Fla. Democrats strive to recoup primary clout

Palm Beach Post ^ | May 14, 2007 | Brian E. Crowley

[Baladas]

Florida Democrats are looking for a way to salvage the party's importance in the presidential primary season, fearing the Republican-imposed date of Jan. 29 will drive candidates away from the state.

The three top candidates, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Barack Obama, all have said they intend to make Florida a priority, but they have done little more than drop by to raise money so far.

There have been few public events. With Florida's new primary date, candidates risk violating national party rules, which means they would not be able to claim any of the state's delegates, if they campaign here.

Even if there were no penalty, an argument is being made that the candidates will continue to invest heavily in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina and make just token visits to Florida.

Florida Democrats may want to take a political cue from California, which moved its primary from June to Feb. 5 at the urging of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who said he is determined to make candidates pay attention to issues important to The Golden State.

Opponents of the California move made many of the same arguments of those who opposed Florida's move from March to January: The state is too big, too expensive, too time-consuming.

But two months after California moved its primary date, Democratic presidential candidates are stepping up their efforts there, visiting the state more frequently and being forced to respond to California issues.

Steve Jarding, a Democratic political consultant and public policy lecturer at Harvard, said Florida will be even more important than California. Efforts to turn the Jan. 29 primary into a nonbinding vote for Democrats will be fruitless because the national media will care little about a proposed caucus to pick delegates weeks later, he said.

[Baladas]

Since when has the MSM not cared about a Democrat primary?

Typical Palm Beach partisanship - since the Republicans were in the majority when the FL primary date was set for both parties and now they won't change the date like CA did, it's somehow Karl Rove's fault.

[EagleUSA]

I wonder if the same cartel of activist judges are planning on trying to legislate from the bench, and rewrite their election laws for 2008....??

SCOTUS ALERT — be ready!!!