The unforgiving minute: Our fools

If anything, The Vagabond Scholar is too kind to the two states enjoying the pride of place in the presidential election cycle:

[W]hile the Iowa Caucus does hold some real consequences (candidates with very low numbers dropping out), there's no doubt that its importance is massively and artificially inflated. It should not hold the prominence it does. The same goes (to a lesser degree) for the New Hampshire Primary. Their predictive value regarding the eventual nominee is quite poor, and neither state is populous or demographically representative of the nation as a whole.

Read more at TVS's post about the traveling kabuki theater that is the quadrennial cycle of Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina.

Other states look at the system as it's played out so far and say to themselves, Yes, if we were first in the nation, our voters would probably looks like fools, too -- but they'd be our fools.

Minute's up.