Prominent NH Expert Jim Splaine On NH Primary - How About December 11th?

The following piece is part of the Huffington Post's OffTheBus project.

This piece is published in partnership with Blue Hampshire.

Jim Splaine, a prominent New Hampshire legislator and author of the state's 1976 primary law which allows the Secretary of State discretion to move the primary before any "similar election", argued last evening on the site Blue Hampshire that it may be time for a December 11th date for the primary:

"So, with the very serious possibility that the Iowa Caucuses will be on January 3rd, New Hampshire now has to make a choice. Should we have our primary right after Iowa, with a reduced "window" between it and us, or use this opportunity to have our Presidential Primary during the first two weeks of December? The second Tuesday in December is the 11th, and that date would do some interesting things..."

While such it's tempting to think of Splaine's comments as little more than a thought experiment, he has been right before. Over a year ago he predicted the primary would fall back to its current projected date of January 8th, and while others were fretting over Nevada's position, he predicted correctly that Nevada would become less relevant as other states pushed up. In New Hampshire, he is regarded as one of the foremost experts on primary scheduling.

In his post he cites five reasons for such an early primary, including reducing the effect of the compressed Iowa/New Hampshire schedule, allowing sufficient time after the primary for losers to recover and regroup, and providing an early window for face-to-face campaigning with voters before the holidays.

Update: Kathy Sullivan, recently retired NH Dem Party Chair, rebuts Rep. Splaine's post in the comments, saying to do this would mean the end of the primary:

"It will be the end of the primary going forward into the future. While we'll still schedule one, the candidates won't come. Why? Because we will have proven what we have denied all these years: that we are arrogant people who only care about New Hampshire, and that we want to go first just because we want to go first, not because of grass roots politics, not because of our dedication to democracy. Say goodbye to the primary, and turn the lights off behind you! "

Read his full post by clicking here.

Read more OffTheBus coverage and get involved by clicking here.

Comments

[eddiestardust]

How to stop the silliness?

Move the Primary to a day or two before or after Christmass....

Christians will all shout HELL NO and politicians will have to move it back to late January!

[rst2536]

THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS

Should any care for an election
In which big money plays a part
In helping us shape our conception
Of candidates who have a heart?
Who’s not a pol who is self-seeking;
But bent on helping our critiquing
Of why we cannot make ends meet
When we look at our balance sheet?
Who’ll help to free us from impressment
As members of the National Guard;
Or those who slave for a green card?
But when it comes to your assessment
Of candidates will cause less mess,
Beware whose speech ends in “God bless.”

[Listen2me]

No matter what they do, the whole process has disintegrated so badly (due to corporate media shills and corporate-owned politicians), that it is irrelevant.

The candidates will be Clinton and Giuliani---this decision has already been made BEFORE A SINGLE VOTE HAS BEEN CAST. Some of the Thug interest groups aren't happy with Mayor Mussolini, but none of the saps running against him on their side have anywhere near the insatiable lust for power that motivates Rudy. Nor do they seem to have the political skills.

The Democrats have done nothing nothing nothing about the voting machines and the other election-rigging schemes perfected by the Thugs.

The primary-calendar mess is part of the overall disintegration of our civil institutions. The only weapon we have left is a general strike . . . . or emigration. Although I'd like to see Jesse Ventura as an independent candidate next year. He beat the top candidates of the two major parties in Minnesota, back in 1998. He has been an outspoken opponent of the Iraq war from before it began. If he were elected President, there'd be no "2013" temporizing---he'd just pull the plug on the occupation.

[splastershoes]

That last quote is brilliant. This is nothing more than a childish act.