Brokerage

I've been trying, desperately, to hold off on idle speculation about a brokered Republican convention. This is the kind of thing journalists love to speculate about, but it's very, very, very unlikely. That said, I write a ton of blog posts. And with each day that passes without a clear shape emerging to the Republican race the temptation grows deeper. And now that Charles Babbington's speculating for the AP, I say let's let the gates slip.

My take is that the insider CW drastically overestimates the idea that such a convention would be a disaster for the party that held it. In general, I think the whole line of thought that's led both parties to conclude in recent cycles that short primary campaigns are beneficial doesn't make a ton of sense to me. To me, the longer the campaign continues, the longer the candidates get tons and tons of free media attention. Things like debates and cable networks showing clips of candidates speaking at rallies and pictures of supporters waving signs are all good for the candidate. The main form of negative media attention a candidate gets during a primary are process stories in the wake of a defeat (see, e.g., Dean after Iowa in 2004, Clinton after Iowa in 2008, McCain during his big collapse in national poll numbers in 2007) but that kind of thing is primarily a problem for whoever wins.

A GOP race that goes all the way to the convention would be a huge, fascinating, and dramatic story that would direct attention away from the star-studded Clinton-Obama race in a probably beneficial way. And it would still leave the eventual winner with plenty of time to make his case to the American people. One of the great ironies of the evolution of presidential politics is that the campaign seasons have been getting longer at the very same time that the rise of cable news and the internet has made it possible for candidates to rise and fall faster than ever. Obviously, the GOP is looking at a generally adverse political climate this year so the odds favor them losing no matter what happens, but I think an extended race could easily wind up helping.

Comments

A GOP race that goes all the way to the convention would be a huge, fascinating, and dramatic story that would direct attention away from the star-studded Clinton-Obama race in a probably beneficial way. And it would still leave the eventual winner with plenty of time to make his case to the American people.

How? By opening up the freakshow that is the twitching, dismembered Reagan coalition? It seems to me that such a convention would be much, much harder to control in image and message, the nativists and theocrats foaming at the mouth and plutocrats clutching their pearls.

Oh, wait. You were doing that reverse-psychology thing, weren't you.

Sorry.
.

Posted by Grand Moff Texan | January 17, 2008 4:50 PM

Obviously, the GOP is looking at a generally adverse political climate this year so the odds favor them losing no matter what happens, but I think an extended race could easily wind up helping.

This makes a lot of sense. What I think is missing is some mention of the discomfort that many Republican voters are going feel about an uncertain outcome and a divided party. While hardly anyone, certainly, will fail to pay attention to a long Republican primary, they may be less likely to get motivated enough to go out and vote for a compromise candidate.

Posted by southpaw | January 17, 2008 4:51 PM

I think it's a great point, though I think the Republican party leverages even more upon authenticity, and tends to see compromise as an antonym.

On a seperate point, did you mean "primarily a problem for whoever *loses*"? Maybe I'm not following.

Posted by Devin | January 17, 2008 4:51 PM

I suspect the effect of a brokered convention would be whatever the media end up assigning to it. If you have talking heads and op-ed'ers blathering about how pathetic it is that the party can't manage to pick a nominee, then it'll be negative. Otherwise, perhaps not.

My take is that long primaries are the biggest problem when you have voters really getting emotionally invested in one or another candidate and getting devastated when that candidate finally loses, with the accompanying magnification of hatred for that candidate's victorious opponent. If a brokered convention comes to pass, the one who emerges might well and truly be loathed by 80% of his party.

Posted by phil | January 17, 2008 4:54 PM

I just don't see how it's practically possible. You only need a simple majority (unlike the Dem. conventions of old), and there will be too much immediate horsetrading, that I figure two minutes after the last primary, someone will have made a deal with another (or two other) candidates.

No one has an incentive to hold out in a simple majority scenario. Everyone has an incentive to make an immediate (and presumably durable) coalition. That involves an immediate coalition, made public right away. (Using publicity as the enforcer.) So no drama at the actual convention.

