States rush to move up in 2008 primary calendar

[Ron Burgundy]

Reuters - With California leading the stampede, states are rushing to get more clout in the 2008 White House race by moving their primaries to early February -- a shift that could aid front-runners with big names and big bank accounts.

As many as 20 states with more than half of the country's population have shifted or are considering shifting their presidential primaries to February 5, 2008, right after the states of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina kick off the process in January.

The mass migration would create a virtual national primary that could wrap up the nominating races early and favor well-known candidates with deep pockets who can raise the $75 million to $100 million that strategists think will be needed to contend this cycle.

That would allow top candidates to spend heavily in Iowa and New Hampshire and still have money left over to buy television ads in bigger and more expensive states that might move to February 5 like Florida, Illinois and New Jersey.

For lesser known candidates, the accelerated nominating calendar provides even less opportunity to build momentum through grass roots, face-to-face campaigning.

"The only voters who will get to see these candidates this time are in the four early states. For the rest of the country, it's going to be a general election-style campaign conducted on television and fly-bys," said Kathy Sullivan, chairwoman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party.

States are moving their primary dates in an effort to become more relevant, having grown tired of seeing the races sewn up before they even cast a vote.

The shift follows a general trend toward earlier primaries that began in 1988 with the creation of a big "Super Tuesday" primary cluster in March. Before that, California and a host of other states traditionally concluded the primary season in early June.

"It is a continuation of a process that has been ongoing for the last two decades, but it is coming to a head in 2008," said Cal Jillson, a political analyst at Southern Methodist University in Texas -- another state considering a move to February 5.

'NOT WORKING'

"Ultimately it will produce a process that I think both parties will say is not working and needs to be revised," Jillson said.

California became the biggest state to back a shift to February 5 when the state assembly followed the state senate's lead and voted on Tuesday to move the primary date from June. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a big proponent, says he will sign the measure.

"We want to let the presidential candidates know: don't come out here just fund raising," Schwarzenegger said in a Reuters interview last week. "We're going to move the primary up to February and you've got to go answer those questions from the California people and to me."

At this stage, perhaps three candidates in each party can raise enough money to compete nationwide in the big-market states, analysts say. Democrats Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record) and John Edwards, and Republicans John McCain (news, bio, voting record), Rudolph Giuliani and Mitt Romney could benefit from the calendar changes.

But rather than end the campaign early, some analysts said a splintered February 5 outcome could leave no candidate with enough delegates to clinch the nomination early and actually prolong the race.

"It could have the opposite effect of freezing the race without anyone having enough delegates to win until you get to the convention," said Stephen Wayne, a political scientist at Georgetown University.

source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070308/ts_nm/usa_politics_primaries_dc [link]