrogates and campaigners.

And finally, perhaps the biggest thing Romney has going for him at the moment – and that Gingrich has working against him – is the primary calendar. Everyone knew when the Nevada caucuses chose to move their contest back to February that January was going to be Romney’s toughest month in this competition by far. Well, once Florida is in the rearview mirror, the calendar is coming up all Romney:

• Feb 4 – Nevada caucus
• Feb 7 – Colorado caucus, Minnesota caucus, Missouri primary
• Feb 11 – Maine caucus
• Feb 28 – Arizona primary, Michigan primary
• March 3 – Washington caucus

Romney is the heavy favorite to win every one of those contests. Eight victories in a row heading into Super Tuesday on March 6. The fact that five of the eight are caucuses helps, since Gingrich couldn’t organize his way out of a paper bag. The fact that Gingrich isn’t even on the Missouri ballot also helps (even though the primary is non-binding, it will still get headlines and be mentioned in with Romney’s victory in CO and MN that night and the next morning).

That’s a whole lot of positive press for Romney, and a long time for Gingrich to go without a win. And once it gets to Super Tuesday, let’s take a look at what Gingrich is up against:

• Alaska caucus (safe Romney)
• Georgia primary (safe Gingrich)
• Idaho caucus (safe Romney)
• Massachusetts primary (safe Romney)
• North Dakota caucus (safe Romney)
• Ohio primary (lean Romney)
• Oklahoma primary (lean Gingrich)
• Tennessee primary (lean Romney)
• Vermont primary (safe Romney)
• Virginia primary (safe Romney)

If somebody can explain how in the world Newt Gingrich can stay in the race after losing eight in a row during February and then winning only two states on Super Tuesday (one of which is his home state), I’m all ears.

Newt’s victory tonight in South Carolina was impressive. Twelve points is a huge margin, and especially so for someone who placed fourth in Iowa and fifth in New Hampshire.

My advice to Newt Gingrich is this: enjoy the high while it lasts. Because as I wrote ten days ago, all you’ve done is delay the inevitable.

The esteemed Larry Sabato brings the official word via Twitter:

@LarrySabato

Bachmann, Huntsman, Santorum fail to make Virginia GOP ballot (March 6).

2 minutes ago via web

Feel free to mock and disregard these candidates from here on out.

UPDATE: Sabato follows up with this tweet: “As difficult as VA qualifying is, I can’t take seriously any POTUS campaign failing to get on 12th largest state ballot.” I agree.

Iowans thoroughly enjoys their “first in the nation” caucus and the status and power it gives them. They also treasure their Ames straw poll which is a major fundraiser for their party. Yet this year they are starting to worry almost to the point of panicking that it may all be coming to an end. Why?

First of all, Ames was a bust prestige-wise. For the second cycle in a row, key candidates skipped it altogether. The eventual winner, Michele Bachmann, enjoyed perhaps 24 hours in the sun before promptly plummeting in the national and statewide polls to single digits. She has remained there ever since.

And now there is a real possibility that Ron Paul might win the caucuses next month. Their leaders are starting to fear that their credibility will go bust if that happens.

Politico reports:

Conservatives and Republican elites in the state are divided over who to support for the GOP nomination, but they almost uniformly express concern over the prospect that Ron Paul and his army of activist supporters may capture the state’s 2012 nominating contest — an outcome many fear would do irreparable harm to the future role of the first-in-the-nation caucuses.

In spin rooms, bar rooms and online forums, the what-to-do-about-Paul conversation has become pervasive as polls show him at or near the top here just weeks before the January 3rd vote.

Paul poses an existential threat to the state’s cherished kick-off status, say these Republicans, because he has little chance to win the GOP nomination and would offer the best evidence yet that the caucuses reward candidates who are unrepresentative of the broader party.

“It would make the caucuses mostly irrelevant if not entirely irrelevant,” said Becky Beach, a longtime Iowa Republican who helped Presidents Bush 41 and Bush 43 here. “It would have a very damaging effect because I don’t think he could be elected president and both Iowa and national Republicans wouldn’t think he represents the will of voters.”

What especially worries Iowa Republican regulars is the possibility that Paul could win here on January 3rd with the help of Democrats and independents who change their registration to support the libertarian-leaning Texas congressman but then don’t support the GOP nominee next November.

“I don’t think any candidate perverting the process in that fashion helps [the caucuses] in any way,” said Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, adding that he didn’t know if that’s necessarily how Paul would win.

While there’s no evidence of an organized effort, public polling shows that Paul’s lead is built in large part with the support of non-Republicans – and few party veterans think such voters would stick with the GOP in November.

“They’ll all go back and vote for Obama,” predicted Beach.

…

John McCain completely ignored the state last cycle and went on to win the nomination. If Paul wins the nomination this time around, the Republican and the conservative leaders in Iowa fear the rest of the country will view it as proof positive their contests are a joke and not to be taken seriously. They would stand in real danger of losing their “first in the nation” status. And even if they manage to hold on to that, their caucus could end up being viewed with all the relevance of a straw poll. It would become a contest for 2nd and 3rd tier candidates to have their moment in the sun.

If this election cycle serves to kill the relevance of Iowa, the Iowans will have only themselves to blame. When you have the state’s evangelicals endorsing the likes of Newt Gingrich, and a supposed big player like Vander Plaats endorsing an also-ran like Rick Santorum, just how seriously can you take these guys? Their caucus is headed over the cliff, and they are the ones doing the pushing.

Citing a crowded debate schedule, the Des Moines Register has pulled the plug on their debate planned for December 19. Instead, they will be joining ABC News and the Iowa GOP as co-sponsors of the December 10 debate.

The elimination of a debate means there are now just four debates remaining before the voting begins:

UPDATE: The CNN / Arizona GOP debate originally scheduled for Nov 30 has been moved back to February (hat tip to reader ilfigo). CNN requested the change to put the debate closer to the Arizona primary, and the Arizona GOP agreed. So that leaves just three debates before the votes start coming in.

Did I miss an event? Let me know in the comments. Please note that this calendar contains only the major Republican debates, not the myriad of “forums” that various groups sponsor throughout the primary season.

With all the debates now rescheduled and Gardner officially setting the New Hampshire Primary, we bring to you the “close to final” edition of the 2012 primary calendar:

Did I miss an event? Let me know in the comments. Please note that this calendar contains only the major Republican debates, not the myriad of “forums” that various groups sponsor throughout the primary season.

The Nevada Republican Central Committee will meet on Saturday for a long-planned meeting. At that meeting, however, Politico is reporting the Central Committee will more than likely vote to move the Nevada Caucus off of Saturday, January 14.

The January 14 date was chosen by the smaller Executive Committee, where only one person voted against the date: RNC committeewoman Heidi Smith. Now, the Central Committee – with about 200 members – is set to overturn the Executive Committee decision and move the caucus. The only question that remains is to what date it will be moved.

If Heidi Smith has her way, they will place the caucus on February 4. However, others are opposed to moving it into February because it means losing their number three spot in the early state lineup.

