How to Bungle a Nomination Process

This has, without doubt, been the most interesting presidential election cycle of my lifetime. Wow. Absolutely nothing is going as predicted by the pundits or pollsters. Bad for them. Good for us.

One of the most interesting aspects has been the seminar being put on by the Democratic Party on how to screw up a nomination process. It's a total mess on that side of the nominating aisle - not that I object to that.

Here are three Democrat peculiarities that have contributed to the train crash:

1. An emphasis on the Caucus.

Does anyone really understand the caucus process? Or know why it is used so much on the Democrat side? What I've observed so far is that the caucus system severely limits the number of people that can participate in the process. How many people are willing to show up for two hours at night and vote out in public in front of their neighbors? It's undemocratic for one, sacrificing the secret vote of the ballot booth.

Look at Wyoming, for example. The Republicans had their primary a long time ago and had a good simple vote. Now the Democrats are doing it with a caucus and, if Fox New's scroll is correct, have about 10,000 people total in the whole state participating. They're going to award 12 delegates to the convention based on the votes of 10,000 people in a whole state? That's screwed up.

Don't even get me started on Texas, where the Democrats had both a primary and a caucus and everyone could vote twice in one day. Do you think this gives anyone confidence in the process? No.

2. Proportional awarding of delegates:

The Dems do it. The Republicans don't - preferring a winner take all system. The result? The Republicans have a candidate, the Dems have a train wreck.

Proportional allocation of delegates sounds fair, but it doesn't aid the nominating process. First of all, I would want to have a process that's similar to the general election, where electoral college votes are awarded winner take all in most states. Also, winner-take-all makes for convincing wins by a large majority and give the winner an implied "mandate" that is more effective in uniting a group at the end of the process.