What Florida Hath Wrought: Will Christmas Be in Iowa or New Hampshire?

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Geographers have long noted that the Florida peninsula hangs off the East Coast of the United States like a small, limp penis. The metaphorical significance was made manifest Friday morning when what I’ve come to regard as “The Evil State” announced that it was moving its primary to Jan. 31, prompting a memorable reaction from Iowa GOP Chairman Matt Strawn:

“The arrogance shown by Florida’s elected leadership is disappointing, but not surprising. Equally troubling is to see this petulant behavior rewarded with our national convention. The consequences of Florida’s intransigence must be swift and severe, including the refusal by the RNC to credential or seat any member of Florida’s presidential primary date commission at the 2012 RNC convention in Tampa.
“Regarding the timing of the First in the Nation Iowa Caucuses, Iowa will remain first. Consistent with tradition, the final Iowa Caucus date will be announced once New Hampshire sets the date of its First in the Nation Primary.”

As I said in my Friday American Spectator column, the RNC-approved schedule — with the Iowa caucuses Feb. 6 — was reasonable and humane. What Florida has done is cruel and insane. Manchester (N.H.) Union Leader columnist John DiStaso has reaction from the Granite State:

The Republican National Committee this afternoon made clear that Republican parties in any state, including New Hampshire, that violate the national party’s primary/caucus calendar by moving their primaries or caucuses earlier than the schedule set out in an RNC rule will lose half its delegates to the national convention next summer.
A senior RNC official said there will be “no discretion, no waivers. Those penalties are in place in our rules. They were enforced in 2008 and they will be enforced in 2012.”
A Florida commission today voted to jump up its primary to Jan. 31 in violation of the RNC rule. It means that New Hampshire, Iowa, South Carolina and Nevada will also violate the rule and move their events into January, and possibly, in New Hampshire’s case, into December of this year . . .
[New Hampshire’s Republican National Committeeman Steve] Duprey, a member of the RNC rules committee who was among those who worked since 2008 on the new rule, said of Florida, “I thought they’d be smarter than this.
“This (Florida jump to January) effectively precludes Sarah Palin and anyone else from getting into the race, and it’s unfortunate for the Republican Party and for democracy. It also makes it much more daunting for any candidate who doesn’t have huge cash reserves to be able to compete and capitalize on an early state win.”
Duprey predicted the New Hampshire Primary will probably be held “right after the first of the year again, and could be even earlier than that,” meaning perhaps even in December.

Of course, if New Hampshire moves to December, Iowa’s law will require them to move to December, too. And all of this — all of it — is the fault of the Florida Republican Party leadership. The Hill notes:

The front-loading of the calendar also means presidential candidates will likely have to campaign through Christmas and New Year’s Day.

Isn’t that sweet? “The Florida Republicans Who Stole Christmas”!

By the way: Don’t believe a word those Florida Grinches say about their reasons for doing this. They’re lying through their teeth if they say this has anything to do with trying to make Florida votes count for more in the primary process. What they are doing — and everybody knows this is the real reason — is trying to force an early end to the fight for the GOP nomination.

So far the only candidate in the field who’s said a word about this crooked Florida deal is Rick Santorum. Everybody knows that Florida’s state House Speaker Dean Cannon has endorsed Rick Perry, and many people suspect Florida Senate President Mike Haridopolos is a Mitt Romney supporter. By front-loading the primaries, Florida now is in effect trying to stop Herman Cain (or anyone else but Perry or Romney) from having a fair chance to compete with the big-money front-runners.

The Underground Conservative predicts “a front-loaded presidential primary system guaranteed to pick an establishment GOP candidate. Mitt Romney = John McCain 2.0,” and adds:

That’s the end result: the Cocktail Party GOP showing the Tea Party who’s boss.

You may have noticed that the sudden announcement of Florida’s Jan. 31 date swiftly followed Cain’s upset win in the Florida straw poll — a result that had caused some people to urge New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to get in. But there won’t be time now for Christie to organize a campaign in time to compete in Iowa or New Hamphire.

Bonus for the old-boy Establishment? By making this move, the Florida GOP makes it all but certain that Sarah Palin can’t run in 2012.

What would really shake things up — and it would be just like her — is if Palin decided to pay back the Establishment by messing up their little insider game and endorsing Herman Cain.

UPDATE: This is incredible! In a Facebook message to “Sunshine State Sarah,” Speaker Cannon admits what the Florida GOP is doing:

I’ll describe what happened in 2008 as the best proof that the threats of calamity in [Florida RNC member Paul] Paul’s letter are unfounded. In 2008, Iowa went Jan 3, NH went Jan 8, MI on Jan 15, NV and SC on Jan19, Florida went Jan 29, and FL had huge, arguably decisive influence. Twenty six states then held their primaries the next week on Feb 5–the “super Tuesday”–and it was over.

