The Republican Rules for 2016

William March reports at The Tampa Tribune:

The Republican Party's Convention Rules Committee on Friday passed stricter regulations, aimed directly at Florida, to prevent states from setting early presidential primary dates that violate the party's schedule.

Under the new rules, if the Florida Legislature breaks the calendar in 2016 as it did this year, the state would lose all but 12 of its delegates to the next GOP convention.

This year, Florida's delegation was reduced from 99 to 50, although the other 49 were allowed to remain as "non-voting guests" with all the delegate privileges and perks except voting.

This year's penalty, committee members noted, wasn't enough to prevent the Florida Legislature from setting the Jan. 31 date for the primary, nor to prevent the candidates from campaigning here.

James Hohmann reports at Politico:

The Republican Party changed a series of rules Friday to significantly increase Mitt Romney’s power over the GOP and make it harder for insurgent presidential candidates to compete in future elections.

After Ron Paul used the convention process to win the most delegates in some of the states where he lost the popular vote, the Republican convention rules committee passed a measure to ensure that a candidate who wins a statewide caucus or primary ultimately controls its delegation and gets more leverage over picking his delegates. The shift to binding primaries and caucuses means the end of so-called beauty contests.The Romney campaign’s move will mean less consequential state conventions — lower-profile events that typically follow the popular vote caucuses and primaries. It also might fend off potential primary challenges from the right in 2016 should Romney win this November.

Pearl Harbor in Virginia?

At Bloomberg, Jonathan Salant writes about the failure of Newt Gingrich and several other candidates to make the Virginia primary ballot:

“It speaks volumes to me about the particular organizational skills of the candidates,” said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond. “It’s hard for me to understand how they could miss this opportunity.”

Gingrich’s campaign director, Michael Krull, issued a statement calling Virginia’s ballot requirement “a failed system” and said the former House speaker would launch a write- in campaign. Virginia law, however, doesn’t allow for write-ins in primary elections.

“Voters deserve the right to vote for any top contender, especially leading candidates,” Krull said.

Krull said last night on Gingrich’s Facebook page that the campaign was “exploring alternative methods to compete” in the primary, and likened the failure to make the ballot to December 1941, when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.

Gingrich earlier failed to make the Missouri ballot, though he claimed that he didn't bother because it was a beauty contest.  These oversights -- along with the campaign's apparent failure to check whether Virginia even allows write-ins -- suggest serious organizational problems.

And the campaign's analogy to Pearl Harbor will revive concerns about Gingrich's rhetorical excess.  Military analogies are often useful in politics, but the Gingrich camp is likening a campaign setback to the death of more than 2,000 Americans. In any event, the comparison does not hold up.  Whereas Pearl Harbor was a sneak attack, the Virginia petition requirement was a matter of public record long available to all the campaigns.

Gingrich, Perry Fail to Make VA Ballot

The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports:

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has failed to qualify for Virginia's presidential primary, the Republican Party of Virginia announced early Saturday.

The state GOP announced at 2:40 a.m. that Gingrich, like Texas Gov. Rick Perry, had failed to amass the required 10,000 signatures of registered voters to qualify for the March 6 contest.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Rep. Ron Paul, certified earlier Friday by the state GOP, will be the only candidates on the ballot.

The stunning result means Gingrich — who lives in McLean, led among Virginia's GOP primary voters in the latest poll and is vying with Romney for national front-runner status — will not get a chance to compete with Romney in the state's primary.

Gingrich's list of Iowa supporters -- famously full of errors and inaccuracies -- foreshadowed his failure in Virginia. Sweating the details has never been his strength.

GOP Delegate Selection Process

John McCormack writes at The Weekly Standard:

Just in time for Christmas, the RNC has a gift for political junkies: a comprehensive document* that explains how each state (and territory) will award its delegates through the Republican presidential primaries and caucuses. 

It's more than a little complicated, but it's important because winning delegates--not states, not the popular vote--is what ultimately matters. The GOP nominee will be the person who gets the votes of 1,144 delegates (that's 50% +1 of the total number of delegates) at the Republican National Convention in Tampa next August.

There's no real uniformity to delegate allocation. New Hampshire, for example, will award its 12 delegates proportionally based on the statewide popular vote. Florida, on the other hand, will award all 50 of its delegates to highest vote-getter in the state. Still other states have a hybrid system--awarding some delegates based on the congressional district vote (either proportionally or "winner-take-all") and other delegates based on the statewide vote (either proportionally or "winner-take-all"). Some states have popular-vote thresholds that candidates must clear in order to be awarded any delegates. Like I said, it's all a little confusing. 

