This got too long to include on the main page Iowa Caucus thread. I hope it's OK to put it here.
The goal of the nominating process is twofold. First you want the candidate that can deliver the most number of votes come November and second you want someone who will follow democratic party platform guidelines. You want to win and you don't want to nominate some Bush in sheep's clothing.
We are hiring a spokesperson for our platform. They can pick and choose pick aspects of our platform that they wish to emphasize, but they have to be able to articulate support for all aspects of our platform and of course be able to expand on them particularly in regards to specific audiences. That platform is the topic of another essay. Good candidates do not have creative solutions to the world's problems. They are salesmen for our values and our issues. All issues are our issues. Let the party build the platform (with our collective kosopean wisdom) and let the candidate sell it to the people.
Now I don't like the idea of splitting the country into sectors or demographics or states or anything like that. I don't like Iowans getting a larger say, I don't like Hispanics or Unions or whoever getting a larger say, I don't like white CEO's getting a larger say. One person, one vote when it comes to elections. If you want influence, help create the platform. The salesperson must sell it to everyone. And they must get the most votes from everywhere.
So what we have here is a contest of who can articulate the platform the best, putting their own personality into it. There is not much room for negativity in this contest. It's about being the best salesperson. Being a bad salesperson is self-evident. Gore can't attack Bradley; Dean can't attack Gephart. There is no point, because both competitors are not arguing about who is right, they argue about who can represent the platform the best. And you don't argue that, you demonstrate that you are better.
So to get in the game you have to raise a certain amount of money for the makers of the platform, the Democratic Party however it exists, by an early date. From there we have a group of individuals who are the candidates. Their job is to go out and sell the Democratic Platform. Proof that they sold that platform is returned in votes and donations by individuals to the platform in the candidate's name, but not for their individual absolute use. If Howard Dean convinces me to give money, I don't want it to go to waste when he is not nominated. I want to have my money go through Howard Dean, because I feel he best articulates my interpretation of the platform, but really my money should help advertise the party platform ultimately.
The primaries and caucuses are pretend elections. They are there only to demonstrate that one candidate can accomplish certain tasks better than someone else. It's like reality TV and its absolute unreality. What do we want to test of our candidates? First of all, we must leave dirty and negative aspects of campaigning to surrogates. We do want to test ability to face negative aspects, but we'll get to that.
1) face to face baby kissing
2) medium crowd energizing- in person and on TV
3) large crowd orating- in person and on TV
4) face to face with citizen hecklers
5) speaking to a moderate to hostile crowd
6) face to face with opposing negative surrogates on TV
Now these are somewhat touched on by the current primary system. By going to small states first and engaging in debates, these skills vaguely show themselves. But we have to be more scientific about it. The Democratic Party, using the buy-in money from the candidates can set all of these up. Imagine a pre-convention convention where the candidates all give their best Obama or Clinton "hope" speech in front of a huge crowd. Pick the talking head least repulsive to us but still nasty and have all the candidates take their shot. Have the candidates speak passionately and compassionately in front of crowds for a Beat Breast Cancer drive. Have "debates" where the candidates all present the same message in their own personal way- an hour and a half infomercial for the Democratic Party. Can you imagine a commercial paid for by the Democratic Party for all the candidates, pointing out individual strengths and accomplishments? This is what we've got to do.
We don't let the candidates set their own agendas. Or at least we forced them to go where we want them to quite a bit, paid for them to get there, and given them an opportunity to speak over and over. The media would love this. The debate in the media would be what we want- is Carol Mosely-Braun a better speaker than Wesley Clark?- discuss. The message of the Democratic Party Platform is assumed to be true, correct and becomes conventional wisdom.
So we've conducted our tests of the candidates and now it's time to find out who won. Randomly pick three states to start us off. How beautiful would that be? The candidates better be up on all the issues (that means how the Platform affects individuals in different places) because this year we have Rhode Island, Texas and Alaska. The primaries are in two weeks. This will test local war room organization and reduce costs tremendously- a national race but the national part controlled by the party and no time to piss off voters with expensive local saturation advertising.
Give the media a week to digest the results- then have another random sample of five or six states. This would continue until all the states are done. No depressing dropping out. No competing for endorsements- (the party platform is all-powerful). Few negative ads. It's a six month product placement-filled contest with the product being the Democratic Party Platform. And then guess what, we bring back the runners-up for a fantastic reunion on the convention floor. We can also judge which candidates do better in different places and send them there during the general election.
I think the legistics of the random primaries, voting booths and all that might be a little tricky but try this on for size- the Democratic Party can buy their own damn voting booths and donate them to the localities for the general election. Set up our own voting system! Diebold can go to hell.
My last thought is how this would look against the Republicans doing it their old way. Is it to radical or desperate? We'd definitely make sure Jim Lehrer took the role of Ryan Seacrest. We don't want text-messaged votes. The random selection of the states would be the main gimmick that would need explaining. The rest could be done quietly- the buy-in for the candidates, the different speaking venues set up by the larger party. Actually I'm not sure about the legalities of campaign funds being controlled to a large degree from above but I'm an idea man, not bogged down by those details. The important part is to select a salesperson of the Platform- a Platform we can hammer together here or in smoke filled rooms or anywhere you want.
