Looks like the Democrats are really working for a new strategy in 2008:

Democrats are laying aside the debate over issues and philosophy and turning to something more prosaic — rejiggering the political calendar — as a way to boost the party’s White House prospects in 2008.

Barring a last-minute shift, Democratic leaders meeting here are expected to add Nevada and South Carolina to the states that hold early primaries, alongside perennials Iowa and New Hampshire.

The move is the main business at the Democratic National Committee’s summer meeting, which opened Thursday in Chicago. It would be the most significant change in the presidential nominating process in years, and hasten the front-loading that has already transformed the contest from a months-long slog into a sprint lasting just a few weeks.

Many political observers in Iowa and New Hampshire bitterly oppose the change; there is even talk of pushing their balloting into late 2007 to leapfrog any interlopers and preserve New Hampshire’s historic preeminence. The proposal also has produced more than a few knocks on Nevada and the louche life associated with Las Vegas.

“It is said that the Democratic Party has a moral values problem,” Ken Bode, a veteran political analyst now teaching at DePauw University in Indiana, wrote in a recent Indianapolis Star commentary. “Adding images of flying dice and spinning slot machines with the surrounding sex industry isn’t likely to help.”

But leaders of the national party appear undeterred.

Actually I have serious problems with the current primary system. The way it is set up, a handful of states get to elect the nominee for both parties. I would love to see a system set up where all states hold their presidential primaries on the same day. This would prevent victories in key states such as Iowa and New Hampshire from affecting the outcome of the remaining states and remove any effect they have on voter turnout in states that hold later primaries.

That being said, the bigger problem I have is this part:

“It is said that the Democratic Party has a moral values problem,” Ken Bode, a veteran political analyst now teaching at DePauw University in Indiana, wrote in a recent Indianapolis Star commentary. “Adding images of flying dice and spinning slot machines with the surrounding sex industry isn’t likely to help.”

Politics and moral issues should be to completely separate subjects. The intertwining of politics and morals is something that has taken precedence in recent years and is a very dangerous mixture in a democracy.

It is also not that the Democratic Party “has a moral values problem”. On the contrary, the Democrats are very moral and believe that too each his own. If someone wants to go out and gamble their money then that is their decision, so long as they do not break any laws in the process. The Republican Party, you know – the party of “small government”, has taken this stance that everything they morally object to should be banned by law. Not only does this strip away from the decision process, in life matters, of our citizens, but it also adds an enormous burden onto our government. Keep outlawing things and you have to hire people to enforce these new laws.

So what we need to do is rework the primary process to where all primaries around the country are held on the same date. This of course would only have to happen every four years. We also need to look at the actual performance of the candidates and not judge them on moral issues, which also tie closely to religious issues. If we let religion and morals dictate laws within our nation then we are one our way to becoming the very same nation that the pilgrims fled from over 500 years ago.