Posted by gfw | January 17, 2008 4:56 PM

Mr. Yglesias opines that a brokered convention might be good for the Rethuglicans. However, suppose such a convention chooses someone who did not compete in the primaries (remember Hubert Humphrey in 1968). The amount of ill will that would be generated by the supporters of those who did compete might cause some of them not only to opt out of working for the nominee but even to stay home in November. It is also not clear who such a person might be. Fortunately for the Democrats, the Governor of California is ineligible to run. President Bushes' brother, Jeb, would be saddled with his inept handling of the Terri Schiavo case. Former Senator Allen inflicted too many wounds on himself during his loss of his senate seat in 2006. The current Rethuglican governors of Florida and Texas are closet fags. Not a very deep bench.

Posted by SLC | January 17, 2008 4:57 PM

The television show "West Wing" had a plotline where this happened for Democrats, and I thought their take on it was pretty plausible.

Basically, all the talking heads are babbling about how it shows disorganization, etc. But the net result is that regular people actually watch the convention b/c its interesting. And since conventions put the party in a pretty positive light, it winds up being a huge help.

I think if either party is allowed to present its message to voters---with no rebuttal by the other side or filtering by the media---it generally helps the party.

Posted by JoshA | January 17, 2008 4:58 PM

No. This is just being contrarian. Imagine you're a spectator watching the Celtics win one game. Now imagine you're a spectator watching the Miami Heat play an entire season. Of which team will you have a better impression at the end?

Posted by lampwick | January 17, 2008 5:04 PM

And it would still leave the eventual winner with plenty of time to make his case to the American people.

uhhh... not exactly.

This year, because of the Olympics, etc. the Republican Convention will *start* on Labor Day the latest in modern memory - and quite possibly the latest in history. There will only be a whirlwind 8 week fall campaign before the election. If the convention isn't a lovefest (and brokered conventions could quite possibly get very ugly), there isn't the traditional summer lull to repair the damage and do the backroom stuff that reunites the party.

The best scenario to come out of a brokered convention would be to draft an entirely new name - one without campaign baggage and who would capture the imagination of the media before there was time for a backlash.

Lots of parallels actually to the Republican 1940 race - complete with crime-fighting NYer (Dewey) wilting in the spotlight - and the Republicans being torn apart by their various constituencies and a large field of candidates - basically united only by a hatred of FDR under a backdrop of threatened national security. Can you say Wendall Willkie?

Posted by Ethel-to-Tilly | January 17, 2008 5:05 PM

The main form of negative media attention a candidate gets during a primary are process stories in the wake of a defeat

No I don't think so. I think the real problem is the candidates run the risk of getting too vicious with each other and spend months in negative campaigning. This leads to people watching the news in fascination, but mostly coming away with an image of the party as bitter, petty, and angry.

Which is where the Republicans are heading, no doubt.

Posted by right | January 17, 2008 5:07 PM

I just don't see how it's practically possible. You only need a simple majority (unlike the Dem. conventions of old), and there will be too much immediate horsetrading, that I figure two minutes after the last primary, someone will have made a deal with another (or two other) candidates.

This is right. The conceit here is that there would be so much personal animus between the three or four top candidates that no deals of this sort could get done, which seems deeply implausible to me.

Posted by Brad L | January 17, 2008 5:09 PM

Damn, another anti-Ron Paul post.

Matt, when will you learn? He is going to be the next President of the U.S.

Everything else written between now and election day is just noise.

Please stop with the smears, already.

Posted by SoCalJustice | January 17, 2008 5:10 PM

I believe that there is a possibility that the DEMs will also end up on a floor fight.

Posted by jojo | January 17, 2008 5:12 PM

I only agree that a brokered convention will help the Republican nominee if a lot of things go right at the convention. And when a convention isn't stage-managed, as a brokered convention can't really be, then there's a lot of potential for things going wrong, particularly intra-party resentments coming to the fore. True, this sort of thing was a bigger risk for, say, 1960s-vintage Democratic conventions, what with those contradictions between folks like James Eastland and folks like George McGovern. While I don't think that the current Republican fractures are as serious as that, there's not a lot of love in true-believer GOPland for McCain or Huckabee, and I'd love to see an airing of dirty laundry.

