Bell Curve The Law Talking Guy Raised by Republicans U.S. West
Well, he's kind of had it in for me ever since I accidentally ran over his dog. Actually, replace "accidentally" with "repeatedly," and replace "dog" with "son."

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

Primary Reform

Making the most of my temporary web access... The LA Times reports that the Democratic party leadership is strongly considering adding "additional contests" between the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary. It's not clear whether these would be caucuses or primaries, or whether any delegates would be at stake--nor is it clear what the Republicans will do. Still, I applaud this discussion hope they improve the current system.

We could use some primary reform! Last year, the schedule was compressed so much in February and March that the Presidential nomination contest still was over by the time CA voted in late March. (California's primary has now been moved back to June, since moving it earlier made no difference.) After that rush, we then had to endure months and months of a marathon campaign between Bush and Kerry.

And the regional balance is questionable too... several Democratic candidates won different state primaries--Clark won Oklahoma (albeit by a hair), Edwards won one of the Carolinas (I forget which), Dean won Vermont (duh)--but Kerry won Iowa's caucus first and that pretty much what sealed the deal. Imagine if South Carolina or Vermont had been first? Or California?

Do The Citizens agree that we could use some change in the primary system? Do The Citizens have any suggestions on Primary reforms? I'll start off with a few suggestions:

(a) To condense the Presidential campaign season, let's shift all the primaries forward to May, June and July.

(b) To enhance the democratic process, let's get rid of caucuses and change all state contests to primaries. Political parties would still be free to have superdelegates and to interpret the results of contests and assign delegates as they like.

(c) To allow all Americans a more even chance at having a say in the presidency, let's have a bi- or multi-partisan committee determine all primary dates 8 or 10 years in advance, like the Olympics do--in this case, to give some relaxation time between recent politics and future contests. This will also ensure that all party primaries in a single state happen on the same day (saves election costs.) We can divide the states into regions (maybe the Federal circuit court districts) and have some form of randomized choosing from a balanced regional palate. Something like that... giving all states a chance to have the first say, while maintaining the rolling system (which allows for state-by-state campaigning, which I suspect is less expensive for newbies.)

(d) If any of this requires writing political parties into the U.S. constitution, so be it. Leaving slavery out didn't make that issue go away either.

(e) While we're at it, let's fix the public financing law. Last year, both Kerry and Bush opted out of it--showing how the law is rather useless.

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

I absolutely agree that no primaries or caucuses should take place before May. There's no reason for it. It's expensive, and the primary gets decided on issues that become irrelevant in the general election.

As for timing the primaries, there are no great solutions. You can't both have a rolling system and avoid privileging the region or state that goes first. Compressed schedules are as bad as drawn-out ones, for different reasons.

I recommend ditching the whole system. Ditch the electoral college, for one, so we stop valuing cows over people. Repeat the process for primary elections, insofar as we stop having a "winner take all system" and award delegates proportional to votes. Then have a real brokered convventionin July. 

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

If we ditched the electoral college (which will NEVER happen), I'd favor a Presidential electoral system like France has. France has a two stage election in which everyone can run in the first stage but the second stage is limited to the top two vote getters.

As for reforming the primary system we're probably more or less stuck with...I'd be all for deemphasizing small states like Iowa and New Hampshire. The only argument for front loading small states is that because they are cheaper to campaign in, you open things up to the candidates with less money. But the money lines up so much so early (even before Iowa) that I'm no longer a fan of this argument.

We have to remember that the primaries are NOT national elections. They are party affairs and so having a bi- multi- or even "fantasy/non-" partisan commission decide when and how to hold them would probably be a gross violation of the parties' rights.

That said, from the parties' point of view, they want the primaries to produce the candidate with the best chance to beat the other party. So you would think they would want the primary system to emphasize those states that are most reprsentative.

Iowa is a big deal and a much bigger deal than it deserves to be but the fact is that Iowa votes about 50-50. The real scandal is Super Tuesday which forces candidates' campaigns to live or die by how many votes they get in the South which is as solidly right wing as it ever was. 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

I agree with RBR. I like the French system because it is simple and clear. Furthermore, it forces candidates to canvas the whole country, something a bit easier to do in a country the size of France, and gives all parties a fairly equal shot.

I also like it because it is like a blanket primary. California tried to have a completely open primary, which is the most democratic you can get, and it was challenged by the main parites. They won because the US Supreme Court said it was a violation of the fist amendment right of assembly. But these types of primiaries may give 3rd parties a chance. But we've had this conversation before- back in the last elections we beat this horse to death. 

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

Insofar as reforming the primaries, I agree with RBR's point that these are party affairs. As such, I don't _really_ care what the Republicans do with their primaries, I only care how the Democrats decide their candidate. Of course, if the Republicans choose their candidate first, they have that much more time to campaign with the support of the whole party machinery...ah, I begin to see the problem. :)

Two comments:
-- my understanding is that the importance of the Iowa caucus is a relatively recent phenomenon, with Jimmy Carter's surprise success in Iowa and beyond. Though the world of elections is completely different now, there's nothing to say it won't be completely different again in a couple of election cycles, and the primary schedule may shift later as a result.

-- any global changes in primaries are fine with me, if they are steps toward using a better voting method. (I like Condorcet, but I'm not picky.) Of course, the problem of rampant strategic insincere voting is not as threatening to the parties as a fairer playing field for third parties and independents. So any reforms _I_ think are a good idea are probably doomed. 

