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Topic: Why Do Iowa and New Hampshire Get to Decide?
| Author | Message |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 12/17/2007 6:51:14 PM | show profile Here you have two small, white-bread (about 95%) rural states deciding once again who the other 98.5% of the United States gets to choose from, and even then it's a small fraction of their own populations doing the choosing. What sort of democracy is that? And why do both parties fight so hard to keep it that way? |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 12/17/2007 7:04:04 PM | show profile And why does the media build the stakes so high for the decisions of about 1% of the voting population? |
| Mag Girl | Posted – 12/17/2007 7:08:18 PM | show profile I think there needs to be one national primary day established. It has never made sense to me to basically have a handful of states decide the primary or unduly influence the outcome. I am sure they fight hard to keep it that way because it allows them to focus their campaign dollars in very specific areas in the beginning. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 12/17/2007 10:35:24 PM | show profile I don't know why, but frankly it kind of pisses me off. My state is pretty meaningless in the entire process. I have little in common with an Iowan, probably more with a New Hampshireite (??), but why are they so special? It sucks. |
| keltoi | Posted – 12/18/2007 12:34:58 AM | show profile Back when I belonged to one of the major parties, it ticked me off every 4 years when the early states and the media decided we didn't have the right to choose from all the candidates. (Since I became an independent about 15 years ago, I don't have any primary choice with the 2 big parties.) But I agree- it should be one day, one shot, just like the big election day itself. No reason that small a percentage of voters should have the right to disproportionately decide our country's future. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 1/3/2008 1:26:00 PM | show profile So today's the day. The day when about 240,000 Iowans go to a caucus to show their preference for a candidate. No real vote, and even the selected delgates get winnowed out over the coming months. Yep, 240,000 Iowans getting to decide who the roughly 240 MILLION Americans of voting age can choose from. That's 1 person choosing for a thousand. And the media's all over it like it's the stone tablets coming down from Yahweh. Great system. |
| catlondon | Posted – 1/3/2008 2:03:13 PM | show profile Super Tuesday State's rights is why there is no federal day for primary elections or no one-size-fits all driver's license etc. Didn't y'all take civics? And Iowa has a great university system and is a very educated state--so stop with the hayseed generalizations, please. That bigotry grows tired after awhile. You are, after all, talking about people who elect both Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin election after election and you don't much different in outlook than those two. But I digress. Iowa and New Hampshire do nothing more than build or stop momentum. The REAL primary this year is February 5, when more than 20 states representing more than half the electoral college hold their primaries. If you don't like when your state holds its primary, agitate. States can change their primary dates (which many did to raise for this cycle). Get involved instead of just whining. |
| crimedog | Posted – 1/3/2008 2:48:31 PM | show profile They are probably the most engaged populous in the nation. They play close attention to the candidates and take their ballots seriously. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 1/3/2008 3:04:11 PM | show profile Not calling them hayseed, cat, but a predominantly rural population that's 96% white is not what I'd call representative of the US of A. Got nothing against Iowa or NH, just have a problem with a tiny non-representative group of folks taking candidates out of the voting process (aided and abbetted by the media) before the rest of the country has a chance to decide for themselves. And some states DID try to move up their primaries this year (Michigan and Flordia come to mind), and the political parties smacked them down. |
| Cyrus | Posted – 1/3/2008 3:31:39 PM | show profile They don't really decide anything; they're covered so much because they serve as the kickoff for the season and because they serve as a sort of litmus test to the "dark horse" candidates. The theory is if they do very poorly in those contests, they'll have so much trouble raising money and being seen as a viable candidate that it won't be worth it. He's not saying it now, but candidates like Bill Richardson -- who I actually think has excellent credentials -- is probably watching them very closely, even though he's sketched out plans for when the primaries move west where he'll certainly do better. So while NH and Iowa are relatively unimportant when it comes to the general election and their small number of electoral votes, in the primary season, it's something different. In reality, candidates that do poorly in