Saratoga News
Columns
Race for the White House is no sprint--it's a marathon
By Carl Heintze
The current race for the White House doesn't seem so much a race as a marathon.
It's been going on for a year now, and we and the candidates still have almost a year before the race is over.
Who is going to be the first to give out, us or them?
The poor people of Iowa got it first, a tsunami of political rhetoric that must have been as inescapable as a real tidal wave. Fortunately, for us at least, most of its force was felt in Des Moines, not San Francisco.
Then there was a briefer wave: New Hampshire.
Next, alas, may be California. For once in its political lifetime, it may provide the deciding chapter in this seemingly endless test of wills.
That's because, for once, California's primary election is early--not early enough, perhaps--but still at least not so far back in the pack that whatever its voters decided was of little consequence. Now it is up there with a lot of the other primary front-runners.
Our big moment comes Feb. 5, Super Tuesday, when 20 states, including California, hold primaries. We won't have to wait until June, as we have in the past.
California's vote may make a difference and not be just a curiosity, a sort of political afterthought, because California is big. It's the biggest state in the nation. That means its voters cast a lot of ballots and its delegates are entitled to a lot of seats in the national conventions of either party.
It also means that we will be the targets of all those left in the race.
That, of course, doesn't make what's likely to happen between now and then any easier. We will still be subject to an unending barrage (in prime time, no less) of television commercials, we will still get dozens of telephone calls, some canned, some "live," urging us to vote for those still left in the marathon.
Whether we will get the close personal attention voters in Iowa and New Hampshire got remains to be seen. California is a lot bigger than either Iowa or New Hampshire and it would take a large army of volunteers to visit every potential voter here. Time mercifully is short.
If Obama, Clinton, McCain and Huckabee want to make their presence felt they are going to have to hurry.
Indeed, by the time California has voted, the issue of who are going to be the party standard bearers may well have been decided. Certainly after Feb, 5 the marathon should be mostly downhill.
Conventions these days are mostly window dressing, a sort of rally after the race is over. The only real issue the country may face after February is who is to be nominated for vice president.
In a highly undemocratic fashion, this choice falls to the candidate. No one wants to come in second in a marathon, but after February some of those who were trying to be first may well be willing to settle for second place. Whether they make it is an open question. Presidential candidates don't pick their opponents as running mates very often.
And usually the candidates for vice president aren't the most likely second-placers.
The final question to be decided is this: Is all this necessary for the future of democratic government?
Do we need a campaign that lasts two years? Do we need to raise millions of dollars, saturate Iowa and New Hampshire with outsiders bent on convincing this small portion of the electorate to vote for one candidate or the other? Should we do away with it, shorten the process, cut down on the rhetoric, expense and time?
It's tempting to contemplate, but if we did we'd put a whole army of pundits out of business. What would the Sunday talk shows talk about? What would Bill O'Reilly and Lou Dobbs have to complain about?
For the past couple of months all these folks and more have been furiously speculating, analyzing, gossiping and generally hanging on literally every word the candidates utter.
If we shorten the race, we probably put them out of business.
If they hadn't been watching would we have known that Hillary really could cry? Would we know about Rudy's police expenses and his various wives? Would we know that like Bill Clinton, his gubernatorial successor is a musician? And an ordained minister besides.
Without the long, arduous, often trivial and frequently intense marathon, what would all these observers find to do? And would democracy know the difference?
