It's time to make presidential primaries more representative

[Geee]

Washington Examiner:


Once again, Americans are going through the motions of pretending that the Iowa caucuses are crucial to the presidential nomination process. Iowa is currently treated with reverence as a proving ground -- a place where candidates can demonstrate their organizational might. But this is inaccurate. Iowa is a place where candidates demonstrate their Iowa organization -- their ability to hire the right Iowa consultants, donate and make promises to the right Iowa state and local politicians, stop at the right Iowa restaurants and eat the right Iowa meals in the right Iowa towns, and support Iowa issues like the ethanol scam.

The winner in next week's caucuses will prove that he knows how to win the allegiance of Republican voters in a small state that did not even support the Republican nominee in 2008. A week later, followers of the political process will perform a similar act of self-deception as they watch for results in New Hampshire's first-in-the nation primary.

The current staggered primary process -- which gives undue weight to a few small states over Ohio, Virginia and Texas, and which makes South Carolina infinitely more important than North Carolina -- is an outmoded anachronism. It mightily benefits professional political consultants, but it brings a host of negative unintended consequences. It has, for example, precipitated a regrettable race to the front of the calendar, which in turn has lengthened presidential campaigns considerably. Not only is there hardly time to govern before the politicking begins anew, but the grueling, 20-month schedule has discouraged the best and brightest in the GOP field from participating for two cycles running.

[Valin]

How many times have I read this fpr the last 35 years?