That is to say, Cannon and the Florida GOP are trying to guarantee a repeat of the preposterously early decision in 2008! And this disaster (which gave the nomination to John McCain) Cannon cites as proof that a front-loaded primary calendar in 2012 won’t produce a “calamity”!

Read the rest of Sarah’s post. Like many Floridians, Sarah doesn’t seem to understand how evil this Crist/Greer-style trick really is. Go back to the story I wrote on Election Night 2008:

Perhaps the most important statistic for conservatives to keep in mind today — as pundits pore over and pour out exit-poll data to tell us What It Means — is this: 53 percent of Republican primary voters did not vote for John McCain.

And how did that happen? Florida Republicans led by the corrupt Jim Greer moved up their primary, forcing the front-loaded 2008 calendar described by Cannon. Then Florida’s RINO Gov. Charlie Crist (after promising to endorse Rudy Giuliani) gave his endorsement to John McCain. Just as Cannon said, “Florida went Jan 29, and FL had huge, arguably decisive influence” — McCain won with 36% to Romney’s 31%, and then Super Tuesday sealed the deal.

Yet the Florida GOP’s attempt to repeat that rigged process — which produced a Republican nominee who didn’t get a majority of Republican votes — is claimed by Cannon as proof that 2012 won’t be a “calamity”!

Once Tea Party activists figure out what the Florida GOP bosses are up to, I guarantee you there will be hell to pay.

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71 comments

  2. I’ve got what might be a better idea, but I need to be able to talk to somebody high up in the NRA to sell it to them, and fat chance of that. My idea is for the NRA to file a challenge to New Jersey’s gun control laws. Put Christie in the position of either having to support the challenge or oppose it. What do you think? But like I said, I  or somebody needs to sell them on the idea.

  6. The only conservative with any kind of strong support then was Fred Thompson, and he turned out to be a dud, some even alleged he was a stalking horse for McCain all along. Other than him, the only other conservatives were Duncan Hunter and Tom Tancredo, neither of whom got any significant support. They weren’t well known like McCain, nor did they have access to funds like Romney. Plus Hucklebee drained support from them as well. 2008 was just a messed up year. Back then actually I was for Giuliani, but that was just because of his 9/11 image. But all the way around it was just a terrible year for Republicans, and that was the main reason the RINOs predominated. It was arguably a valid attempt by the party to reach out to what they considered a broad cross-section of the American people, by picking a centrist, or moderate. It backfired, so of course they want to triple down on the stupid by pestering the hell out of Christie, arguably the biggest RINO in the country, to run this year.

    I’m sorry, but I just can’t vote for some fat-ass tub of lard that supports gun control, and I’ve had several cups of coffee by now. Somebody better bring these people back to reality real quick, because I promise you I’m far from the only person who feels that way.

  7. […] RS McCain, who doesn’t hold back in the least, had this to say: You may have noticed that the sudden announcement of Florida’s Jan. 31 date swiftly followed Cain’s upset win in the Florida straw poll — a result that had caused some people to urge New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to get in. But there won’t be time now for Christie to organize a campaign in time to compete in Iowa or New Hamphire. […]

  9. If Palin is going to run she needs to get cracking. Yeah, she would win the nomination handily, but she needs to do more than show a little bit of thigh, she needs to go all in, and she needs to do it now.

    Otherwise, if she waits too long, then her only realistic chance is if the first three or four primaries are split, with a different candidate winning one each. If that were to happen, then yes she might be able to wait until March, but that’s one hell of a chance to take.

  10. From Wikipedia:

    There is no provision for the role of political parties in the United States Constitution. Before 1820, Democratic-Republican members of Congress would nominate a single candidate from their party. That system collapsed in 1824, and since 1832 the preferred mechanism for nomination has been a national convention.[11]
    Delegates to the national convention were usually selected at state conventions whose own delegates were chosen by district conventions. Sometimes they were dominated by intrigue between political bosses who controlled delegates; the national convention was far from democratic or transparent. Progressive Era reformers looked to the primary election as a way to measure popular opinion of candidates, as opposed to the opinion of the bosses.

    So, the Godforsaken Bolshes are the authors of this system!  I knew it!

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_primary#History

  11. My gut-feeling is what you express in your first paragraph, but, despite having followed the game of politics since I was a beardless youth, I can admit that Mrs. Palin is one of the savvist players I have ever seen.  She constantly does things that don’t follow the normal rules and, most importantly, succeeds when she does so.  I am compelled to defer to her because of this.

  12. How do you think Mrs. B and I feel!  We go up for a week-and-a-half every year on our vacation to Wolfeboro because it’s nice and quiet up there.  This move by the evil Floridians means it’s going to be anything but calm and serene.  Damn them…damn them all to Hell!

  16. South Carolina Primary, Nevada Caucus Move Up…

    RS McCain has reported the news that the South Carolina Primary will be held on January 21, ahead of the leap-frogging Florida Primary (January 31), and Nevada has tied their Caucus to be held the week following the New Hampshire Primary. This as a res…

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