The Presidential Secondary

This commentary was written by CBSNews.com's Dick Meyer.

The primary campaign will be over in less than 45 days and the candidates are bloody and their prospects deeply uncertain. The 2008 race remains a tough one to handicap, even this far along.

Whoa, you say, the primaries haven't begun. Wrong. The primaries began last winter when candidates began announcing the pre-announcement and then announced their announcements and then announced. The candidates have debated more times than Lincoln and Douglass ever shook hands. They have been on the Sunday shows for a year, they have cut on each other and they have aired ads.

Nope, the primary campaign is over.

On January 3 in Iowa the Presidential Secondary opens. Thanks to the nearly kaput primary campaign, candidates who had stature nine months ago now look like Lilliputians. Imagine how puny they'll seem by November 2008. Americans will resoundingly vote for relief, sending out a national cry of "Uncle! We give up."

The Democrats at least have a front-runner in the form of Hillary Clinton. Many Democrats believe she is unelectable, of course, but she is the front-runner. And she seems especially unelectable in theory. That is, the concept of "Hillary" does not work as a victorious American president. But the reality of Hillary versus Barack, John E., Rudy, Fred, Mitt, Mike H. or John McC. works better than any other equation. Hence, she is the front-runner.

Many, especially Obama fans, are saddened to see the Democratic primary campaign turning so snarky. Campaigns have simply become very skilled at tearing down opponents and very bad at building public admiration. The great hope was that Barack Obama might change that skill set. Not going to happen and that is a bummer.

John McCain's fans suffered similarly. McCain was to straight talk as Obama was to positive talk. McCain, like Obama, was the charisma leader in their posse. Such factors matter little in 24-month campaigns where every voter is a pundit, every sound bite is YouTube fodder and every utterance is repeated ad nauseum.

So McCain is behind the pack, sometimes trailing Mike Huckabee and Fred Thompson.

Rudy Giuliani is the front-runner in his gang. But there's a problem. Mitt Romney is leading in Iowa and New Hampshire. Most handicappers don't believe that Rudy can lose the first two big Secondary races and still be the front-runner. And most-experienced Rudy watchers don't believe the Mayor will handle electoral adversity with grace and aplomb.

So in the Secondary campaign there is tremendous opportunity to further diminish the candidates' stature, the legitimacy of the presidential selection process and the credibility of the American press corps.

Of course, things really won't turn sour until the general election. And if history is a guide, the next president will have an awfully hard time actually governing.

E-mail questions, comments, complaints, arguments and ideas to Against the Grain. We will publish some of the interesting (and civil) ones, sometimes in edited form.
By Dick Meyer