Let the Real Race Begin

Isn't it fascinating that we have an actual, for real political race in both parties this year? I for one have been totally put off by politics for decades now as we've had a series of shoe in candidates or inept candidates or decisions between candidates that were the lesser of two evils. Now we have a variety of people with very different personalities and no one to date has the clear advantage. We've eliminated some of the pretenders and we're down to the legitimate contenders and a couple of spoilers.

Before the election of Ronald Reagan, presidential political conventions were often tumultuous affairs where there were many rounds of voting until via back room wheeling and dealing a candidate was finally chosen. Subsequently, most of the years since, candidates have already had the nomination locked up before the convention. Wouldn't be great if this was a throw back to that prior time. Here's how it happens. You need the third candidate (Edwards and Huckabee) to each stay in the race to the end and have enough delegates to prevent either of the front runners from having a clear majority. Then you go into the convention where on the first (and maybe the second, I don't actually remember all the rules) round each delegate has to vote for the candidate that they were elected for.

Now here is the cool part. After that first round, when nobody has a majority every delegate is up for grabs. They can now change candidates, vote for people who weren't even in the primaries. That's what I'm hoping for - a real electoral circus. For more information on what can happen read this.