*If you want even more details, check out The Green Papers.

See here for more on the significance of Florida's winner-take-all primary

Changing Rules of the Game

At National Journal, Reid Wilson notes several ways in which the 2012 contest is changing presidential campaigns:

• "Debates are now the first primary," said Glen Bolger, a Republican pollster sitting out the 2012 race (Bolger's firm, Public Opinion Strategies, is Mitt Romney's lead pollster). 
• "The echo chamber has been exponentially heightened and strengthened by social media," said Rich Killion, a New Hampshire Republican strategist who worked for former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty. "The water cooler is not at work and you don’t have to wait until tomorrow to share your opinions; it's at your fingertips and you can do it in your pajamas in the middle of night or in the back of a cab racing to the airport.
• Meanwhile, the 2012 contest has been marked by the emergence of candidates who have used presidential campaigns as a way to sell books and make a profit. Donald Trump and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin never went beyond flirting with bids in the media, though cable news networks hungry for ratings covered their every move.
•  Other states have long coveted the attention (not to mention the tens of millions of dollars in economic activity) an early slot on the primary calendar guarantees. Florida's refusal to move its primary in compliance with Republican National Committee rules earlier this year forced Iowa and New Hampshire to move up; Michigan, Arizona, Colorado, and other states have put similar pressure on the nominating calendar, despite warnings of RNC-levied penalties.

A Backloaded Calendar

Can Romney clinch the GOP nomination early? At The Huffington Post, Jon Ward and Mark Blumenthal write:

But the 2012 primary calendar is heavily back-loaded, with major states such as California and New York going much later in the process than in 2008 and far fewer delegates up for grabs through Super Tuesday. In fact, the altered calendar will create the most spread-out contest since the 1970s. And more states than in the past will award delegates based on each candidates' portion of the vote, rather than all of a state's delegates going to the winner of the popular vote. All together, it will be mathematically impossible for Romney -- or anyone -- to eliminate opponents early on.

...

The February states are Maine, Nevada, Colorado, Minnesota, Missouri, Arizona and Michigan. In 2008, Romney won all but Arizona, which was John McCain's home state.

Yet, mathematically, it will be hard for Romney to argue after January and February that he is the putative nominee.

There are approximately 2,427 delegates up for grabs in the 2012 Republican primary, but a number of states who broke Republican National Committee rules and moved their primaries forward will likely see their delegate totals halved. So the actual number of total delegates will probably be 2,284, meaning a candidate will have to win 1,143 to clinch the nomination.

Through January and February, according to the website TheGreenPapers.com, only 334 delegates will be awarded. Super Tuesday will add only 599 more -- a total of just 41 percent of all delegates

The Nomination Calendar, as of Now

Thanks to Josh Putnam's invaluable Frontloading HQ blog:

• Tuesday, January 3: Iowa caucuses (Democratic & Republican)
• Tuesday, January 10: New Hampshire
• Saturday, January 21: Nevada Democratic caucuses, South Carolina Republican Primary
• Saturday, January 28: South Carolina Democratic primary
• Tuesday, January 31: Florida
• Saturday, February 4 : Maine Republican caucuses (through February 11), Nevada Republican caucuses
• Tuesday, February 7: Colorado Republican caucuses, Minnesota Republican caucuses, Missouri (non-binding)
• Tuesday, February 28: Arizona, Michigan,
• Saturday, March 3: Washington Republican caucuses
• Tuesday, March 6 (Super Tuesday): Alaska Republican caucuses, Colorado Democratic caucuses, Georgia, Idaho Republican caucuses, Massachusetts, Minnesota Democratic caucuses, North Dakota Republican caucuses, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, Wyoming Republican caucuses (through March 10)
• Wednesday, March 7: Hawaii Democratic caucuses
• Saturday, March 10: Kansas Republican caucuses
• Sunday, March 11: Maine Democratic caucuses
• Tuesday, March 13: Alabama, Hawaii Republican caucuses, Mississippi, Utah Democratic caucuses
• Saturday, March 17: Missouri Republican caucuses
• Tuesday, March 20: Illinois
• Saturday, March 24: Louisiana
• Tuesday, April 3: Maryland, Washington DC, Wisconsin
• Saturday, April 14:Idaho Democratic caucuses, Kansas Democratic caucuses, Nebraska Democratic caucuses, Wyoming Democratic caucuses
• Sunday, April 15: Alaska Democratic caucuses, Florida Democratic caucuses (through May 5), Washington Democratic caucuses
• Tuesday, April 24: Connecticut, Delaware, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island
• Saturday, May 5: Michigan Democratic caucuses
• Tuesday, May 8: Indiana, North Carolina, West Virginia
• Tuesday, May 15: Nebraska, Oregon
• Tuesday, May 22: Arkansas, Kentucky
• Tuesday, June 5: California, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Dakota Democratic caucuses, South Dakota
• Tuesday, June 12: Ohio
• Tuesday, June 26: Utah