Posted by honestpartisan | January 17, 2008 5:17 PM

I am confused. Matt says several times that he thinks a brokered conventional would actually help, and the only reason he offers is that it would increase media attention. Why does increased media attention necessarily help the Republicans? Won't it depend on what happens during the rest of the primary and the convention and how the story is framed by the media? Sure, it could help if the media give the Republicans net positive coverage, but is Matt saying that it helps the Republicans even if the media gives net negative coverage? That is not an obvious conclusion.

Posted by blah | January 17, 2008 5:20 PM

Matt has written a post that is actually sensible. The problem for the party that finishes the primary race early is that the public has more time to get sick and tired of its nominee. If Hillary or Obama wraps the process up early, and becomes the only Democratic face in the news every day, people will have months to decide that Hillary is like nails on a blackboard, or that Obama looks good but is too shallow, and that they don't want to live with them on a daily basis for the next four years.

Posted by Gary Imhoff | January 17, 2008 5:21 PM

jojo,

I think that you're right, and I'd go even further. I think that the Dem convention is *more* likely to end up on the floor, because Edwards has already said he is going to the convention, and Clinton seems like she would too, based on her temperament. If they refuse to deal until the convention, then it goes to the floor. But it seems like Obama and Edwards would make a deal of some sort (VP or otherwise). There are also far more superdelagates in the Democratic convention, so they presumably could vote "present" for a couple of ballots. (I think that's possible, but maybe not.) And since superdelegates are pretty much uncommitted (although they usually endorse) the first ballot will hold some uncertainty.

Does anyone know, can delegates vote present or abstain and thereby prevent a majority? Is it the majority of votes cast? Is it a majority of certified delegates?

Posted by gfw | January 17, 2008 5:21 PM

Blah, I think the operative phrase here is "all things being equal."

Posted by gfw | January 17, 2008 5:24 PM

I did some (admittedly crude) statistical investigations into this topic years and years ago.

What I found was that competition for the opposition-party nomination had little effect on the outcome. On the other hand, competition in the incumbent President's party had a huge effect. The more competition for the nomination, the more likely that the incumbent party would lose.

Now I just found a correlation, and correlation doesn't prove causation, etc. etc. Nevertheless, if the GOP has a brokered convention I'll bet good money that they lose.

Posted by Matt Stevens | January 17, 2008 5:28 PM

Blah, I think the operative phrase here is "all things being equal."

I am not sure what you mean.

Posted by blah | January 17, 2008 5:28 PM

If the Republicans had the same delegate selection methods as the Democrats, this would be a real serious possibility. The Republicans may well get saved by the fact that the winner of a state gets disproportionately more delegates than those who came in second or third. The winners of California and Texas will thus get a huge advantage going into the convention. California is probably where Mitt Romney should direct his organization at this point. Huckabee is the loser in this delegate distribution system, as he hardly gets any delegates for third place performances in the high teens. However, if the East favors McCain, the West favors Romney, and the South favors Huckabee then we might be in for quite a show.

Posted by Robert | January 17, 2008 5:39 PM

What I found was that competition for the opposition-party nomination had little effect on the outcome. On the other hand, competition in the incumbent President's party had a huge effect.

Was this true regardless of whether it was the President himself who was on the ticket? I think it's pretty well established that a strong primary challenge to a sitting President is one of the most obvious causes of recent one-term presidencies (Bush I - Buchanan, Carter - Kennedy, Ford - Reagan, LBJ - McCarthy, etc.). I'd be surprised to learn the same holds for other cases.

Posted by right | January 17, 2008 5:45 PM

Yglesias pretty much invokes the Faster Feiler Thesis of which Mickey Kaus is a devoted adherent. Is it plausible that several months of uncertainty of who the GOP nominee is going to be, coupled with absolute certainty of who the Dems are going to nominate (and all the GOP candidates training their fire on that person), followed by a brokered convention that effectively reintroduces one of these guys and provides that person with a huge bump--that all this could really help the GOP.

On the other hand, what could also happen is that the GOP candidates might spend all their time attacking each other, and one party would have a standard-bearer while another one wouldn't. Throw in a vicious nominating convention, producing a candidate that isn't too popular (let's just say Romney), and it could just as easily lead to a Nixon '72 style romp in reverse.

