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The new front-loaded primary schedule is certain to create chaos for both parties. The idea was to establish the candidate early in order to clear the way for fundraising. The convention becomes a coronation and a pep rally.
The focus on early primary states that characterized previous cycles is probably irrelevant. In the past, the media attempted to turn it into a horse race; national polls mattered little, because the dynamics were formed around Iowa and New Hampshire. The media would trumpet the momentum that the winners of the early primaries garnered, and this in turn would affect the later primaries.
With a front-loaded primary schedule, the momentum factor may become irrelevant. The races are on top of each other, and the voting could be over before the media can shape the horse race. A split convention could be guaranteed for both parties, ironically the very outcome the new schedule was intended to avoid.
How will this affect Democrats?
The Edwards campaign in particular has focused on Iowa and New Hampshire. They hope to turn early victories into momentum. But this is last years strategy, and this time around it might not work. In any other cycle I would assert that Edwards is poised to steal the limelight early and ride the momentum to the nomination. Now I am not so sure.
Illinois announced plans to move up its own primary. They hope to give favorite son Barack Obama a healthy dose of early momentum of his own. This could reinvigorate a campaign that is increasingly seen as flavor-of-last-month.
As far as Clinton is concerned, early polling could prevent another candidate from gaining the momentum to take over the top spot, but the early primary schedule could cost her the nomination in the end because Edwards and Obama will win enough delegates to insure a brokered convention.
Who benefits from a brokered convention? Al Gore. He is the only person who could skip the primary season altogether, and then be offered as a compromise candidate at the convention to almost universal support within the party.
NOTE: The Republicons will probably have their own version of this scenario, but I don't want to discuss how Newt Gingrich wins the GOP nomination.
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