Should the Conventions Matter Once Again?

Iowa is a state made up mostly of white Protestant farmers who raise pigs and cows and grow corn, soybeans and oats. It produces more federally subsidized ethanol than any other state - contributing much pollution runoff that ends up in the Mississippi River and causes a Dead Zone in the Gulf of Mexico.

Des Moines, the state capital, is also full of insurance salesmen. With a population of only 2.9 million people, the state has just seven electoral votes - two less than Alabama.

Is that the kind of people we want making one of the most important early decisions about who will serve as president of the United States for the next four or eight years?

The Iowa caucus vaulted to the head of the political line in the U.S. presidential nomination process in 1972, thanks to a series of articles in the New York Times, according to Wikipedia.

Democratic operative Norma S. Matthews, Iowa co-chair of the George McGovern campaign, is credited with engineering the early January start for Iowa, as the story goes. McGovern finished second to Edmund Muskie in the first early "Hawkeye state" caucus, giving him the momentum to win the Democratic Party's nomination for president in Miami later in the summer.

But that first famous caucus was held on January 24, not Jan. 3 as it will be this year just two days after the New Year's Day holiday.

In 1976, Jimmy Carter used his second place finish in Iowa to propel his dark horse candidacy into a win in the New Hampshire primary and ultimately the party's nomination for president. The Republicans also made the caucus important in 1976, and since then, presidential candidates have increased their focus on winning the little Iowa caucus.

In the months leading up to the 2004 caucus, predictions showed candidates Dick Gephardt and Howard Dean neck-and-neck for first place, with John Kerry and John Edwards far behind. Negative campaign ads attacking each other by the two front runners soured the voters on the leaders, however. With Gephardt's presidential hopes dashed and Dean's badly battered, Sen. John Kerry reportedly put all his remaining money in Iowa and swung voters towards him. A strong showing by Sen. John Edwards propelled him into the vice presidential slot, but the ticket ended up not being strong enough to blow away George W. Bush's bid for a second disastrous term.

This year, with other states moving their party priimaries up to Feb. 5, Iowa did not want to relinquish its importance in the process and moved its caucus to Jan. 3.

And for the past month, the two Democratic Party front runners, Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, have been forced to fight it out on the ground in Iowa and largely ignore their important duties on the U.S. Senate floor. Obama has been attacked for missing votes, and well he should be, since only Sen. Chris Dodd showed up of all the candidates to fight a measure to grant immunity to the telecom giants for their role in illegally spying on Americans.

Where do the Democratic Party's front runners stand on that issue? Voters may never know - thanks to the people of Iowa's interest in the nativity and distaste in campaign negativity.

Even National Public Radio has questioned the wisdom of this.

NPR: History May Not Help Figure Out Iowa

Most party insiders and media pundits believe the presidential race will be over on Feb. 5 due to the winner take all nature of the delegate system. So, what are the campaigns supposed to do from February to November? That would be the longest political campaign in the history of democracy, and it is likely that the public will grow so sick of it that more and more will not participate in the process. And which party do you think benefits from lower public participation? You guessed it. The corporate and Christian Republicans.

Personally, I hope the early caucuses and primaries result in ties all around, so that the party fight continues into the summer. Wouldn't it be nice to see the party nominating conventions matter once again?

Due to changes in election laws and the manner in which political campaigns have been run since 1972, the conventions have virtually abdicated their original roles and today act mostly as ceremonial television shows that matter little if at all.

United States presidential nominating convention

Remember 1968 and Chicago? Now those were the days.

Democratic Convention and antiwar riots

Maybe with the disastrous war in Iraq and the stumbling economy - and without a clear-cut winner for the Republicans or the Democrats through the caucus and primary process - perhaps this is the year conventions will matter once again. Imagine both parties being forced to reach out and draft another kind of candidate - maybe Al Gore or Ron Paul.

One can only hope...