// posted by Bob

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure why RBR thinks a change in the electoral college will never happen. Sure, it hasn't happened in 200 years, but that's no reason. Direct election of senators was really a bigger deal (it stripped state governments of direct representation in Washington). The electoral college has the bizarre effect of focusing politicians only on states that happen to have a very divided public, particularly the winner-take-all system. There have been moves to change that last aspect, at least. 

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

Primary elections are very much a creature of US politics, largely unknown elsewhere. They are a result of the 1960s and early 1970s, when the parties were shifting (i.e., solid south went from Dem to Rep). The Democrats really led the change because that party was beset by problems. There was the calamity of the 1968 Democratic convention, frustration with machine politics in Chicago in particular. But a huge part in the change was the refusal of Southern states to allow blacks to participate. At the 60 and 64 conventions, some southern states sent two delegations. Primaries and voting rights went hand in hand.

Those days are over. There seems to be no reason why the parties couldn't choose candidates like every European country does - by the party in a smoke-filled room. However, there is a (not crazy) belief that a primary will choose a more electable candidate than a party convention.

There's the issue alluded to above by RBR and others. The more the selection process is geared towards party insiders, the theory goes, the more likely they are to choose an extreme or unelectable candidate. Open primaries get the broadest public input by allowing the crucial independents to weigh in. States where the parties hold separate primaries are skewed toward party activists.  

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

I think it will never happen because more states benefit from it (i.e. rural states who only get any attention at all because the electoral college inflates their influence on Presidential outcomes) than are needed to block an amendment to the Constitution. 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure I agree, RBR. Most rural states just vote solidly Republican. The small ones get no attention unless they are swing states. It would be different if every vote were "in play." Only a handful of very tiny states get a large enough vote jump with the 2 extra votes (HR+2=E) for it to seem to matter. If the EC were abolished, Bush would try to increase turnout in those small states.  

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

The question isn't whether you think they benefit from having their influence exagerated in the electoral college. The question is whether their state legislators think the benefit.

It is undeniable that states like Montana or Rhode Island (not rural but very small) have more influence on the presidential elections than their population warrents. And that that exageration is due to the electoral college and would be eliminated if we abolished that system.

The Constitution is intentionally designed to give small, sparsely populated states a blocking power on amendments. They'd use it to keep the electoral college.  

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

RBR writes: "The question isn't whether you think they benefit from having their influence exaggerated in the electoral college. The question is whether their state legislators think the benefit."

Interesting. This doesn't sound like a game theorist to me. =) 

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

Game theory is NOT about assuming that your perceptions hold for everyone. It is about trying to identify your subject's perspective and putting yourself in their shoes.

The best use of game theory is based on empathy verified by evidence. 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

Okay, but if we establish, as I think we can, that the extreme bias of the EC in favor of swing states damages interests of small solid-column states, and far outweighs the minor arithmetic advantage in EC voting, then I assume you will calculate your model based on that objective fact, not the subjective misperception of legislators. If the perceptions of legislators is the key, not the truth of the matter, then it seems we'll be in for a lot more "framing" and "psychological motivation" than we're used to. 

// posted by LTG

Dr. Strangelove said...

A little recap... I'd proposed 3 changes to the primary system:

(a) Shift all primaries forward to May, June and July.

(b) Change all state contests to primaries

(c) Use some random/bi-partisan process to determine a new rolling order for each primary election cycle.

LTG agreed with (a), but then went on to suggest (as did RxR and USWest) that we get rid of the rolling primary system entirely. I was surprised to see this. Do you think this is a widely held belief? If so, is it more of a liberal or conservative one--or doesn't it break along those lines?

Incidentally, Bob said global primary reforms were good if they led toward a more sophisticated method of voting (e.g. Condorcet method or instant runoff or preference voting). I agree... and I think we've discussed that before on another post at length. But glad to hear Bob fighting the good fight, still :-)

LTG mentioned that, "Only a handful of very tiny states get a large enough vote jump with the 2 extra votes (HR+2=E)..." but I think he may understate the fairness issue. Eight states have 3 electoral votes (incl. D.C.), meaning their presidential voting power is nearly tripled, another five states have 4 electoral votes (nearly doubled), and another five have 5 electoral votes (2/3 increase.)

Anonymous said...

Rejection by 13 states blocks a Constitutional amendment. Thanks to Dr. Strangelove I can count 17 states with substantial over respresentation in the EC. That gives the pro-Status Quo crowd (of which I am not a member in this case), 4 states to give and still win. That's what I was thinking of when I said it would never happen.  

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

Dr. S is sort of right, but he knows that his calculations need to be more complicated. For every state, HR+2=E. The question is, for each state, how much does the ratio HR+2/538 differ from HR/435. So it's not quite doubling and tripling to get 2 extra EV. For example, CA: 12.1% v. 10.2% For Wyoming (one HR) 0.22% vs .55% (about 2.5x). In other words, though, the increase is from diddly to squat. But the change in influence  between a swing state (e.g. WV - 5 EV) and a non-swing state is huge. WV is courted. Alaska is not. 

// posted by LTG

Dr. Strangelove said...

LTG is rioght about swing states. My point about the EV was mostly fairness, not influence. But then, that's why I hate the electoral college as a whole, for a hundred reasons ;-)