the beginning probably wouldn't be chosen by a ton of other people across the country, even if they kept going, converted to a third-party nominee, etc. Ross Perot was a perfect example of that. ------ Cyrus Afzali Astoria Communications www.astoriacomm.com |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 1/3/2008 3:41:33 PM | show profile There could be a number of reasons a candidate does poorly in the first few states, yet that doesn't make him or her less viable down the road in other regions (as you noted with Bill Richardson). I think part of the reason these small contests play so huge is that the media is quick to place undue importance on them, and secondly quick to crown king (or queen) to the lead few, creating a bit of self-fulfilling prophecy as the months go by as it dismisses the also-rans. The media already has done so to a degree with its horserace mentality, selecting a lead three or so in each party and all but delegating the remainder to obscurity, whch also becomes self-fulfilling. |
| catlondon | Posted – 1/3/2008 3:43:44 PM | show profile And just because the media doesn't pay attention doesn't mean a candidate won't gain traction. Just witness Ron Paul, whose support comes from outside Iowa, but he is able to use the Iowa caucus to promote a wider campaign. Anyway, the system people should demand is dismantled is the electoral college. A popular vote should suffice for a democracy. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 1/3/2008 3:50:54 PM | show profile I agree on dismantling the electoral college, cat. I believe the original intent was because the Founding Fathers didn't quite trust the wisdom of the masses, and there are many today who still don't. That may also be the reason the FFs founded a democratic Republic, but avoided a true democracy. See--I did study my civics. ;-) |
| catlondon | Posted – 1/3/2008 4:14:32 PM | show profile Keltoi you get an A+ today. Many of the founding fathers also had slaves and we did away with that institution, so I don't see why we can't flush the electoral college, too. I don't even think we'd need to wage a war to do it--we'd just have to suffer through a mind-numbing number of political blowhards going on and on about it on cable TV for months on end and then we'll want to kill ourselves anyway. Much like the primaries! |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 1/3/2008 10:30:59 PM | show profile So something like 60% of republican voters in Iowa considered themselves evangelicals and, surprise surrpise Huckabee wins. Nice to see a close race on the Democratic side. |
| keltoi | Posted – 1/3/2008 11:21:28 PM | show profile 60% evangelicals. Ah. Truly representative of the US population. |
| crimedog | Posted – 1/3/2008 11:38:54 PM | show profile Huckabee's win is a blow to the party. We can only hope he wins in New Hampshire and North Carolina. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 1/4/2008 9:58:02 AM | show profile Well, a handful of Iowans managed to convince Dodd and Biden to bail. Two less to choose from. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 1/4/2008 10:07:41 AM | show profile The fact that Obama can win in a rural white state makes me feel a little more hopeful for this country though. |
| catlondon | Posted – 1/4/2008 12:09:40 PM | show profile "The fact that Obama can win in a rural white state makes me feel a little more hopeful for this country though." Because everyone in a rural white states is racist? |
| Olbypocrisy | Posted – 1/4/2008 12:36:04 PM | show profile The fact that Obama can win in a rural white state makes me feel a little more hopeful for this country though. Wow!!Liberals and their stereotypes .Did you forget about Jesse Jackson?? |
| catlondon | Posted – 1/4/2008 12:56:48 PM | show profile Sorry to disabuse you, but it's not a liberal stereotype, it's a coast vs flyover country stereotype and coasters (East and West) are both guilty of it. I've lived East, West, and Mid-West (in each for more than 4 years) and that's been my experience--people think that Iowans (Minnesotans, North Dakotans, you name it) are born on the farm and, except for the occasional foray to Mall of America, never leave it. Oblywhatever-- you might want to take your one-note, ad hominem argument back to the TV News section. |
| Olbypocrisy | Posted – 1/4/2008 1:28:15 PM | show profile What does that have to do with" Obama can win in a rural white state"????? Your saying whites won't vote for a black person. That is a liberal stereotype.Watch ABC,CBS, Hardball and CNN.Libs are really worried about this. You forget Jesse Jackson won almost all of the southern states.He was black.He got lots of white voters. So why would anyone be suprised that a black person can win a rural white state??? |
| crimedog | Posted – 1/4/2008 1:49:59 PM | show profile There you go folks - a nice injection of the Olby venom. |
| catlondon | Posted – 1/4/2008 3:27:51 PM | show profile Olbypocrisy Posted ? 1/4/2008 8:54:49 AM | show profile It will be something to watch.I want to see how racist Democrats and liberals vote.I bet they won't vote for Obama. Guess you lost your bet. |
