“Politics has gotten so expensive that it takes a lot of money to even get beat with,” quipped Will Rogers more than 75 years ago.
Mitt Romney could probably relate. Or maybe John McCain. And very soon, it’s likely Rudy Giuliani, John Edwards, and either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama will be able to as well.
The presidential hopefuls will have raised – and spent – an astronomical amount of money attempting to win their parties’ nominations. But after Super Duper Tuesday, or Feb. 5 as it was once known, more than $400 million will have been spent on nothing but a year of expensive insults and a good idea of how interstates are paved in Iowa, New Hampshire, Michigan, Nevada and South Carolina.
Nineteen states will hold primary elections for both parties that day, while two will have just Republican elections and three will decide on Democratic delegates. Feb. 5 will host more primary elections than any other day in the United States’ 232-year history, as a prelude to what by most accounts will be among the most important presidential elections ever.
Some of us north of the 49th parallel, content with our parliamentary democracy’s effective dullness, can smirk at the media fracas which has been brewing on American 24-hour news channels during the last year. The primary system is a prime example of how modern media operates, with polls, blogs and televised punditry offering unprecedented levels of insight, no matter how wrong it often is.
There was near consensus before the Jan. 8 New Hampshire primaries that Obama, fresh off his caucus victory in Iowa, would walk away as frontrunner, destined to become the first African American nominee for a major party. Polls released the day before showed Obama leading Clinton by close to 13 percentage points; magazine covers from Macleans to Newsweek trumpeted his ascent to the top of the famously disorganized Democratic Party.
And yet, despite all of the inevitability predicted by the media, the day belonged to the Clinton camp. Record turnout across the state brought Hillary back to life, albeit by the slimmest of margins. Revitalized, Clinton warned the campaign was far from over.
This vetting process makes certain that no candidate will be successful without talking to actual voters and kissing babies in states as different as New Hampshire and Nevada. The dozens of debates and countless town hall meetings expose hopefuls to the realities facing their constituents: what, for example, is Edwards going to do to help culinary workers in Las Vegas secure jobs? How will McCain help New Hampshire farmers find trading partners around the world?
These questions might seem petty, but they force candidates to account for the huge burden of responsibilities required of a president of an increasingly diverse nation some 300 million strong.
The same beauty of the primary process, however, is its biggest drawback. By having to speak to people in states separated by thousands of miles, with beliefs and challenges even further apart, politicians have to spend millions in travel expenses and to support staff in sparsely populated, unrepresentative states.
As of the third quarter of 2007, Hillary Clinton had raised more than $90 million; she had spent nearly half of that, well before the heaviest campaigning began. Millionaire Mitt Romney brought in more than $60 million, with mixed results so far.
Among the top four contenders alone – Obama, Clinton, Romney, and McCain – more than $250 million had been raised by September 2007; with the final quarter results due later in January, that number could very well double. The New York Times predicts the final tally of the presidential race will surpass $1 billion, more than the GDP of Eritrea.
While a boon for the economies of New Hampshire and Iowa, what this all amounts to is a process wherein money has the final say in how long candidates are able to support a full-fledged campaign. Most of the nominees have been touring the nation for close to a year; Edwards has been at it since his hopes of being vice-president were dashed in 2004.
If a candidate starts to slip in the polls, the cash stops coming in. Without a fully stacked war chest, so goes the conventional wisdom, the hopes of winning more than a couple of states’ delegates are all but lost.
There is a perverse logic to the system. Americans, well documented as some of the most individually generous people in the world, can vote with their money with greater return than any ballot can provide. The primaries – and all of the inherent fundraising – are boiled down to whoever can appeal to the demographics with the most money to burn.
While it may make great television, the nomination system all but keeps presidential hopes alive for the rich or for those who can pander to them.