US presidential election campaigns are protracted events with few limits on what candidates can say or do. They are a drawnout ‘election cycle’ which bores and frustrates most Americans. For evidence that elections are too long, look no further than Larry Sabato’s excellent book covering the 2008 election. The title is the giveaway. It’s called Marathon.
They might also be thought of as the electoral equivalent of an Iron Man, a gruelling multi-discipline endurance test. Presidential elections now comprise three such tests — the pre-primary season of intraparty debates and fundraising; the formal primary nomination process; and the campaign between the two main party nominees. True, the USA is a sprawling, diverse, regionally differentiated, federal country, but so too is Canada. The latter can manage an election cycle that produces a government in less than 6 weeks. The USA takes 2 years. No wonder most Americans (and outsiders) feel numbed and stunned by the whole process.
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