This news comes on the heels of two days of negotiations with RNC Chairman Reince Preibus. In return for moving the caucus, Priebus reportedly promised Governor Bob List that Nevada would be given official “early status” in future calendars.

Obviously, if Nevada moves back to February 4, it will be a big disappointment for the Romney campaign, who is counting on momentum out of Nevada to propel him through South Carolina into Florida. If they decide to move back to January 17, the calendar looks much more favorable to Romney. We’ll know on Saturday, and then Gardner should officially set New Hampshire on January 10 soon after that.

UPDATE: The Las Vegas Sun has more details on the discussions between Reince Priebus and the Nevada delegation. Apparently, the deal that Priebus presented to Nevada involves them moving specifically to February 4, 2012. The RNC specifically asked Nevada to “give up its number 3 spot this year”, and in return, “Nevada would receive promises of stricter future sanctions to protect its early state status in the long term.”

If the Nevada GOP Central Committee end up taking this deal – and it appears likely they will – then this is awful news for the Romney campaign. The primary calendar will move from Iowa to New Hampshire and then to South Carolina — nearly two weeks later, when any momentum out of New Hampshire will likely be lost. Nevada would kick off the Romney February portion of the calendar, now including NV, CO, MN, ME, AZ, and MI. Mitt would be favored to win all six at the moment, but if he loses two of the first three contests that will have an impact on the trajectory of the race heading into February.

New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner is out with a new “my way or the highway” op-ed, posted over at TheIowaRepublican.com. In it, he makes the case for New Hampshire being the first in the nation primary, and for them having to necessarily go seven days before the Nevada caucuses. Here’s the rubber-meets-the-road moment:

We cannot allow the political process to squeeze us into a date that wedges us by just a few days between two major caucus states. Our primary will have little meaning if states crowd into holding their events just hours after our polls have closed.

The date of our primary is decided by state law, not by the rules or desires of political parties. Since Nevada’s caucus is similar in the eyes of our statute, it means the New Hampshire primary can be set no later than Saturday, January 7th.

IT’S REALLY UP TO NEVADA. If Nevada does not accept a date of Tuesday, January 17th or later for its caucus, it leaves New Hampshire no choice but to consider December of this year. The dates of Tuesday, December 13th, and Tuesday, December 6th are realistic options, and we have logistics in place to make either date happen if needed. Candidates have been campaigning here, and elsewhere, for months, and it is about time we begin the next stage of the presidential nominating process.

I know it’s tough, but try and ignore the glaring lack of logic in his writing. (“In the eyes of our statute”? Really? Isn’t it you who interprets the statute? And if Nevada is “similar” why wasn’t Delaware “similar” in 1996 and 2000?)

Apparently, Saturday, January 7th isn’t an okay date for NH because Iowa is just three days earlier, and New Hampshire desires to go on a Tuesday. The Nevada GOP has said they want to go on a Saturday in order to increase caucus turnout; however, it is feasible that they could acquiesce and set their caucus for Tuesday, January 17th.

To the Nevada GOP Central Committee: I know it’s not what you wanted. I know Bill Gardner is being a primary/caucus bully. But for the sake of everyone’s sanity, the simplest solution to this whole thing looks to be taking one for the team and moving from the 14th to the 17th. Please?

Dave G suggests that New Hampshire moving up its primary to (perhaps) December 6th would help Romney.

First of all, I doubt it will be that early and I certainly hope not. It’s my hope that Secretary of State Gardener get over his pique about Nevada holding its caucus 4 days after New Hampshire. In both 1996 and 2000, Delaware held an actual primary four days after New Hampshire and it did little to dampen New Hampshire’s impact.

But should the primary occur in New Hampshire will it help Romney? If you view politics as a football game, then the answer is yes. If your team is up by two touchdowns and 7 1/2 minutes come off the clock, the chances of your team winning, go up exponentially.

However, it’s more complicated in politics. It does help Romney in that it lessens the ability of his opponents to raise money to compete in New Hampshire and organize. It also lessens the window for Romney to make a gaffe or Rick Perry to recover from his errors. ‘

Indeed, if this whole thing hurts anyone, it certainly hurts Rick Perry, who had no idea how late he was getting into this thing when he got in.

However, all candidates who have been doing the work in Iowa and New Hampshire, moving the primary up won’t have a big impact.  Not all time in a Presidential campaign is created equal.  While political junkies of all stripes have been paying rapt attention, the average voter hasn’t. And a primary campaign reaches a point when voters decide to engage the process.

If we take a look back at 2007-08, this is backed up. Romney had taken a lead in New Hampshire in May and had led (usually by double digits) through December 17th.  The last five polls that ended on December 17th had Romney +12, Romney +15, Romney +13, Romney +13, and Romney +12.  McCain began to move as New Hampshire voters became engaged with the next polls being Romney +4, a tie, Romney +7,  and Romney +3.  The LA Times/Bloomberg released an outlier poll on December 26 that had Romney +14, but the next two results were tied.  Then on December 31st, McCain took the lead and with the exception of two polls, consistently held it until he won the Primary.

All that happened is that the voter engagement period will occur sooner. Another impact on this race if Iowa and New Hampshire occur in 2011, more three weeks out from the next contest in Nevada, they could diminish their role in the presidential process by blunting the momentum of the winner. A mid-december win in New Hampshire will be drowned out by the Holidays in the rest of the country. Already, the March 6 Super Tuesday and February Dead Zone (with only two non-binding Caucuses and two primaries occurring) threaten to weaken Iowa and New Hampshire’s power, being too early could imperil it even further and allow a candidate who wins neither state to take the nomination.

The Iowa GOP Central Committee convened last night via conference call, and they tentatively agreed to set the Iowa caucus for Tuesday, January 3. The date will be voted on and become official when they meet together in 10 days.

The move is a shot across the bow of New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner, who is still threatening to set the New Hampshire primary on January 3rd. In the past (in 1996, for example), Gardner has interpreted the New Hampshire law requiring their primary to be seven days before a “similar” contest to apply only to other primaries and not to caucuses. This year, for whatever reason, he is throwing a tantrum over Nevada setting their caucus on January 14. Gardner said because of the law, New Hampshire cannot go on Tuesday, January 10.

The RNC disagrees, and is “encouraging” Gardner to reconsider this new interpretation of the law — by threatening to strip New Hampshire of its first-in-the-nation status unless he relents and goes on the 10th. This move by Iowa appears to be an attempt to strong arm New Hampshire into common sense compliance. The timing is interesting, though: Gardner has said he will not announce a date for the New Hampshire primary until at least October 17th, ostensibly because he wants to ensure no other states go rogue like Florida. With the Iowa GOP signalling they will not wait for his decision, he may be effectively boxed in now and will look like the bad guy if he announces the 3rd – or earlier – now.

So most likely, this will be our early state calendar – and we should know for sure in a little over ten days:

January 3 – Iowa
January 10 – New Hampshire
January 14 – Nevada
January 21 – South Carolina
January 31 – Florida
February 7 – Colorado, Minnesota
February 11 – Maine
February 28 – Arizona, Michigan

That’s 87 days until the party starts, folks.

