Is this the craziest, most convaluted primary season in history (both parties)?
The media and the internet play a minor role in the craziness of this system. Their ability to quickly distribute sound bites taken out of context does not help the system, but the craziness is built into a system of finding national candidates from a group of candidates who for the most part have never run as part of a national campaign. (The system in other countries essentially requires some time in the national leadership before running for the top slot in your party.) What people need to remember is that the “modern” primary system is only about 30-40 years old. (It began to take shape after the 1968 conventions.) Prior to that, candidates only ran in a handful of primaries as “tests” of strength to convince party leaders around the country that they could win in the general. The second key fact is that this year is the first time under this system that nobody in the current Administration was a candidate — the closest that we have come to this in the past were 1988 and 2000 when
