MY ANNUAL RANTS ABOUT OUR PRESIDENTIAL NOMINATION PROCEDURES (COMMENT). Henry Nejako commented here on my post on advertising and The Music Man that: “Donald Trump using free advertising resulting from his outrageous comments succeeded in making his followers feel that their country has lost its greatness and ability to provide for them and that Trump is the only person who can rescue them.”
I have been complaining about our system of choosing presidential nominees pretty much annually since this post in January, 2007. Some of the points made by people I quoted in that post were: “[The process] excludes many serious candidates…..The process gives too much power to Iowa and New Hampshire.â€
The post discussed a hypothetical national primary in 2008, one year after the post. The stumbling block was name recognition: “But there are almost a dozen other potential candidates in the two parties — senators, congressmen and governors well known in their home states, but strangers to the national electorate — who would be severely handicapped by a massive Feb. 5 primary.â€
I suggested in later posts that a two-stage process—either by a convention or a second national primary with a small number of semi-finalist candidates—would give more voters a chance to cast meaningful votes. Dick Weisfelder commented here in a comment chain that Annalisa and Nick participated in that we should be moving toward a British or Canadian system, and I heartily agree.