Word: calendar
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...long as anyone can remember, Republicans have wired their presidential primary process in order to produce strong and unstoppable front-runners at a very early stage in the election calendar. But this year, all that intricate circuitry is going haywire...
...been in the past. That's because the party itself is such a muddle, having come to South Carolina with three separate winners in the first three big contests. And the primary will soon be followed by an explosion of contests across the map. "The accelerated, front-loaded primary calendar was supposed to create order and instead has given us chaos," says Ralph Reed, the former head of the Christian Coalition, who helped orchestrate George W. Bush's victory over McCain here in 2000. "A party that abhors a vacuum is now staring into the abyss...
...South Carolina Republican primary has always been the Mother Superior of nominating contests, bringing order to the process, and rapping the knuckles of the rowdies, so that the rest of the calendar looks more like a coronation than a campaign. The state's location at the heart of the party's southern political base, as well as its mix of economic and religious conservatives, make it uniquely suited for the role. Not once since the inception of the primary in 1980 has its winner failed to go on to win the party's nomination...
...honor will not get Huckabee the nomination. As the calendar flies by, the states get bigger and even more costly, putting his shoestring campaign under increasing pressure. And Huckabee is still struggling to appeal beyond his evangelical base. In two states now, Michigan and South Carolina, his message of economic populism has failed to make substantial inroads...
...Mitt Romney won the GOP caucuses easily, capitalizing on Nevada's sizeable Mormon population and the fact that none of his Republican opponents made more than a token effort in the Silver State.) Roughly 100,000 voters participated in caucuses that were moved forward in the primary calendar specifically to give a western state a say in determining who would win the two parties' nominations...