# Would you like the American presidential campaign season to be shorter?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-the-american-presidential-campaign-season-to-be-shorter/463029>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [September 11, 2008, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-the-american-presidential-campaign-season-to-be-shorter/463029 "2008-09-11T00:05:56Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tastes_of_chocolate/32/3232_2.png) [@Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tastes_of_Chocolate)\
**Post date:** [September 12, 2008, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-the-american-presidential-campaign-season-to-be-shorter/463029/21 "2008-09-12T20:56:00Z")

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I’d be all for a fairly long primary season followed very quickly by the conventions and almost immediately after that by the election.

As mentioned above, having a drawn out primary season gives not-popular-at-first candidates an actual shot at getting a party endorsement. But once all the primaries/caucuses are over, have the conventions right away. Why bother waiting? The public has already voted. The delegates chosen. So vote already.

Once that’s over, why do we need another 3 months? What will be said in the last 3 months that really shouldn’t have been said all along? If a candidate knows that what they say leading up to the primaries is also what will be heard before the election, maybe we could cut down on some of the ugliness. Maybe it would lead to more of a campaign designed to define yourself, rather then define/misdefine the other person.

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**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\
**Post date:** [September 12, 2008, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-the-american-presidential-campaign-season-to-be-shorter/463029/22 "2008-09-12T21:44:22Z")

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You can pay as much or as little attention to the campaign as you like.

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**Author:** ![straight\_man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/straight_man/32/3027_2.png) [@straight\_man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/straight_man)\
**Post date:** [September 13, 2008, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-like-the-american-presidential-campaign-season-to-be-shorter/463029/23 "2008-09-13T02:26:18Z")

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> [@Grey](#):
>
> Strikes me that extended election cycles allows for a much more transparent vetting of candidates. Though to be fair, once a party leader is elected, Canadians do get to see more of their future leaders in action than Americans.

**Grey** , your cite does not match your claim. The American system is more democratic (as the article said) because of who votes, not how long they take to do so. But that’s not a fair comparison; we Canadians don’t really vote for our PM _at all_.

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