Wednesday, February 27, 2008

California Primary Held Too Early

I have been waiting for someone else to note this fact. California held its Democratic Primary too early to be relevant.

It is more than ironic that the Texas and Ohio primaries are considered crucial for Clinton and, depending upon the results from next week, Pennsyvania could be "the decider" in April.

The problem for California's Democratic voters is that many cast their ballots by mail in advance of developing stories - particularly the story of Barack Obama. The rest of us who voted at the polls were just beginning to get the message that there was a viable alternative to Clinton.

So here we are. We used to have an election date in March - generally reserved for local elections - it would have been a good date. Imagine if Clinton and Obama on March 4 were competing for California as well as Texas and Ohio.

Also imagine if so many of our Superdelegates hadn't committed before March. My own Congressman - Mike Thompson - committed to Clinton. Obama won in his District even though Obamamania had yet to take hold in most of the state. Nearly 55% of the voters in Thompson's District voted for someone other than Hillary Clinton.

Now if we Californian's could just approve an initiative to allocate our Electoral College votes proportionately we could become completely irrelevant....