Reform chaotic system of primaries
EDITORIAL
State Journal-Register
January 6, 2008

These are exciting times for many Illinoisans - Democrats and non-Democrats alike - as today finds our own Barack Obama at the head of pack seeking the Democratic nomination for president.

His victory in the Iowa caucuses was all the more thrilling because it was an underdog win over the favored Hillary Clinton.

But why was Obama viewed as the underdog? How did Hillary Clinton become the de facto favorite? Obama, after all, had been a national political star since his famous speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

On the Republican side, why was Mike Huckabee's victory so surprising? It's not as if a governor from Arkansas hasn't won a nomination before. THE ANSWER to these questions gives a hint to the many problems that plague the current presidential primary system, which is in dire need of reform before the 2012 election cycle.

Obama and Huckabee became the underdogs in their races because the media - newspapers, magazines, national television, bloggers and talk radio hosts - had declared them as such. This was a byproduct of a process that, like no election period before it, saw parties and state governments jockeying for a piece of the primary sweepstakes and a chunk of the money that flows into states that have primaries that "matter." As things turned out, in 2008, that means having your state's primary elections on or before Feb. 5, the date on which 22 states including Illinois will hold primaries.

Illinois last year moved its primary from March to February because Democrats here wanted to help Obama. An early primary victory here could help Obama significantly. By March (the primary's original date), Obama already may have wrapped up the nomination, or he could have been eliminated from the race. Either way, a primary that late likely would draw little attention.

THE HAPHAZARD manner in which primary dates are set has produced a system in which the "rules are for all kinds of local and parochial reasons with little or no regard for any sense of an overarching national interest in the decisions which are made," says a concise and compelling analysis by professor John S. Jackson of the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. We strongly suggest a visit to the institute's Web site - www.siu.edu/~ppi - to read the whole paper, which details the extensive financial and electoral problems caused by the current system.

But what draws our attention to Jackson's analysis is its careful outline of several viable alternatives to the current chaotic system.

We believe the country is not well served by a system in which the national media declare a front-runner based solely on the contents of a candidate's war chest, and in which more than half the primary coverage goes to the small and unrepresentative states of Iowa and New Hampshire.

A SYSTEM of regional primaries has always seemed more fair and logical to us. That would allow voters to gradually winnow large fields of candidates on a series of dates in which all the primaries "matter." It also would let the campaigns focus on regions of the country rather than frantically trying to hit states they see as important between now and Super Tuesday. A national primary followed by a runoff is another possibility.

Regardless of the option, we think the parties need to work out a system that avoids a repeat of the long, expensive and sometimes nonsensical process we have seen in recent months. The stakes hardly could be higher.

"The President and the Vice President of the United States are the only two nationally elected officials we have," Jackson writes. "If there has ever existed a national office in the United States, with a national interest attached, it is the nominations and elections for president."

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