Political analyst Sean Trende is out with a fascinating new analysis of the GOP primary contest in this morning’s edition of Real Clear Politics.  I find myself pretty much in agreement with Sean, but there are some nuances and more intangible aspects to this contest as it is currently developing that I will discuss in a future writing.  So, rather than comment further, read Sean’s analysis here.

Interesting news from South Carolina and Florida this morning regarding the early primary schedule…

First, from South Carolina where fiscal issues might turn their primary into a caucus:

South Carolina’s much-watched first-in-the-South Republican presidential primary could become a far less important first-in-the-South caucus.

Without the help of the state, the party may not legally be able to hold a primary in early 2012, Chad Connelly, the recently elected chairman of the S.C. GOP, said Friday.

Gov. Nikki Haley is expected to veto part of a state budget proposal, now on her desk, that could partially pay for that primary. Connelly is concerned that veto would mean the State Election Commission could not help run the GOP primary, forcing the party to opt for a caucus.

Lots of punditry already explaining how switching to a caucus hurts or helps various candidates, with folks divided on Romney’s fate. Some predict it will hurt Romney because caucus goers tend to be more conservative and less moderate – especially, it is guessed, in a state like South Carolina; others saying it would help Romney’s chances since he tends to overperform in caucuses as compared to primaries.

My bet? South Carolina finds a way to pay for the primary. I don’t think they’ll give up their “first in the south” status this easily… but who knows?

Then, news from the Sunshine State as the Florida GOP puts forward their new compromise proposal:

The calendar remains unsettled, and the Florida date is to be set by a commission whose members will be named by Scott and state legislative leaders. Haridopolos and Republican state Chairman Dave Bitner tell USA TODAY they are floating the idea of setting the primary March 1, 2 or 3.

That would be after the first four states but before the Super Tuesday primaries March 6.

This seems to be one of the best options advanced by either side thus far in this FL/RNC battle. As Ben Smith notes, “In the March 1-3 option, everybody saves a little face. Florida gets to hold an early primary, even if that just means voting three days earlier than a slew of other states. The RNC gets Florida to back away from its current date of Jan. 31, as well as its original negotiating target of mid-February. It also helps Florida plant a flag as a special state for future GOP primary calendars, which is a big part of the objective here.”

What remains to be settled would be whether or not the RNC would penalize Florida delegates if they choose to go before March 6.

Anyone reading the news over the past year had good reason to believe that the 2012 election might provide some relief from the increasingly early, increasingly front-loaded Presidential Primary calendar that has been plaguing United States elections in the last few cycles. With Republicans moving back their announcements until spring, and the national party coming down in favor of a later primary schedule, there was good reason to hope we might see a saner calendar this cycle. If only wishing made it so.

While some states have been relatively supportive of the 2012 calendar guidelines laid out by the GOP, Florida, it seems, is not among them. By continuing to schedule its primary for January 31, Florida both violates the rules passed after the 2008 cycle, and threatens to pull other states up earlier. Iowa, South Carolina, New Hampshire, and Nevada would all certainly seek an earlier date – so too might Wyoming, Michigan, Georgia, Texas, and others.  This calendar-jumping was chaotic enough in 2008, even when it was highly anticipated. But as we approach the 2012 season, a similar occurrence could create real problems for the candidates, most of whom have already delayed their announcements by a month, and plan to delay them even further until spring. Any front-loading now would seriously cut the amount of time candidates have to campaign for the Presidency.

Beyond the minor changes to the primary calendar that were approved after the 2008 election, both the Republicans and Democrats flirted with several alternative proposals; including a single, national primary day; regional, rotating primaries; and perhaps the most well-developed proposal: the Ohio Plan. Although it failed to pass, the Ohio plan would have divided states by size, and provided set periods for different groups of states to hold their contests. Although each of these plans has merit, they are also flawed in their own ways. A national primary would be too hard on the individual candidates, who would need to contend for the limited party resources that help to make a national campaign possible in the general election. Regional primaries are a gamble, because each region would only have its turn to go first every 20 years or so – which may or may not be when those states are particularly in need of national attention. Of existing proposals, the Ohio Plan was the most promising, but still failed to adequately distribute influence between the states…the first contests would have been the likes of Montana, Idaho, and the Dakotas.  The ideal primary reform should do the following:

1. Preserve the status of traditional “bellwether” contests like Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina (among others), which have become a valued tradition in American politics.

2. Prevent states from jumping position to try to gain influence. This inevitably pushes the primary contests too early into the year, and is the major flaw in the current system.

3. Introduce a predictable, routine, and compressed calendar which reduces the long gap between the beginning of the primary campaign and the conclusion of the general election (in the last cycle, this period was nearly two years).

4. Divide influence regionally and between the states, ensuring that as many contests as possible have due influence over who becomes President – whether they are big, small, critical, or largely predictable in the general election.

5. Provide the greatest possible diversity of methods for candidates to run their campaigns. The extreme frontloading heavily favors well-funded and national campaigns, providing only the smallest opening for regional powerhouses.

So, with these criteria in mind, how might we go about devising a primary schedule? The first step would be to divide the country in a manner similar to the regional primary proposal. Although not all states in a region would vote at once, this would nonetheless recognize the common, but unique character of separate areas of the country; the Northeast is important to commercial business, the Midwest values manufacturing, the South is a guardian of personal and social virtue, the Plains rely on agriculture, and the West is important to both mining and high-tech industries. Here is how the regions might be divided.

The next, and most important, step is to determine the order of the contests; this, after all, is the main point of contention among the states themselves.  This is also a point where conventional wisdom needs to be discarded. The significant influence of Iowa and New Hampshire led states to believe voting early meant more influence – a trend Florida appears destined to continue this year. Yet in the end, it was California, voting on Super Tuesday and with a complicated delegate allocation, which ensured John McCain would win the Republican nomination. The Democratic contest continued even later, and was not resolved until after March. Clearly, both early and late contests can wield significant influence.  To allocate this influence as equally as possible,  states should be allocated into groups, with one state from each of the five regions making up an individual group, and with each group being given a set week for their contests. Smaller states, would go first, helping to weed out weaker candidates, while larger states would vote last, casting the deciding, or at least final, primary vote.  This system allows progressively fewer candidates to play for increasingly larger stakes, but also leaves open the ability of individual candidates to pursue regional strategies according to their own strengths and weaknesses.

Finally, there is the exact makeup of the calendar. The 2008 primaries began in early February, followed by Super Tuesday (where half of all contests were decided), then progressed slowly all the way into June – a six month calendar. 2008 also saw some of the latest nominating conventions in history, with the official start of the general election being delayed well into the fall, just two months from Election Day.  A more compact schedule, which better reflects the lives of ordinary voters, would be preferable. By switching to a 14-week calendar, starting in March and ending in mid-June (just as families were beginning their summer holidays), our electoral habits could better reflect our personal ones. There would be just five contests in March, the early states. April would follow, with a week off for the Easter holiday, a week for contests by non-US states (including D.C.), and a 15-state “Super Tuesday” contest, preserving another valued political tradition. States of moderate population would vote in the first three weeks of May, while a second weeklong break would be scheduled for the week of Memorial Day. Finally, the largest states would vote in June, before a month-long recess for Americans to enjoy their summers free of the political deluge. Ideally, conventions would be scheduled in the second half of July, while the Olympics occupied early August. The general election could begin mid-August, providing Americans ten weeks to decide their next President.

