... but do the Democrats always have their convention before the Republicans? Or is it like baseball where the league that wins the All-Star game gets home field advantage (with the party in power being the "winner" of the last "All-Star game"?). Just wonderin"...
Your first bleg!
ReplyDeleteI believe it's the case that the party with the incumbent president goes second, at least in the modern era. Half-hearted Googling didn't get me a succinct statement of this rule (or convention!) from an authoritative source, but the Wikipedia entries for the Democratic and Republican support my memory.
The past forty years:
2008 -- Bush (R) incumbent:
Dems: August 25-28
Reps: September 1-4
2008 -- Bush (R) incumbent:
Dems: July 26-29
Reps: August 30-September 2
2000 -- Clinton (D) incumbent:
Reps: July 31-August 3, 2000
Dems: August 14-17, 2000
1996 -- Clinton (D) incumbent:
Reps: August 12-15
Dems: August 26-29
1992 -- Bush (R) incumbent:
Dems: July 13-16
Reps: August 17-20
1988 -- Reagan (R) incumbent:
Dems: July 18-21
Reps: August 15-18
1984 -- Reagan (R) incumbent:
Dems: July 16-19
Reps: August 20-23
1980 -- Carter (D) incumbent:
Reps: July 14-17
Dems: August 11-14
1976 -- Ford (R) incumbent:
Dems: July 12-15
Reps: August 16-19
1972 -- Nixon (R) incumbent:
Dems: July 10-13
Reps: August 21-23
1968 -- Johnson (D) incumbent:
Reps: August 5-8
Dems: August 26-29
By the way, half-hearted Googling did lead me to a forum on Sean Hannity's site, in which the wingnuts were whining about the Democrats "always" getting to go first. For example:
"It seems the Democrates always get the upper hard no matter what."
Don't click that last link unless you have strong drink at hand. It's a powerful argument against an open Internet, not to mention democracy.
... support my memory.
ReplyDeleteNot, however, well enough to cause me to remember to preface this phrase with the word conventions.
Brendan,
ReplyDeleteHey, maybe it is my first bleg. And it worked! Thanks for the info!
BTW, Brendan, I clicked on the link and, for some reason, my IP is banned from the site...
ReplyDeleteThe Hannity forums site? That's interesting. I wonder if it's to do with your ISP in particular, or any overseas ISP. Knowing Hannity, I wouldn't be surprised at the latter.
ReplyDeleteI don't like banning, especially just for viewing, but if you had to have one site on the entire Web that you couldn't go to, that'd be a good one.