By Dick Morris
FrontPageMagazine.com February 12, 2007
The nominees for the 2008 presidential race will be selected in 2007. The tempo of the new political process, driven by 24-hour cable news, Internet bloggers, conservative talk radio, and liberal NPR is so rapid that the nomination race cannot exist in stasis waiting for Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina to get around to holding their votes in early 2008. Well before they open their caucuses or polling places, this nomination, in each party, will have been decided by the national media coverage during 2007.
A recent Gallup poll found that 35 percent of Americans — probably everyone who votes in a caucus or primary — watch cable news stations frequently. The intensity of viewer and voter interest and the ubiquity of the political coverage on these stations force the process to accelerate and to come to an early conclusion.
The role of Iowa, New Hampshire, etc.
What is the role for the early, small caucus/primary states in 2007? They will not have held their primaries or caucuses yet, but the state-by-state polls published regularly in 2007 become the equivalent of virtual primaries in each of these states.
Now you have to win the American Media Primary of 2007 and then your victory is ratified in the primaries and caucuses of 2008.
The importance of the front-runner
The key for the candidates is to become the early front-runner and hold the position for the first three quarters of 2007. Once that is accomplished, the nomination is probably in the bag. No clear front-runner, except for Rockefeller in 1964, has ever failed to win the nomination since the primary process became pivotal in party nominations in 1960.
Rudy and Hillary: tentative leaders
Already the process seems to be congealing around Hillary and Rudy as tentative front-runners.
For the whole column click here.
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