This, I recognize, sounds very confusing on paper – but it becomes far clearer when visualized. Consider the following maps (red represents states voting, dark gray represents contests yet to be held, and light gray represents prior contests): weeks 1-4 (early states), week 5, week 7 (Super Tuesday), week 9, week 10, week 11, week 12, and week 14. Note, the gaps in the schedule here are for the breaks mentioned above: Easter falls on week six, the non-state contests (Guam, Puerto Rico, American Samoa) would vote during week 8, and Memorial Day falls during week 13.  You can also view the schedule as a calendar.

This system has several advantages over both the current system, and existing proposals for reform.  The schedule begins slowly, the number of contests at any given time remains manageable, and candidates have several possible paths to the nomination. But perhaps most importantly, this schedule would ensure that virtually all states had the potential to play an important role in the process. Under this system, it would be impossible to win enough delegates for the nomination until you were more than two-thirds through the primaries – and that is if you win all delegates from all the contests. Even a candidate consistently winning 65% of the delegates would need until Memorial day to be officially declared the winner (see here).  Since the largest contests come in the last two weeks of the season, even moderately well performing candidates are likely to remain in the race until the end. True, this could mean the primaries are not resolved by the time the voting is done, but with plenty of time left to hold summer conventions, it is unlikely this would have a negative effect on the parties – and since the consequences would be the same for both Democrats and Republicans, the end result would probably be a wash.

I cannot claim this proposal to be perfect, but I can claim – honestly – that it is fair; fair to the candidates, fair to the votes, and fair to the states. And in American politics, that is saying something.

Comments and constructive criticism are welcome.

Yesterday, the Iowa GOP announced that they have scheduled a second debate in conjunction with FOX News, to be held one week before the Iowa caucuses.

To keep track of all these debates, straw polls, and primary dates, I’ve combined them all into one handy dandy color-coded table:

Did I miss an event? Let me know in the comments!

I’ve pointed out several times that the way the Primary System is currently favors Mike Huckabee. The Republican Nominee has been since 1980, the Winner of Iowa or New Hampshire, and the winner of South Carolina. The power of momentum, combined with a desire to unite the party as quickly as possible to avoid a protracted nomination battle leads the party to unite as quickly as possible.

Many Romney supporters have hoped that Primary reform could help Romney, by displacing Iowa from the top spot:

Any serious player in the  next cycle should, at this point be reaching out to these groups and attempting to bring them into the tent.  Unfortunately, I see Huckabee trying to build his own tent.  That leaves us little option but to try and figure out how to prevent him from spoiling.

Changing the primary rules comes first to mind, which is something that needs to happen anyway to prevent shenanigans from the opposition.  I know the RNC has a working group on the primary rules going now.  If I am a Romney or a Pawlenty, then I have people in that group that are thinking not just about the Democrats, but about the spoilers.

Lowell chimes in:  John has hit on the key issue.  As long as the GOP starts in Iowa, with its quirkiness, and follows that up with New Hampshire’s open primary and Democrat voters skewing the outcome, it will be difficult for an electable center-right conservative to develop the momentum he or she needs to win the nomination.  In 2008 Iowa made Mike Huckabee and New Hampshire resurrected John McCain.  Both candidacies were doomed.  McCain was the third choice of the majority of Republicans.  Surely we can do better than that.

So thus the purpose of primary reform seems to be to stop Mike Huckabee and save the GOP.

Except that’s nowhere in the context of any article on Primary Reform.  In fact, if one looks at our current primary system, it was practically custom built for big money candidates. Back in 2000, George W. Bush’s 50 State campaign overcame John McCain with $80 million in fundraising. Bob Dole’s nationwide organization easily overcame Pat Buchanan’s insurgent campaign. The problem was that Mitt Romney’s investments didn’t pay off.

When we talk about Primary Reform, it should be realized right away what concerns Republican leaders isn’t. what concerns many people at the grassroots. What concerns Republican leaders is a process of compression and frontloading. This has multiple negative effects: 1) Campaigns require a lot of upfront fundraising scaring off me potential challengers, 2) voters don’t really have a chance to learn about the candidates and make an informed decisions, 3) many states have no real say in the process.

Conservatives are concerned about open v. closed primaries. Some people want to get rid of caucuses. And yes, still others would like to ensure their least favorite Presidential candidate doesn’t get the Republican nod in 2012. That’s great folks, but don’t expect the RNC to address any of this. The more they address, the harder this will be to get done, and people have been trying to get the primary process fixed since 1996, and they need a 2/3 vote to get this done. The articles on this talk only about the calendar.

Primary reform has three popular forms.

1) The Rotating Regional Primaries: This would split the country into four regions and allow regions to rotate which would go first. This was proposed by State Secretaries of State back in the 1990s.  This plan as all other plans can be modified to include Iowa and New Hampshire at the front end. However, I don’t think rotating regional primaries will go anywhere, because it delivers a huge benefit to big states.  If you’re a California, a New York, a Texas, or a Florida, you’re going to get far more candidate attention, money, etc. as the showcase prize. Imagine being stuck in a region in the East with New York, Pennsylvania, and California, or in the midwest with Ohio, Michigan, and Illinois. The RNC is the Republican Party’s version of the U.S. Senate with each state and territory getting three vote, so American Samoa has as much say as California does in this process. Also, a rotating regional primary would produce distortions. If the South goes first, you’ll most likely have a very different outcome then if the Northeast goes first.

2) The Delaware Plan: The Delaware system instead of dividing states by regions would divide them by population with the smallest population states voting first. As proposed in 2000, states would vote in this order beginning in March:

POD 1: American Samoa, Virgin Islands, Guam, Wyoming, District of Columbia, Vermont, Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Delaware, Montana, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Hawaii, Idaho, Maine, Puerto Rico.

POD 2: Nebraska, New Mexico, Nevada, West Virginia, Utah, Arkansas, Kansas, Mississippi, Iowa, Connecticut, Oregon, Oklahoma, South Carolina.

POD 3: Kentucky, Colorado, Alabama, Louisiana, Arizona, Minnesota, Maryland, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Missouri, Washington, Indiana, Massachusetts.

POD 4: Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, New Jersey, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Florida, New York, Texas, California.

I’ve been a fan of this plan in the past, but I think it’ll have trouble in the RNC. Moderate sized states like Minnesota, Kentucky, and Virginia could not be happy with being forced to wait to vote until May and June. In addition, the Iowa Delegates at the RNC  opposed in 2000 and unless an allowance was made. And Southerners couldn’t be happy with being locked out of the first week’s vote just because they lacked tiny states. This one seems unlikely to win RNC approval.