It's Official: Nevada Frontloads

Calendar crowding continues. Anjeanette Damon writes at The Las Vegas Sun that Nevada has traded delegates for an early spot on the calendar:

In an effort to preserve the state’s relevancy in choosing the Republican who will go up against President Barack Obama next year, the Nevada GOP today set Jan. 14 as its caucus date.

The move brings the party one step closer to locking down an early primary contest calendar that was upended last week when Florida flouted national party rules and moved its primary to Jan. 31.

Since 2008, Nevada has enjoyed the privileged third-in-the-nation presidential primary contest, which is supposed to motivate candidates to compete in the small state.

By moving its caucus date from February to Jan. 14, Nevada will lose half of its delegates to the national convention. Party leaders found the penalty an acceptable loss in exchange for protecting the state’s influence as an early proving ground for the field of GOP contenders.

“This is absolutely in the best interest of our state,” Amy Tarkanian, chairwoman of the Nevada Republican Party, said in a written statement. “We are in the process of creating a caucus that will energize Republicans throughout Nevada and the west, and allow us to play a major role in deciding who will carry the fight to unseat Barack Obama and his destructive policies.”

More at Frontloading HQ

Carolina Calendar Chaos

The GOP nomination process keeps evolving. Reid Epstein writes at Politico:

Continuing the stampede of primaries earlier in the calendar, South Carolina GOP Chairman Chad Connelly announced on Monday that he was moving his state’s from Feb. 28 to Jan. 21.

The 2012 primary calendar is looking increasingly like 2008’s: New Hampshire is almost certain to set its first-in-the-nation primary for Jan. 10, leaving Iowla to hold its caucuses a week earlier, either on Jan. 2 or Jan. 3. Nevada Republicans on Saturday affirmed their decision to hold caucuses the Saturday after New Hampshire’s primary, whenever that takes place.

The four early states were trying to coordinate their scheduling efforts, but Florida’s decision last week to put its primary on Jan. 31 threw things into chaos.

Connelly blasted Florida Monday for forcing South Carolina to move its primary into January, potentially costing the state half its delegates to the Republican National Convention because RNC rules forbid nominating contests before February.

Because New Hampshire law requires it to hold its primary “7 days or more immediately preceding the date on which any other state shall hold a similar election,” Secretary of State William Gardner will not schedule the state’s primary for Jan. 17, the other Tuesday before South Carolina’s primary.

And it remains unclear whether Nevada and New Hampshire can reconcile Nevada’s effort to hold its caucus five days after the New Hampshire primary with New Hampshire state law.

MORE AT FRONTLOADING HQ

GOP Calendar and Allocation Rules

Beth Reinhard reports at National Journal that the rules of the GOP nomination process could be especially relevant this time:

The national party is requiring states that hold March contests to award delegates proportionally, meaning a first-place finish doesn’t guarantee the whole bag. Winner-take-all states can’t vote until April. The arrangement is designed to slow the flow of delegates to a trickle, unlike the fast floods typical of modern-day nominating contests that render the late-voting states irrelevant.

“From my vantage point, it looks like it’s going to be a protracted battle, and both the Perry and Romney camps are showing that they are planning for something long term,” said Josh Putnam, a visiting assistant professor at Davidson College whose FrontloadingHQ blog is a leading authority on the primary calendar.

In 2008, more than 50 percent of the Republican delegates were awarded by the time the race got to the multistate contest known as Super Tuesday, which fell on Feb. 5. The 75 percent threshold was crossed by March 4, Putnam said.

Although the 2012 calendar is still very much in flux, Putnam predicts that 50 percent of the delegates won’t be awarded until March 13—one week after Super Tuesday—while 75 percent won’t be allocated until May 8.

“We always hear about the states like Arizona and Michigan that are trying to move up, but underneath the surface we have a majority of the states complying with the rules, and a number of them have moved their dates back,” Putnam said.

