Listen to Lamar...
...and Reform the Presidential Primaries
As the Scene staff sat around on election day, mulling the latest Zogby poll that forecast the inevitable results—namely, that John Kerry is an unstoppable force, by virtue of his, yes, momentum—we got to thinking that this whole presidential primary stuff needs to be reformed.
Our thinking is this: One week before the Iowa caucus, John Kerry was nothing more than a political asterisk. Out of nowhere, he started polling well and pulled off a surprising caucus win. From there, we’ve seen nothing but irrational political exuberance attach to his campaign. Kerry is now 12 for 14, not because he has won the Super Bowl of politics but because the Super Bowl is being held in the preseason.
Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander had it right earlier this month when he stood on the Senate floor and offered his humble opinion about how to improve the process (which, mind you, we would favor even if our candidate, John Edwards, were doing better). “The NFL schedules 20 weeks of contests over five months to determine its champion,” Alexander said. “The presidential nominating process uses the equivalent of two preseason games in Iowa and New Hampshire to narrow the field to two or three—and sometimes pick the winner.”
After a little more rambling about the NFL’s scheduling history, which had the added benefit of showing off the piano-playing Alexander’s range of interests, the state’s junior senator went on to say this: “Every September, the NFL fields 32 teams, almost all with a shot at the playoffs. Every four years, the presidential nominating process does well to attract a half-dozen credible candidates for the biggest job in the world—and all but half are effectively eliminated after two contests. If professional football were presidential politics, Sportscenter would pick the Super Bowl teams after three or four preseason games.”
Alexander, who has twice been a presidential contender, proposes the following fixes: First, allow candidates to accept up to $10,000 a pop in individual contributions until they reach $10 million raised. He argues that today’s $2,000 limit makes it impossible to assemble the cash needed to run a presidential race. “The Packers would never make it into the playoffs under the revenue rules of presidential primaries,” he says.
Second, and most importantly, Alexander proposes to spread out the primaries so as to minimize the influence of the Big Mo. This would allow voters in individual states to get to know the candidates and maximize the ability of the candidates to make distinctions among themselves. “Twenty-eight primaries are crammed into five weeks after New Hampshire,” Alexander says. “Congress should assume the role of Paul Tagliabue. Create a window between February and May during which primaries may be held every two weeks. Iowa and New Hampshire can still come first, but they would become off-Broadway warm-ups and not the whole show.”
Under the Alexander scenario, democracy gets a better hearing. Candidates would have the resources to stay alive for at least several months. With the primaries spaced out, they would have the opportunity to present themselves in a meaningful way. And for those of us who love watching this great chase, we would get to stay tuned not just for weeks but months.
This nominating cycle was effectively over after Iowa and New Hampshire, which is a travesty. Entrusting the naming of the leader of the free world to two otherwise insignificant states is mindless. Let 15 or 20 other states join the lineup and then we will have rationally arrived at a candidate.