So, it could turn out either way. What would be interesting is if both parties wound up having brokered conventions--a possibility, certainly. Since the Democrats' primaries prefer proportional allocation of delegates to winner-take-all, it is entirely conceivable that HRC sweeps Super Tuesday, gets something like 45% of the delegates in every state, and still loses if Obama manages to get 35% and Edwards gets 15%. Now that would get ugly.

Posted by Lev | January 17, 2008 5:49 PM

Was this true regardless of whether it was the President himself who was on the ticket?

Yep!

Posted by Matt Stevens | January 17, 2008 6:26 PM

To me, the longer the campaign continues, the longer the candidates get tons and tons of free media attention.

They get free media attention, but the field as a whole burns through money all the time, rather than having it to save for the general.

Posted by DonBoy | January 17, 2008 7:54 PM

If no one wins a majority of the delegates during the primary season--and I think that hinges on whether Giuliani and either Huckabee or Thompson can win a few states--then I think a pre-convention deal would be absolutely poisonous for the GOP. Likely, but poisonous, since whoever is on the outs (such as Huckabee's Maccabees) will probably stay at home come the election.

Better a brokered convention with a surprise nominee, who as Matt says can avoid the six months of bad press that Hillary, Obama or Edwards will accumulate. I still think Cheney's the GOP's best shot of winning in November and that a brokered convention is the way to make it happen--you know, the whole patriot-answering-the-call-to-duty-in-the-nation's-hour-of-need thing.

The other "waiting in the wings" candidates are totally unviable: Gingrich can't help from sounding like a lunatic, Jeb looks to have directed state funds into the credit shitpile plus the whole Schiavo fiasco, Colin Powell destroyed his reputation working for Bush. You could see maybe going deeper on the bench to someone like Mike Pence or nominating Liddy Dole or Kay Bailey Hutchinson as some sort of "me too" historicism. But Cheney as the reluctant warrior would be awesome, and I say that as someone who hopes he one day sits in a cell at The Hague.

Posted by jlw | January 17, 2008 7:57 PM

Faux News announcer on the 6th day of the convention: "And the crowd lining up to f*****e 'Jeb' Bush stretches over the horizon. Please, reconsider, they say. Save us from ourselves!"

Posted by Jeffrey Davis | January 17, 2008 8:32 PM

If Giuliani wins a primary, any primary at this point in his flagging campaign, a brokered convention is likely with 4 candidates capable of winning the nomination having won a primary. If Thompson wins a primary like SC, not so much, but if both Thompson and Giuliani win one, look out.

Posted by Mitch Schindler | January 17, 2008 8:35 PM

I'm telling you, it ain't gonna go that far. The business cabal that controls the Repubs will get together in a secret location and pick a nominee long before the convention. I think they're gonna pick Romney. He'll lose the election, but the cabal will retain control of the party. The idea that they'll let Huckleberry or McInane win is foolish. Of course, the theocrats will cry foul and try to leave the party but the business types will say "Where ya gonna go preachy-boy, to the Democrats?". It's all in Revelations, people!

Posted by Rihilism | January 17, 2008 10:25 PM

Gary Imhoff @ 5:21 PM:

precisely!

and not only will they grow sick of them, they won't bother to go out and vote for them, unless fresh emotional controversies can be drummed up that appeal to a large audience.

It's a good bet that unless there is new major terrorism or military adventures, we won't be hearing much about Bush in the major media news from now on. That means lots of people will end up thinking along the lines of already having lived with the frontrunner candidates as president for many months, already at the stage of wanting to "throw those bums out," not realizing they haven't been elected yet. :-)

Posted by artappraiser | January 17, 2008 10:40 PM

JLW 7:57pm: If Powell's reputation is ruined, then what of Cheney's?! Does he get points for being a good puppetmaster?

Posted by nbt | January 17, 2008 11:20 PM

The real problem with a contested convention

Those of us who think that a contested convention for either party, but more so for the Republicans, would likely be a disaster, don't think that the main reason would be the delay in ending the nomination process until the convention. That set of concerns is minor and tactical, and could very well, as Yglesias maintains, actually be an advantage. The real problem is that the contested convention itself would probably not work well at all as a means of arriving at a choice of nominee.