3) The Ohio Plan has perhaps the best potential to bring together a conensus.  It was last year’ s choice that was unceremonious sacked by John McCain in order to avoid ticking off delegates from large states he didn’t end up coming close to winning and/or to save him from a 2012 Primary challenge. The way the Ohio Plan works is that Iowa and New Hampshire vote in the first week of February, followed by South Carolina and Nevada in the second or third week, giving each region of the country a chance to play a role in the process. Then every state with less than six electoral votes as well as every territory will vote no earlier than the third week in February and then all the other states will vote in a series of rotating pods that are not regionally based with no state voting later than April:

Rotating Pod X: Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Wisconsin, Utah and Washington

Rotating Pod Y: Arizona, California, Connecticut, Indiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia

Rotating Pod Z: Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania

The plan’s a little confusing, but it’s less likely to annoy Southerners, big state voters, or small state voters. The problem here is that Saul Anuzis, who is on the Ad Hoc Commitee looking at this process was against the Ohio Plan last year for fear it would lead to a brokered convention.

How do the candidates far v. the current system?

Anyone not named Huckabee, Palin, or Romney: Any of these proposals would help candidates who are not on the radar. The up front money required to run a Presidential campaign will drop. The power of Iowa and New Hampshire to decide someone’s fate will decline. There will be other states that can give second chances. It becomes far more feasible to go to Iowa (or for that matter Guam) and become a surprise winner.

Mitt Romney Romney would probably be saved from a wave of Big Mo based on a Huckabee win in Iowa/South Carolina (unless they keep Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina first, choose rotating regional primaries and the South is the chosen first region.) However, Romney 2012 would have to be far different than Romney 2008. Romney raised a total of $107 million, however in 2007, the campaign had total operating expenditures of more than $86 million in 2007 before any primaries were held. If we assume that Romney came very close to his fundraising ceiling, it’s safe to say that he can’t spend like that in 2011, but that he’ll have to pace his spending. This could weaken the effective power of his financial edge.

Mike Huckabee Huckabee’s path becomes both easier and harder. As long as early primaries are kept alive in some form, he’ll have the chance to convert early primary victories into campaign cash, something that alluded him with the steamroller coming out of New Hampshire and the inability to win more states until Super Tuesday. On the other hand, the traditional road of Iowa-South Carolina 1-2 knockout punch.

Sarah Palin: Should Sarah Palin run, a longer nationwide tour will benefit her more than having to depend on Iowa and New Hampshire. She could definitely given some key momentum with the small state pods. Regional primaries are more iffy.

The Biggest Loser: The Ames Strawpoll. In a less frontloaded system, I don’t see people ending their campaigns in reaction to the results.

I was reading in the comments this weekend with folks discussing what certain candidate would need to do in 2012 in certain primary states. Of course, this is premature because we don’t know what states will actually try to go first. I would suggest, though, that we do know which states will probably be pivotal.

Going back to 1988, a simple pattern emerges in open Republican Contests. Take a look at this chart of the last four elections, the eventual Republican nominee is in bold:

We can see that in the past four cycles, the Republican nominee has been the winner of the South Carolina Primary, but also has been the winner of either New Hampshire or Iowa. There’s been an axiom for some time that the nominee of the party will be in the top 3 in Iowa or the top 2 in New Hampshire. I would suggest that recent history (and we can go back to 1976 on this) is that the winner of the Republican Nomination will be the winner of the Iowa Caucuses or the winner of the New Hampshire primary, and that a “Bronze” in Iowa (to use a Romneyism) or a “Silver” in New Hampshire mean nothing.

I will also venture that the winner of the 2012 nomination will probably be the winner of South Carolina. There’s one notable exception and that will be in the event that Mark Sanford runs, but that’s a bridge we’ll cross if we’ll come to it.

The question regarding is, “Why?” and I think the answer comes back to two problems that confront the primary process: compression and frontloading.  The system has shoved the vast majority of primaries to the front of the line right after Iowa and New Hampshire.

In such a case, there is effectively no campaign in places like California, New York, New Jersey or a very short one.  Even campaigns that have money like Romney in 2008 or Forbes in 2000 are going to go sparingly on building organizations for states they may never end up reaching. Voters don’t have time or don’t choose to take the time to really focus on the candidates until the week before the election. And why should they? To get excited about campaign that might not make it out of Iowa would be silly.

Thus, attempts to give greater influence to bigger states, have ended up magnifying the importance of Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. And it’s not that other states haven’t tried to take it away, but they’ve largely failed.

In 1996, Alaska held a non-binding Caucus and Louisiana held a binding one before Iowa. Delaware held it’s Republican Primary too soon after New Hampshire (only 4 days), while Arizona, North Dakota, and South Dakota leap-frogged ahead of South Carolina.

The net results: Alaska’s Caucus was won by Pat Buchanan, who proclaimed himself “King of the Klondike.” Louisiana’s Caucuses were banked on by the campaign of Senator Phil Gramm to give him a needed shot of momentum. However, Louisiana’s attempt to jump the line infuriated Iowans who got every candidate to drop out save for Gramm, Buchanan, and Alan Keyes. Gramm then lost Louisiana and after raising millions of dollars and tying in the Iowa Strawpoll, he finished in single digits in Iowa and was out of the race.

Arizona and Delaware were the only two states to go for Steve Forbes. They provided no momentum and were disconnected from the rest of the campaign. Bob Dole won the Dakotas, but the nomination wasn’t put away until he won a decisive victory in South Carolina. After South Carolina, except for a Buchanan win in Missouri, no state was even close.

In 2000, Delaware put itself between Iowa and New Hampshire and this time, eliminated Steve Forbes by going for George W. Bush. However, the turning point was Bush’s 9 point victory in South Carolina. After that McCain won his home state of Arizona, carried Michigan with a coordinated Democratic effort to embarass John Engler, and then didn’t win outside of New England on Super Tuesday.  

In 2008, Wyoming held it’s County Conventions before the New Hampshire Primary, Romney won them, but lost New Hampshire after losing Iowa. Romney also won Michigan, but it did him no good in South Carolina where he finished 4th. After McCain won South Carolina, he lost more states than most other nominees due to Romney’s connections in Massachusetts and Utah as well as the money invested by Romney in small caucus states that voted on Super Tuesday, as well as Huckabee’s strong Southern showing (and his win in Kansas), but still the Plurality of Republicans conceded to his nomination.

Why didn’t attempts to knock off the big three states work? First, the candidate didn’t cooperate. If some year when a state tried to leapfrog to the front, all the major candidates go campaign there, the power of Iowa and New Hampshire will be broken. Until then, it will remain.

Second, as stories of major candidates campaiging in Wyoming aren’t in the news and talking heads aren’t discussing, “Who’s going to win Wyoming?” In the absence of that coverage, these other events are like trees falling in the forest with no one around when it comes to giving the public an impression of momentum.

Finally, the belief, often unstated, is that Republicans need to unify as soon as possible. Disunity is more of a fear than picking a bad candidate. “Get it done early.” is a whole lot more important than “Pick the right guy.” A protracted process or a “brokered convention” is to be avoided at all costs.

