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Calendar Calisthenics
12-07-2009 An item over the weekend reminds us that for some national politicos, it is already time to start tinkering with the schedule for the 2012 presidential primary cycle. In this case, it is the Democratic National Committee hoping to avoid a reprise of the chaos and rancor that characterized the scheduling process in 2008.
Three key questions come to mind immediately. First, if (as the reporting suggests) Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina maintain their early positions outside of the contest window, will there be any attempt to reshuffle the order, particularly between New Hampshire and Nevada? Second, will the DNC be able to move the entire cycle back (February 1st is mentioned), so that the early contests don’t all occur shortly after New Year's Day? Third, can the DNC come up with an attractive incentive scheme to reverse the frontloading trend and spread the primaries and caucuses back out of bit?
The idea of regional groupings (usually mentioned in conjunction with rotation) has been kicking around for some time now. It is typically pitched as a means of instilling greater fairness between the states, and as a way to get Iowa and New Hampshire out of the lead-off slots. This current DNC proposal, however, seems to suggest that the groupings would not affect the pre-window states.
I must say that I am generally skeptical of the national parties’ ability to incentivize state-level scheduling behavior in a coherent and sustained fashion. But perhaps all of the key players were sufficiently chastened by the last cycle’s conflict to act with greater cohesion the next time around. Having an incumbent president running for reelection may also stabilize the process, at least for Democrats. Comments: Posted On: 12-08-2009 21:44:28 by Jim Splaine
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