...

Here’s the catch: Even if Perry sweeps the South in March, his lead could be limited by the proportional allocation of delegates in those states. By April, when the winner-takes-all option kicks in, the race heads to Northeastern states closer to Romney’s home turf.

The constant shifting among states friendly to Perry and Romney could turn the primary season into something of a relay race. Which candidate will be holding the baton at the finish line is still anybody’s guess.

GOP Nominating Process

At RealClearPolitics, Sean Trende makes important observations.

First, the South is not necessarily dominant:

Southern delegates will make up just over a third of the total GOP convention -- and this is using the Census Bureau definition of the “South,” which includes border states like Maryland and Kentucky. Note that the Northeast and West combine for as many delegates as the South, while the West and Midwest can combine to trump it.

What about Romney?

That Rose Garden strategy may have worked well against Michele Bachmann in August, but it won’t work against Perry in November. And that brings us to the realquestion: What happens when Romney does join the fray? He has always been 100 times better on paper than in reality -- has that changed? Has Romney really solved the problems from his 2008 race? Can he come across as convincing and personable, or will he always seem insincere and robotic? Can he withstand the barrage over RomneyCare when it comes, or does he have a glass jaw (as he did in 2008)? To my mind, those questions are as important, if not more so, than questions about Perry’s ability to campaign.

There are new rules:

The RNC has decided to strip half of the delegates from any state that holds a primary or caucus before March 1, other than Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, or Nevada. Some states are considering pushing their primaries back, although these also tend to be the more moderate states, like Wisconsin and New Jersey. The more conservative states seem to be hanging tough, for now. In other words, you could end up with some of the more conservative states in the GOP electorate losing clout at the convention.

And a new calendar:

Notice that these late primary states are overall substantially more moderate, and significantly less evangelical than the earlier states.

This could prove critical in a drawn-out race. The reason is simple, and yet not well-known. The RNC has provided that states holding primaries before April 1 must allocate delegates proportionately. But after that date, states may opt for winner-take-all primaries, and many of these states have done so. In other words, we could have a situation where a conservative candidate (or a pair of conservative candidates) does well in the first three months, but has to give some delegates to the more moderate candidate. This is similar to what happened to Clinton, who won crucial primary battles late in the game, but couldn’t make much headway in the delegate count because of how these delegates were allocated. So despite winning the majority of primaries, the conservative candidate could end up with only a small lead in delegates over the more moderate candidate. If the moderate candidate then performs well in April or afterward, he could quickly rack up enough delegates to break away and claim the nomination.

Winnowing Starts Tonight

CBS reports:

Saturday's Iowa straw poll "the biggest test so far" for many of the Republican presidential wanna-bees taking part, but the results are non-binding and the contest "really doesn't tell us anything about their national standing," says CBS News correspondent Norah O'Donnell.

Still, she added on "The Early Show on Saturday Morning," the straw poll "does say a lot about the campaigns' organization and strategy."

CBS News political analyst John Dickerson said, "It doesn't pick winners, but it can be a graveyard for candidacies.

"In 1999, (Tenn. Sen.) Lamar Alexander made a big effort and then didn't do very well in the straw poll, and that was the end of it for him. He dropped out of the race. (Former Health and Human Services Secretary and ex-Wis. Gov.) Tommy Thompson, in 2007 -- the same thing happened to him.

"So, it doesn't tell us who the winner is, but Iowa doesn't really do that as much as it tells you what the field's going to look like going forward. It winnows out candidates, so this may be the last place for some of these campaigns. They may disappear after the ... straw poll."

The 2012 Calendar

Jeff Zeleny writes at The New York Times:

Even as the Republican presidential contenders zigzag through Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, an uncertain and potentially unwieldy primary schedule in subsequent states is alarming party leaders, who fear that the voting could start earlier, last longer and complicate efforts to confront President Obama next year.

The 2012 presidential race is the first to fall under new rules from the Republican National Committee, which had intended the contests to start in February, a month later than in 2008. But at least a half dozen states are threatening to defy the rules and move up their primaries.

The result is that the first ballots are once again likely to be cast in January as Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina move up the dates of their contests to protect their franchises as the early voting states.

At the same time, the rush toward the front of the calendar by Florida, Michigan, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia and Missouri is accompanied by another trend: several states are pushing back their presidential primaries — or canceling them entirely — because of tight state budgets.

The outcome is a sharply scaled-back set of contests in the weeks after the initial flurry — with Super Tuesday in particular diminished in importance — followed by a stretch of primaries lasting until summer.