Thus, barring a change in the primary schedule, unless the candidate is Mark Sanford running as a favorite son after being trounced in earlier primaries, whoever wins South Carolina will win the GOP nomination.

In my previous article, I’ve explored why the current awkward dance primary system is broken, and why the Rotating Regionals, the Delaware Plan, and the Ohio Plan do not sufficiently address the issues inherent in that system.

Now, please indulge me as I unveil my Wyoming Plan – a plan which, I believe, lays out a primary calendar for this party that not only meets all of our current needs but is able to grow and evolve to match the challenges of the future as well.

The Rotating Regionals plan was based on geographic borders. The Delaware Plan was based on total state population. The Ohio Plan was based first on maintaining current early state status, and then on state size, and then on an ideological/geographic balance.

The Wyoming Plan is based on total primary delegates.

To understand the plan, you have to understand the way the GOP decides how many delegates each state gets in the primaries. Basically, the national party lines out four categories in which to award delegates to states: district, at-large, state party, and bonus delegates.

District delegates
This one is simple, and it factors in the size of the state (and potential size of the Congressional delegation) by awarding each state three delegates for each congressional district. (For example, Wyoming, which has one Congressional district, gets three district delegates. Alabama, which has seven districts, gets 21 district delegates.)

At-Large delegates
Another simple one – this one factors in the potential size of the Senate delegation by giving each state five delegates per Senate seat regardless of which party occupies the seat. Thus, each state gets 10 at-large delegates.

State party delegates
Three party officials in each state are automatically delegates: the state party chairman, the national committee chairman, and the national party chairwoman. Thus, each state gets 3 state party delegates.

Bonus delegates
This is where the GOP delegate allocation system is genius. Each state gets bonus delegates based on a number of different criteria:

• If the Governor of the state is Republican, the state gets 1 extra delegate
• Each GOP Senator nets the state 1 extra delegate (max of 2, obviously)
• If the US House delegation from the state is majority Republican, they net 1 extra delegate
• For each chamber of the state legislature controlled by Republicans, the state banks an extra delegate (again, max of 2, obviously)
• Finally, if the state cast its electoral votes for the GOP candidate in the last election, they get extra delegates based off of a mathematical formula which takes into account the total electoral votes cast (for a minimum of 7 extra delegates).

As you can see then, the number of delegates each state gets the chance to award during the primaries can shift from year-to-year based on what happens within that state and on a national level in Presidential elections. By tapping into and piggy-backing on that shift each election, we can devise a plan which can grow with the needs of the party in the future.

The basis of the plan is thus: arrange the states in order from smallest number of delegates to the largest number of delegates. Obviously, this order shifts slightly every four years because of the bonus delegates (and shifts ever more slightly every 10 years because of the census).

Once you have this list, remove the non-state entities like American Samoa and Guam from the list and then group the states in groups of five. Each of these groups will hold their primary on the same day, one week apart from one another, beginning the first Tuesday in March. Taking a week off for Easter, we end the process in the middle of May, just in time for summer vacations.

So that’s the basis of the plan: ten primaries with five states each, beginning with the states that have the lowest number of delegates. Why is this so beneficial? For so many reasons…

• Five states at a time, especially beginning with smaller, more inexpensive states, is a way to test candidates’ abilities to play in multiple states at once without eliminating those candidates who lack huge fundraising numbers or name recognition.
• Beginning with the states that have the fewest number of delegates first is a way to get Republicans enthused, interested, and active in states where they would otherwise be predisposed to not get involved. Some would argue that this system rewards states for not voting Republican, but to the contrary it would serve to excite and energize Republicans in those states so they are more likely to vote Republican in the next election.
• If there were huge cultural or sea change shifts in state’s voting habits in the future, this system would automatically adjust along with them to ensure a balanced party (and thus a balanced candidate).
• Starting with the states with the fewest delegates allows the process to play out for a longer period of time, thus giving more states a greater say in the process.
• There is some built in ideological and geographic balancing when you arrange states in this manner — for example, the second week’s primaries would include Maine and Rhode Island along with North and South Dakota and Montana. Wyoming would go in the third primary along with Connecticut.
• Since the delegates for each state are not settled until statewide elections, it would drive up the enthusiasm and coverage of state elections. Local politics would matter again in a big way, thus encouraging GOP control of state legislatures and governorships. More people would pay attention and vote in midterm elections, and that’s always a good thing.

So we have a process that allows the little guy to compete at the beginning, and if he or she can win support there can continue on into the later rounds; a process which energizes the state parties; a process that makes local politics relevant; a process which offers ideological and geographic balance and promises to create a more balanced candidate; a process which is pliable and flexible enough to change and remain relevant; and a process which gets more people in more states involved in choosing our nominee. What’s not to like?

Well, for one, Iowa and New Hampshire lose their first in the nation status. To some folks, this is inexcusable, and to others, they’d like to see IA and NH take their place at the back of the line. What I’d like to offer as part of the Wyoming Plan is a compromise: allow Iowa and New Hampshire special permanent spots in the first group of five. They still get to be in the group of the first primaries in the nation, but they do not have undue influence over the process.

And we haven’t done anything with the six non-state entities yet, either. The Wyoming Plan would place one of them every week alongside the five states already voting, during weeks 3-8 of the process. Why then? Because you don’t want a non-state primary to have a lot of influence at the very beginning of the process or at the very end (think Puerto Rico in 2008 for Hillary and Barack), and putting more than one at a time makes their influence to great as well.

The only other problem (and it could be major) is that South Carolina loses its “first in the south” designation – and if they complained long and loud about it, you could potentially promise them a spot in the second group of five… although the more spots you promise like this, the more states are going to want them.

So here’s what the calendar would theoretically look like, using delegate numbers from 2008 (and understanding that they will change for 2012):
(more…)

The primary calendar is broken. Let’s face it. The calendar is a holdover from the ancient days of political history when candidates wouldn’t even enter the primary race until after a few of the early primaries had gone by… and states have taken that calendar and made haphazard changes to it over time that have only their interest in mind and not the national party’s.

It’s like building a small house back in the 40s, and then having each subsequent owner add a new addition to the house through the next sixty years with no rhyme, reason, or overarching vision for what the house could (or should) be. In the end, you still have a house. One that you’re able to live in. But one that has no flow, that makes certain things more difficult than they should be, and that you know could be better.

The current primary calendar rewards and punishes certain things that ought not be rewarded and punished, and forces candidates to do certain things they shouldn’t have to do. For example, the calendar is designed to reward rich candidates and punish candidates with little money. It boosts candidates with star power and punishes those with low name recognition (unless they have gobs of cash). It allows a candidate to focus on one or two states, which handicaps them for the general election where you have to run in at least 20 states simultaneously. It gives unnatural boosts to candidates that emphasize certain characteristics of philosophy instead of focusing on the whole party and country. It forces candidates to enter the race way too early in order to try and raise way too much cash for a race that is way too expensive.

