The GOP primary free-for-all

[Giovanni Jones]

It's kind of fun, watching all these states trying to butt into the front of the line to have the earliest caucus/primary.

In reply to:

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[ShinerTX]

Why should Iowa and New Hampshire decide who will be President? Maybe that's why we get old wishy-washy vs. the community agitator.

 

[Joe Fan]

Anyone wanna guess what Jeb Bush's new job will be?


Need a hint? He was called "Mr. Principle"

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Lobbyist!

Cannot make this stuff up

 

[ProdigalHorn]

What needs to happen is that either each primary should be held simultaneously, or their results should be unpublished (which of course wouldn't work because people would blab.)

The current system absolutely works to the advantage of established choices (with probably a few exceptions - I think Santorum won Iowa a couple of elections ago, didn't he?)

 

[NJlonghorn]

What needs to happen is that either each primary should be held simultaneously, or their results should be unpublished (which of course wouldn't work because people would blab.)

The current system absolutely works to the advantage of established choices (with probably a few exceptions - I think Santorum won Iowa a couple of elections ago, didn't he?)

I agree that the system should be changed. I don't think it is fair for the same states to be first every time, and the jockeying for position is ridiculous.

That said, I don't think either of your suggestions is workable. The whole point of staggering primaries is to allow a lesser-known candidate to establish traction on a smaller stage, then build momentum. If the primaries happened all at once, or if the results weren't made known, the leader at the start would always get the nomination.

I think the order of primaries should be either random or rotated. Some thought would have to go into making it fair and workable.

My initial draft -- Divide the states into 10 pools of roughly 54 electoral votes each. Then, randomly choose an order for the pools to have primaries, separated by one week each. Thus, there are 10 equally important primaries per week for roughly 2.5 months. This could run from mid-April to the end of end of June, with conventions following in July.