GOP Adopts 2012 Primary Schedule
And the good news is, there won’t be any voting until February of that year:
KANSAS CITY, MO. — The Republican National Committee adopted a new schedule for the 2012 presidential primaries Friday, agreeing to a plan worked out in concert with Democrats and designed to delay the start of the campaign season.
The proposal, drafted by a special RNC panel, gained approval from more than the necessary two-thirds of the committee’s 168 members.
Party leaders hailed the vote as a historic change in the presidential selection process, one that would avoid the development of a single national primary in which states choose to hold their nominating contests on the same day.
The new schedule is designed to make it difficult for a candidate to rack up an insurmountable number of delegates early in the process, forcing candidates to campaign across the country.
Under the new schedule, no state would hold a primary or caucus before the first Tuesday in February 2012, in attempt to avoid a repetition of 2008, when the Iowa caucuses were held Jan. 3.
Iowa and New Hampshire would retain their status as the nation’s first contests, held in February, joined by South Carolina and Nevada.
Other contests would generally be held in April or later, although states would have the option of holding votes in March, provided convention delegates chosen at those elections were awarded to candidates in proportion to the percentage of the vote they received, rather than in a winner-take-all system.
On behalf of Americans everywhere who didn’t really enjoy it all that much when the Iowa Caucuses were competing post-New Years’ festivities, recovery from the same, and the Orange Bowl, I say thank you, thank you RNC.