Additionally, I believe it’s high time for the national parties to take control of the primary process. It’s time to end the awkward dance of state parties and state governments and national parties all trying to plan the same calendar – when all three groups have different agendas and goals in mind. This “too many cooks” syndrome reared its ugly head several times in the lead up to the 2008 primaries, and is just another example of why this isn’t working the way we’re currently doing it.

The list could go on and on. But suffice it to say that, despite assurances from some in the party that have their head in the sand, the system is broken.

(And just to ensure that this does not come up in the debate, I’ve been advocating for changing the primary calendar long before Romney lost – in fact, I was advocating changing it before the candidate field was even set for 2008 and before I settled on supporting Romney.)

Having said all that, there are three current plans that seem to have the strongest chance of getting looked at by the party: Rotating Regionals (proposed by the National Association of Secretaries of State), the Delaware Plan, and the Ohio Plan. However, my belief is that none of these three plans do enough to address the issues with our calendar.

Rotating Regionals
The country is divided up into four regions (Northeast – 11 states, South – 13 states, Midwest – 11 states, and West – 13 states). Iowa and New Hampshire still go first, and then one region goes at a time on the first Tuesday of March, April, May, and June. Every four years, the region that goes first would rotate.

Problems: this creates a de facto regional candidate favorite every election. If the northeast region went first in 2008, we probably would have had Giuliani as our nominee. If the south region went first, Thompson would have gotten the nod. If the west region went first, the Democrats would have nominated Bill Richardson. The point is, the primary process becomes much less about vision and policy and positions and becomes infinitely more about regional strength of a candidate. If the first region is the midwest, but our strongest candidate hails from the northeast in a particular year, he/she basically has no chance if a midwesterner is on the ballot. Additionally, this method leaves no way for candidates with low cash flow or name recognition room to do anything, as they would have to compete in a dozen states at the same time right off the bat.

Luckily, both the RNC and the DNC have rejected this proposal in the past, but the NASS is still campaigning for it and pushing the idea.

The Delaware Plan
Divides the states into four different groups again, but it takes away first-in-the-nation status from IA and NH. Also, this time the states are divided based on total population. The smallest 12 states would vote on the same day in March (including Iowa). The next smallest group of states would all vote on the same day in April (including NH), then the third group votes in May, and finally, the largest 13 states would finish the process off in June.

Problems: Basing where a state gets to vote in a political primary order based solely off of total population seems silly. I’m sure the Democrats wouldn’t be too happy with WY, ID, AK, ND, SD, and MT getting first dibs to choose their candidate, for instance – and all those states are in the first group. States ought to be ordered based on some kind of political importance, not just total population regardless of registered voters, party ID, voter turnout, primary delegates, etc. And again, starting the process off with 12 states right off the bat limits your candidate field to only those who are incredibly well-funded.

The Ohio Plan
This is a little more complicated plan. Under the Ohio Plan, four states reserve the right to go before everybody else: IA, NH, NV, and SC. Then, after those four states hold their primaries, the 14 “small states” hold their primary at the same time. This group includes: AK, DE, HI, ID, ME, MT, NE, NM, ND, RI, SD, VT, WV, and WY – along with all non-state primaries such as DC, Guam, PR, etc.

Those 18 states would remain the same every election. The remaining states are then divided into three rotating “pods”, labeled X, Y, and Z. Each election, the pod going “first” (i.e., after the early state and small state groupings) will rotate. The pods are as follows:

Pod X: Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Wisconsin, Utah, and Washington

Pod Y: Arizona, California, Connecticut, Indiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia

Pod Z: Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania

Problems: This plan appears to try and balance liberal and conservative states in each pod, as well as balancing regional interests in each. However, you’re still stuck with the same problem – you have more than a dozen states holding primaries on the same day (except in Pod Z), resulting in four “super Tuesdays” in a row after the early states are out of the way. Furthermore, you have those four early states continuing to hold far too much influence, only to be followed up by a slew of “small states” that candidates will potentially ignore anyway. This plan requires a lot of travel in a short period of time and again denies lesser known or lesser funded candidates the same opportunity as rich competitors.

The Real Solution?
I think it is high time to tear down this mess of a remodeled house and set up a system that is relevant to the current culture and will be pliable enough to last into the foreseeable future without any major problems arising. I have devised my own plan to fix the primary calendar, which I will dub the “Wyoming Plan”, and will unveil it here on Race42008 tomorrow afternoon.

Regional primaries! New early states! National primary days! How about Russian Roulette (bullets = n-1, n being the number of candidates)? Nobody seems to be too satisfied with the way that the current primary calendar is situated, and, hey, why should they be? It didn’t produce the results that they wanted. But nothing’s wrong with the primary calendar. In fact, it’s rather brilliant, especially with the addition of Mega Tuesday in 2008.

Let’s say that you’re the Republican Party poobahs, starting from scratch, and you’re faced with the task of constructing a way to produce a nominating system that’s fair to upstarts without purposely harming frontrunners, produces the sort of candidate that can appeal to swing voters and independents but gives the base a significant say, and tests organization but also tests popular support? And for the cherry on top: none of these factors should be allowed to dominate the other.

Well, that’s what we have right now, actually.

It’s Fair to Upstarts

Iowa and New Hampshire are both small enough, population-wise and by land mass, that retail politicking is practical and efficient. Name ID means far less in a small state like New Hampshire or Iowa when a candidate can bring his message directly to the people. Try to imagine a Mike Huckabee succeeding were we to have a “regional primary day.” How would he ever have convinced anyone that he was a legitimate contender? How would Mitt Romney have ever overtaken Rudy Giuliani had he not created buzz out of Iowa? Without being able to use Iowa and New Hampshire as a microcosm of the Republican base, the nominations would be the frontrunners’ for the taking every time. Such is the folly of shifting to a “regional primary” sceheme or demanding that a different state — like the massive Pennsylvania or Texas or somesuch — go first.

It’s Fair to Frontrunners

While the upstarts get a greater chance of success, the frontrunners still have the ball in their court. If they’re deserving of the nomination, they will get to prove it in front of people who are going to analyze what they have to say in greater detail than the rest of the nation. They get the typical frontrunner advantages anyway, in that people are going to be more attracted to their events in the short-run: as long as they can sustain their advantages, then everything should be fine for them. Iowa and New Hampshire let the frontrunner fall — but also stand — on his own merits. Iowa got to see more than just Hillary Clinton’s name ID and compared her side-by-side to Barack Obama. New Hampshire came to the opposite conclusion.

Independents Get a Say

New Hampshire is famous for its independent involvement in the primary. Since, in the fall, the Republican Party is going to have to attract a swarth of swing voters in order to win the general election, it only makes sense to let them have a say. The Republican base in New Hampshire — which is more pragmatic and moderate, anyway — still gives its input, but ultimately, New Hampshire produces candidates that can better appeal to independents. This is an obvious point that’s brought up by most defenders of the primary calendar.

