Poll: 63% Think Long Primary Hurt The Democrats
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Democrats, Hillary, History, PollsThat’s the latest from CBS News:
Sixty-three percent of all voters - including more than half of Democratic primary voters - say the length of the Democratic primary battle has hurt the Democratic nominee’s chances. Just 27 percent say it has helped the nominee’s cause.
But the solution to this seems a bit nutty…
Roughly two-thirds of Democratic primary voters think there is a better way: to have a single national primary day instead of the current, staggered timeline.
It’s over in one fell swoop? I’m not really a big fan of that. The one silver lining to all of this is that the candidates visited nearly every single state and territory in the union, and that’s definitely a positive thing. It may not result in party unity, but it was certainly good for democracy and the economies of all the states involved.
Also, a single primary day could result in a huge mess. Because it wouldn’t be just between two candidates, right? CBS didn’t detail what they meant by a single primary day, but imagine 7 different candidates splitting up the delegate pie. Sure, you’d have probably two people vying for a majority and then somebody in a close third and then a bunch of people wrestling for fourth, fifth, etc., but would anybody get the delegates they’d need to clinch? Highly, highly doubtful. What it would result in is a guaranteed fight at the convention. I mean, maybe I’m not fully getting this idea, but it doesn’t seem like a good one.
And sure, this would cut down on all the media coverage and spin and nonsense we see on the campaign trail, but part of that is definitely practice for what a candidate will face when he or she is in the Oval Office. As maddening as the process is, that experience campaigning shouldn’t be discounted.
This entry was posted on Thursday, June 5th, 2008 and is filed under 2008 Election, Barack, Democrats, Hillary, History, Polls. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
June 5th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Justin,
I absolutely agree with your skepticism about the results of this poll. It’s too soon to look back on it objectively and once we’re fully involved in the general election I don’t believe it will be too much of a factor.
Maybe to the contrary, because just think how much more damaging it would’ve been if the GOP were bringing out all of these controversies for the first time! When Hillary’s best argument was that she was fully vetted as a candidate, how ironic is it that she served to make sure that has su been done for Mr. Obama. Now whether or not it has been completely done is the question.
June 6th, 2008 at 2:19 am
How to a run a single national primary:
1) National Primary
2) Anyone Below 20% is cut
3) Another month of campaigning
4) Survivors do a run-off
5) Anyone below 35% is cut
6) another month of campaigning
7) Final Primary Run-Off
Of course, small states get fucked her but the people who support national primary day are lame.
Also, no way in hell can I read the CAPTCHA.
June 6th, 2008 at 6:57 am
2/3 of the people think it hurt democrats,. but are they right? Or do so many folks think that simply because it’s been obsessed about since March.
A national primary day is not going to happen for the same reason that cat herder is not a job. There’s no good mechanism to get every state to toe some national line. If you son’t belive me, then why not start this national primary effort by finding out where NH and Iowa stand ion the issue. Dp=on’t expect a warm welcome.
Fortunately, the fact that it won’t happen is a good thing. That we choose our final candidates via a slow, long, gradual weeding-out process is sensible.
IMO, the people who want a national primary day are idiots in addition to being pipedreamers. And while this suggests that 2/3 of democratic voters are idiots, that’s probably not the case. I think most folks just haven’t thought it through. The only folks who are true idiots are those who have thought it through and explored both the dynamics of how possible it is (IOW isn’t) and the adverse effects of such a change, and are still for it.