The Hill: Biden has broken all the 'rules' of presidential primaries

[UncleNoel]

https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/488162-biden-has-broken-all-the-rules-of-presidential-primaries

Snip//

A landslide in Florida, with the third-most Democratic convention delegates, and a decisive victory in Illinois, with the sixth-largest bloc, gives the former vice president a delegate lead of more than 300, and he'll rack up even more with a clear win in Arizona — a clean sweep.

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The Biden turnaround, going from front-runner a year ago to a failed candidacy a month ago, to inevitable nominee today, is unprecedented in American politics.

Every rule I learned in covering presidential politics for almost a half century has been broken, including:

No one loses both Iowa and New Hampshire and wins the nomination. An also-ran in these first contests loses momentum, money and political support. Serious contenders failed miserably to jump start campaigns. For the Democrats in 1976, Sen. Henry Jackson skipped New Hampshire — and when Jimmy Carter won the Granite State, it effectively ended Jackson's hopes. In 2008, the early Republican front-runner Rudy Giuliani — really he once was a serious person — figured he'd take off in the big Florida primary. But after John McCain won New Hampshire, support for “America’s Mayor” plummeted; he dropped out nine days before the Florida primary. Biden, however, finished fourth in Iowa, fifth in New Hampshire and is now on his way to November.

Endorsements don’t really matter in the modern media age. Witness the last two presidents. In 2007, the establishment candidate, Hillary Clinton, cornered scores of high-level endorsements — far more than Barack Obama — to little avail. Four years ago, about the only top Republican to endorse Donald Trump was Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions. (The president showed his sense of loyalty this month by endorsing Sessions' opponent in a primary.) Then there was Jim Clyburn. Joe Biden might have won the South Carolina primary last month anyway — but the eloquent endorsement of Rep. Clyburn, the most important African American office holder in the party, generated the Biden avalanche in South Carolina, carrying over to Super Tuesday three days later.

Money is the mother's milk of politics, especially if one candidate has a lot, the other very little. By Super Tuesday, Mike Bloomberg was spending more than a half a billion dollars, while Biden was too strapped to even have offices in some of the states in play. Biden won 10 of 14 states that day, picking up 632 delegates. Bloomberg won American Somoa. The “Big Mo” triumphed — momentum not money.