After hearing for myself (through an earpiece) the gripes from editorial writers in Michigan and Arizona questioning the legitimacy of Iowa and New Hampshire as traditional primary lead off batters, I have to wonder...are you kidding me?
I refer to my appearance last night on the News Hour with Jim Lehrer in which your humble blogger was thrust into the position of being the defender (for a day) of our first-in-the-solar-system primary status in the wake of Michigan’s likely move of its primary to Jan. 15. My appearance through the magic of television was actually done in a cramped studio at Channel 9 in Manchester and it was quite a case of chaos in hiding. I had little background briefing, nor did I know the names of my fellow talking head experts. (If you happened to see it and wondered why I slipped into babbling U.S. Senate speak when I said “the gentleman from Arizona” and “the gentleman from Michigan” now you know why.) I couldn’t see what was happening on the screen and had to keep a semi-intelligent plastered face look on at all times because I never knew when the shot would turn to me — all while listening to everything through an earpiece.
Anyway, I muddled through and came away wondering if either of the “gentlemen” who were complaining about New Hampshire in particular (we are an inviting target) had even the slightest clue about what happens here on a quadrennial basis.
Yes, it’s often a circus but the people and the campaigns (and even the media hordes) take this electoral challenge of vetting the contenders from the pretenders seriously. The reality that I hoped I got across isn’t that the NH primary should be first because it has always been first but that it’s first for a reason — the candidates can come here and not pander (at least most of the time) about local issues and test out and discuss national themes. Everyone knows industrial meltdown in Michigan and immigration in Arizona are vital issues there and elsewhere. But the NH primary, for all its occasional silliness and faults (and even our hubris about its role), isn’t Romper Room. It’s a good place to deal with national issues because of the state’s ideological diversity and the ability for candidates to meet and greet and deal with the financial and organizational difficulties of campaigning without breaking the bank.
No wonder it annoys some states. They can’t offer what the state has already done for decades. And it’s nonsense that candidates are afraid to speak out the Iowa-NH tyranny — the reality is that if the candidates were so adverse to our charms and if the state hadn’t stepped up to the plate to do the job, we wouldn’t be having this discussion.
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