We used to have working conventions, at which representatives from the state parties would gather to choose their presidential nominee, because we used to have functioning national and state parties. We stopped having working conventions because we stopped having functioning parties. What we have now instead of parties are campaigns, each working to capture the party brand for that cycle. The delegates this year, unlike as little as 50 years ago, will be attending as representatives of campaigns, not local parties. If one of these campaigns hasn't won before the convention, or if two of them can't (because not even any two candidates combined have enough votes for a first-ballot win), or won't (because of the ideological divides or personal animosity) reach a deal to capture the brand between them, then it's hard to see what identity or role beyond representing their candidates the delegates will have to fall back on to move beyond supporting their candidates.

To put this another way. In the bad old days, candidates had to assemble a coalition of local party chieftains to win the nomination. Nowadays, we don't have such chieftains, and candidates have to appeal to voters in primaries directly. If they succeed, that gives them the right to name delegates loyal to them to go to the convention. Instead of the candidates being the creations of the delegates who attend the convention because these delegates are the party, we now have a convention made up of the creations of the candidates, who attend because the candidate created them to serve his or her candidacy. An old-style convention would often be replete with messy conflict and corrupt bargains, but it could at least, at the end of the bargaining, create a candidate, because it was the party. Our new-style conventions are marvels of order in comparison, but that's only because the delegates are mere creatures following orders, and always, at least, perhaps, until this year, the controlling majority has taken its orders from the one candidate who has already taken over the brand.

Even the messy old-style conventions will seem like marvels of order compared to what will happen if no one candidate, or coalition thereof, manages to control a majority by the opening of the convention. The delegates will not be the party, local chieftains with an on-going place in any local party power structure, so when their identity as servants of the various candidacy fails to get them a nominee, which, by definition, will be the case if no candidate/coalition has reached a lock by opening day, they will have to fall back on their identity as adherents of one of the bizarre zoo of ideologies which is the Republican Party in deciding who gets to be the candidate. The resulting fracas will no doubt produce many interesting things, but probably not a candidate.

Posted by Glen Tomkins | January 17, 2008 11:42 PM

Matt,

What's it going to take for you to write a blog post about a brokered DEMOCRATIC convention? If Clinton and Obama are tied after Feb. 5?

Clinton/Obama or Obama/Clinton '08

Posted by DemUnity08 | January 18, 2008 12:10 AM

The only way I see a brokered convention helping R's is if they go way out to uncharted waters for their nominee and pick someone like Lugar. He's on the outs with the party insiders, but not as badly as the guy from NE.

There will be time between the last primary and the convention. If it is apparent that there is no clear winner, every last cent of funds will be spent destroying the other candidates. Every favor ever earned from a reporter will be called in to spread the most vicious stories possible.

The same party that raised the fake mob at the Florida recount will raise larger, REAL mobs, protesting eachother.

Posted by Njorl | January 18, 2008 12:25 AM

"I've been trying, desperately, to hold off on idle speculation about a brokered Republican convention."

Why? You've never held off on idle speculation before.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | January 18, 2008 12:32 AM

I worry deeply about the Democratic race ending early while Republican race drags on till the convention. As soon as it's clear who the Democratic nominee is, every one of the Republican candidates will turn to bashing the new Democratic candidate full time as they argue that they are the one who can beat our candidate. If the Democratic race ends on Super Tuesday and the Republican race doesn't (as seems fairly likely) the Republican ads in the remaining states may well even wind up attacking our candidate, but since we won't know who the Republican nominee is we won't be able to fire back with our own attack ads. So it seems like a very dangerous situation to me.

Posted by Elliot Reed | January 18, 2008 12:52 AM

I've thought the same thing on the Dem side, a long campaign helps. This year it would help tremendously. Not only would 2 or 3 candidates that have very similar views be on TV more often, the issues they care about would be discussed more often.

On the Republican side its a little different since there are significant differences between the candidates on many issues. I don't see how the divides between them could be easily bridged and people who supported a candidate who didn't get the nomination would likely stay home.

Posted by crack | January 18, 2008 5:07 PM