Primary

[Kyouryuu]

X-posted from my journal...

A few weeks ago, I talked about my annoyance with the primary voting process. For those unfamiliar with how it works, the Republicans and the Democrats hold primary elections prior to the big one in November of next year. These primaries are designed to determine who will earn the nomination of the party. For example, in the Democratic party, you have Clinton, Obama, Edwards, Richardson, and so on. After the primary, the one with the most votes is generally the one who will be the Democratic candidate for President. Same for the Republicans.

Now, the need to ferret out who should be the frontrunner is plausible, I guess. Each party only has so much money and so much focus.

No, my problem is how certain states get to vote first and, therefore, decide the President before anyone else gets to.

Iowa and New Hampshire are the targets for this. Many of the candidates, especially Romney and Obama, are off campaigning only in these two states, trying to win over their populace. The pundits are already prognosticating - whoever takes Iowa and New Hampshire will surely take the nomination. Then, you have us over here in Washington... our votes essentially don't count because our primaries come long after Iowa voted for us. I don't like John Kerry and yet because of these early states, that's who we got stuck with in 2004. They made the decision for us.

So, you have this race where states try to have their primaries first. This has gotten to the point where the first primary will be held in January, a scant three months away.

The whole thing is absurd. I, for one, don't want Iowa and New Hampshire determining the fate of our country. Nor should any state have that capacity of speaking for any other. Why can't we hold these primaries on the same day for both parties? What is the point of spreading it out?

[Munk]

You can only vote someone who is nominated.
Thats as simple as it is.

I guess in each party there is always a high hierarcy of candidates which have to be passed before final nomination.
The process of pre-nomination is simply determined by the organisation paying for candidacy

[Sedwick]

They probably feel New Hampshirians and Iowans are more intelligent and enlightened and thus more trustworthy of such an important decision

[Ford Prefect]

If in doubt as to how it all works and why, try reading Fear And Loathing On The Campaign Trail '72 by the late, great Hunter S. Thompson. The best explanation of how the American Election process works ever.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear_and_L ... _Trail_'72