And as commenter Big S points out: “[An] advantage to holding some open primaries is that it allows Republican-leaning Independents to participate, keeping them closer to the party and providing a route by which it may be grown.” Exactly. The primary calendar lets Independents know that the GOP is not a Secret Club, while at the same time not diminishing the base’s say to the point where it doesn’t count for anything significant.

The Base Gets a Say

But the base gets a say, too. South Carolina’s primary is closed and usually produces the victor, anyway. New Hampshire picked John McCain and South Carolina OK’d him. (If no consensus is met after that, then it would all be thrown out the window and, with everyone fairly in the spotlight by then, Mega Primary Day would decide the probable winner.)  Iowa and South Carolina are home to the social conservative base of the Republican Party, and they dominate its electorate at the polls. No one in the current primary calendar gets through without the consent of the Republican Party base. (And yes, John McCain was approved by the base. Activists and the base are not the same thing. John McCain was not approved by activists, but he was indeed approved by the base.)

Organization is Tested

Iowa is a crucial test of who’s got his act together and who’s gliding by on name ID and TV ads. Iowa showed that Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee were putting together solid ground games while Rudy Giuliani was crossing his fingers and hoping that he wouldn’t implode (eventually leading him to all but give up on the state, since Iowa wouldn’t OK his cosmopolitan brand of Republicanism). On caucus day, we see not only which candidates have amassed support, but what they can do with that support. It’s not enough to just have the raw numbers if a solid year-long campaign organization is to be put together.

Raw Support is Tested

But caucuses are not how Election Day in the fall operates. So raw support is tested too, through New Hampshire and South Carolina. Organization counts for plenty there, just like raw support does in Iowa, but one is emphasized over the other in each case. And both matter a lot.

—

Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Mega Primary Day. It works out fine, really. If we dig long enough, I think that we’ll find that the key complaint that most critics of the primary calendar have is that their candidate wasn’t able to get through it.

Hugh Hewitt writes at Townhall that now is the time to fix the Republican Primary Calendar, and that we should demand some plans from the RNC Chairman. That’s true enough. It’s when Hewitt gets around to laying out his plan that I wince. Hewitt theorizes a leftist coup led by Harold Ickes to take over the GOP nominating process is possible and his plan to stop it:

To do so, it needs to mandate that Iowa will caucus on the same day that New Hampshire votes, that New Hampshire will close its primary so that only Republicans so registered by the close of 2011 can cast a ballot, and that two other states will vote on the same day –the state in which John McCain won by the narrowest margin and the state in which he lost by the narrowest count, which would mean Missouri and North Carolina would be invited to vote on the same day as New Hampshire. (This last formula for adding states also conveys to all other states that they might not be locked forever ought of the primaries that count most.)

New Hampshire will scream and moan of course, but so what. Let them move their primary again and again. What matters is that Republicans in large states vote very early in 2012 to dilute any attempt to manipulate the process.

“That which gets rewarded gets repeated” is a saying among compensation experts. Expect “Operation Chaos” to be replicated by the Dems in 2012, and steps need to be taken now to telegraph that such efforts will not work, or at least not as effectively as they might if the old schedule and rules are adhered to.

Is there a problem with Hewitt’s plan? Yes. Most Republican experts think the chief problem with the Republican Primaries is compression and front-loading. That problem is made measurably worse by Hewitt’s plan. Hewitt overestimates the effect of Operation Chaos. While,  the primaries should be closed, I don’t think that’s the main issue.

We need to fix the primary process when it comes to the frontloading and compression because it makes it impossible for a lot of candidates to run. This is why campaigns take so long: because you need to put together a huge war chest in order to even compete in our current process. It takes time to raise that money, and there’s no time after Iowa and New Hampshire to put together a boat load of cash.

That’s why, ultimately, despite the talk about several prospective “fresh faces,” we’re looking at Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, or Mitt Romney as the Republican Nominee. Can Tim Pawlenty get $60 million in cool hard cash behind him? No.  Romney can, Palin probably can (remember the $10 million raised directly after her nomination), Huckabee may not be able to, but his name recognition can help and he’d raise far more than the $16 million he did last time.

If you want a shorter campaign, you do something like the Ohio Plan, the Delaware Plan, or the Rotating regional primaries. Instead, thanks to John McCain, odds are we’re going to have the same misery in 2012. The candidates who are not nationally known outside political circles have zero shot at the Republican nomination. In 1992, Bill Clinton was able to announce his candidacy in November of 1991. Those days are gone. Unless you can raise a ton of money quickly, if you announce in June, the year before the election, you’re probably too late. Most political leaders are unwilling to subject themselves to the grueling process of raising all that money only to find themselves wiped out after a poor finish in Iowa or New Hampshire.

By spreading out the primaries, you’d actually make the pre-campaign shorter (people announcing June-September in 2011 rather than January-March) and less expensive as you’d only need a few million dollars to play and would have some time after the first contests to raise more money before the next ones.

However, thanks to parochial interests, as well as the fact that many people benefit from big bags of cash being necessary to run a campaign, primary reform is an event I consider unlikely to occur anytime soon. In fact, my gut says it will only gets worse and that 2012 will come down to which candidate has “The Big Mo” going into Super Tuesday. The last big state to vote before Super Tuesday will get to crown the winner, “Mr./Mrs. Inevitable” and it’s a title that’ll stick.

Michigan Democrats have agreed to have a revote on June 3rd.

I think this is a good move for Hillary. It improves her odds of winning the popular vote among sanctioned primaries and it also narrows Hillary’s pledged delegate gap. This guarantees Hillary will be campaigning against Obama for the next 4 months.

This re-vote will be privately funded meaning Democrats may have to pay millions of dollars that could have been used in the general election campaign.

McCain wins 9 states.
Romney wins 7 states.
Huckabee wins 5 states.

However, McCain wins CA and MO, the two biggest battlegrounds. He also takes the most winner-take-all states and winds up well ahead of Romney and Huckabee in total delegates after tonight (406 to 151 over Romney according to CNN; 407 to 146 over Romney according to the AP). Huckabee is still well back despite his surprising wins tonight, with 93 (CNN) or 63 (AP) delegates.

Romney has vowed to continue the campaign, as has Huckabee.

The next contests are a caucus in Kansas, a caucus in Washington for partial delegates, and the next step in Louisiana’s crazy primary system, all on 2/9. The next states that people will actually care about are the trifecta of Virginia, Maryland, and DC on the 12th.

At work now- so I can’t hang around, but here are a few quick observations I noticed over the last few days through 12 pm today, when I went and cast my vote. Like I’ve said, I live in East Tennessee, which is the GOP’s strongest region.

• Since yesterday, I’ve received two messages on the answering machine from Mike Huckabee, and one from McCain
• During the Super Bowl, I counted two Obama commercials, a couple for Hillary, and one from Huckabee (the “Christian Leader” one)
• Ron Paul has a ton of signs
• John McCain has almost as many signs up as Paul
• When I was at the voting place, a couple of people openly said “Fred’s still on the ballot? I’m voting for him then.”

I think I stand by my earlier prediction. I’m not a McCain supporter, but it I were, I’d be very confident about his chances here today.