...

Josh Putnam, an assistant professor at Davidson College who studies presidential primaries and writes the blog FrontloadingHQ, said the biggest change to the calendar was the shrinking of Super Tuesday — from 24 states last time to about 10 next year — and the lengthening of the nominating season.

“Four years ago, there was a mad rush to the first Tuesday in February,” Mr. Putnam said. “This time, a sizable chunk of states are deciding to move back.”

Another dynamic in the calendar fight has made this round of behind-the-scenes competition among states even more chaotic.

Republicans have long operated under a winner-takes-all system, which has allowed the party to wrap up its nominating fight more swiftly than Democrats, who allow states to award delegates proportional to the share of votes received by the candidates. This time, most Republican delegates will be awarded proportionally for all primaries and caucuses taking place before April 1, which means finishing second can be nearly as fruitful as winning. If the campaign narrows to a head-to-head match between two candidates next year, it has the potential to become a Republican version of the extended 2008 Democratic delegate fight between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton that was not resolved until all states had voted.

Republican Nominating Process

At Crystal Ball, Rhodes Cook writes:

Both national parties have agreed to push back the start of their nominating process by one month from 2008. That year, Iowa and New Hampshire voted in the shadow of New Year’s Day, and by Super Tuesday (Feb. 5), more than half the country had voted. To nearly everyone in the political community, the last nominating season began too early, peaked too soon and, for Republicans, was over much too quickly. John McCain had the nomination wrapped up by early March.

Such an early ending should not occur again next year – so long as the states follow the new rules, that is. No state is allowed to vote in January. Only Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina will be permitted to vote in February. The rest of the country will be allowed to hold their primary or caucus beginning the first Tuesday in March (March 6, 2012), which will be the new “Super Tuesday.”

In addition, new GOP rules forbid any contests held before April 1 to award all of a state’s delegates to the statewide winner. That could be a major concern to Republican leaders in many early-voting states, who used winner-take-all in the past to attract the interest of candidates and enhance their state’s influence. If their state votes before April 1 next year, it will be required to provide for the division of delegates proportionately among candidates to reflect their share of the vote.

Proportional representation has been a staple of Democratic rules for a generation and was one reason why the 2008 contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton was so long running. But for Republicans, this is new ground. And it is not completely clear yet how the proportional representation requirement for pre-April states will be implemented.

However, to David Norcross, the former chairman of the rules committee of the Republican National Committee (RNC), the change is “majestically simple.” For a decade, Republican rules makers considered an array of complex plans to arrest “front-loading,” including ones where states would vote in inverse order of size. But with the elimination of pre-April winner-take-all events in 2012, many GOP officials hope that they have not only found a simple way to slow down the nominating process but also to encourage states to hold their primary or caucus well after Super Tuesday.

Cook notes another potential change that may affect the outcome in unknown ways. Cash-strapped states may abandon expensive primaries in favor of caucuses. Candidates with passionate followings (Pat Robertson for the Republicans in 1988) or strong organization (Barack Obama for the Democrats in 2008) would have a greater edge in caucuses than in primaries.

Romney's Strategy

AP reports:

In his first presidential run in 2008, Mitt Romney sought back-to-back victories in Iowa and New Hampshire to propel him to the GOP nomination. He won neither, the two-state sprint failed and so did his candidacy.

This time his strategy is more of a multi-state marathon, with economically suffering Nevada an important round in what advisers predict could be a protracted fight to be the party's 2012 nominee.

On his first trip this year to Nevada, the former Massachusetts governor toured a neighborhood north of Las Vegas Friday that has been very hard hit by foreclosures and talked throughout his trip of economic worries that top voters' lists of concerns.

...

The strategy calls for big showings in New Hampshire and Nevada to boost momentum. After that comes strong fights in enough other states so Romney enters the party convention in Tampa, Fla., next fall with more delegates pledged to him than any other Republican.

Romney seeks to seize on a change in how the GOP chooses its nominee.

Candidates who won a state used to get all delegates in a winner-take-all system. Republicans now will award delegates proportionally, meaning finishing second or third in a state is worth it. That could benefit a wealthy candidate such as Romney. In 2008, he spent $110 million, $45 million of his own money.

