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Primary perplexities

By Herbert Klein
March 24, 2008

As the "grand" experiment in early primaries rolls on toward Pennsylvania, it is time for the nation's political parties to reassess the value of this radical change in American elections.

In my opinion, early primaries create more confusion than clarity for the scrutiny of presidential candidates.

The early primaries succeeded in but one category. They have brought out increased turnouts in Democratic elections and have gained interest among young people. Most of that, however, can be credited to the youth surge behind Barack Obama.

It seems logical the Obama surge would have occurred with late primaries or early ones. The surge was boosted by Mr. Obama's oratory and personality.

As for other factors, early primaries have had a negative effect on voter understanding of the issues in this presidential race. The multiple debates, a product of early primaries, have focused more on oratory and side issues rather than major matters. Debates have become so frequent that interest in them has diminished.

The pundits predicted that the party nominees would be determined on "Super Tuesday" in February. That did not happen in either party. The eventual Republican nominee, John McCain, was labeled "dead in the water" after the first caucus in Iowa. He surprised the media with a comeback election in the New Hampshire. Then came "Super Tuesday" where the results in both parties were mixed.

The early primaries have made the 2008 election process the most expensive in history. More money has been raised and spent on primary elections than has been spent on previous general elections.

Other than technical differences between the health plans of Hillary Clinton and Mr. Obama, there have been no thorough discussions of major national issues. Iraq troop withdrawals have been mentioned, but the debate has centered more on dates than the merit of withdrawal. There has been no detailed focus on the effect that the timing of a withdrawal will have on the entire Middle East. The economy gained little attention on "Super Tuesday" and has become a major subject only recently.

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