From a memo by the RNC counsel's office:

Any state (other than the four states allowed to conduct their processes in February) conducting its process prior to April 1, 2012 must allocate its delegates proportionally, but the definition of “proportional allocation” is left to each state’s individual discretion, subject to a final determination in accordance with the Rules. The determination to leave the definition to a state’s discretion is in recognition of the Republican Party’s established practice of allowing each state to determine its delegate selection process. The RNC desires to avoid encroaching upon each state’s authority as much as possible, while at the same time balancing the needs of both promoting order within the process and allowing more states to be involved in the selection of the Republican presidential nominee. As a result, the amended Rule No. 15(b) reflects a compromise of requiring “proportional allocation” in some form for states conducting their process earlier in the schedule, while leaving the definition to the discretion of each state and giving states that want to award their delegates on a winner-take-all basis the freedom to do so as long as they wait until at

least April 1st.

The Committee thoroughly discussed the definition of “proportional allocation” and adopted some language during its May 5, 2010 meeting to help provide guidelines associated with the new provision that the Committee determined would allow a state to comply with the proportionality requirement. These guidelines were provided to the full RNC in advance of the RNC’s vote approving the rule change and constitute important legislative history that the RNC recommends states take into account in crafting proportional allocation rules:

“‘Proportional allocation basis’ shall mean that delegates are allocated in

proportion to the voting results, in accordance with the following criteria:

i. Proportional allocation of total delegates based upon the number of statewide

votes cast in proportion to the number of statewide votes received by each

candidate shall be the default formula for calculating delegate allocation, if

no specific language is otherwise provided by a state.

ii. If total delegate allocation is split between delegates at-large and delegates

by congressional district, delegates at-large must be proportionally allocated

based upon the total statewide results.

iii. If total delegate allocation is split between delegates at-large and delegates

by congressional district, delegates by congressional district may be allocated

as designated by the state based upon the total congressional district results.

iv. A state may establish a minimum threshold of the percentage of votes received

by a candidate that must be reached below which a candidate may receive no

delegates, provided such threshold is no higher than 20%.

v. A state may establish a minimum threshold of the percentage of votes received

by a candidate that must be reached above which the candidate may receive

all the delegates, provided such threshold is no lower than 50%.

vi. Proportional allocation is not required if the delegates either are elected

independently on a primary ballot not in accordance with a primary

presidential candidate’s slate or are not bound at any time to vote for a

particular candidate.”

These parameters are included here to provide important guidance. Each state’s

“proportional allocation” system is left to the state’s discretion, but substantial departure from these guidelines carries significant risk that not all delegates will be seated.

Romney and the GOP Nomination Process

Jonathan Martin writes at Politico:

Mitt Romney is sketching a path to the GOP nomination that looks nothing like the one blazed by Republicans before him.

Romney’s plan, by necessity, more closely resembles the outline of the epic 2008 Democratic presidential primary than the GOP’s recent victory-by-early-knockout design.With glaring weaknesses in two of the traditional early states, an increased number of contests allocating delegates on a proportional basis and a capacity, thanks to his own deep pockets and a growing stable of donors, to raise significant cash, Romney’s second White House bid relies on outlasting the competition.

Much will depend on the still-unsettled primary calendar and the eventual field of candidates. But the former Massachusetts governor’s aim, according to multiple aides and advisers, is to exceed expectations his team is working feverishly to lower in Iowa, to come back strong with a win in New Hampshire, to survive South Carolina in part by picking up an off-setting victory in Nevada and then to settle in for what many described as “a slog” that they’ll emerge from thanks to superior money and organization.

Josh Putnam has more on the GOP's proportional allocation requirements.

The Nominating Process

Once again, party activists are considering changes in the presidential nomination process. In the Washington Post, Dan Balz writes:

Now a new effort to fix a broken system has begun. A commission established by the Democratic National Committee to review the nomination process held its first public meeting yesterday in Washington. A panel set up by the Republican National Committee to examine its process met privately a week ago.

A couple of observations are in order. First, I would quibble with the word broken. What's broken? In 2008, both parties nominated the candidates that their rank and file supported. The process allowed for an airing of issues, and on the Democratic side, it enabled voters to get a good long look at a relative newcomer to national politics.

Second, the only prediction that one may make with confidence is that any reforms will have unanticipated consequences. Front-loading was supposed to bring the process to an early close. But 2008 showed that two evenly-matched candidates can keep the contest going for a long time. Superdelegates purportedly would exercise independent judgment and tend to favor "establishment" candidates. In 2008, they followed the polls and flocked to Barack Obama.

You may find the Democratic Change Commission at http://www.democrats.org/a/2009/06/introducing_the.php