Is there enough time for Christie to make a comeback?

[Mr. Morden]

It's possible that none of Bush/Christie/Kasich/Rubio drop out before New Hampshire, but that they don't all maintain their current standing there.  I don't think we've ever had more than five GOP candidates win more than 5% of the vote in NH, yet current polls show 7 or 8 candidates with 5% or more there.  I don't know that that's sustainable.

As primary day approaches, I'd imagine that there'll be at least some consolidation of the vote down to a smaller number of candidates, even if no one actually drops out.  So maybe, for example, Kasich's support disintegrates and it largely goes to Christie, or something like that.  Doesn't mean that would be sufficient for Christie to win though.

[Mr. Morden]

Even if he can't make enough of a comeback to win the nomination, he might be able to make enough of a comeback to set himself up for 2020.  For Christie and a few of the other candidates, I wonder how much the 2020 race will factor into their decision on when to drop out of this race.

[Mr. Morden]

Even if he can't make enough of a comeback to win the nomination, he might be able to make enough of a comeback to set himself up for 2020.  For Christie and a few of the other candidates, I wonder how much the 2020 race will factor into their decision on when to drop out of this race.

I assume it'll be a big factor and deterrent to dropping out. They each want to be the last establishment candidate standing so if Cruz or Trump lose big, they can be the person the media is saying should have been the nominee.

I think that's right for Christie and Rubio.  I'm less clear on whether Bush and Kasich are interested in running again.

You really have to wonder what Republican officials expected to happen when they designed this year's primary system and schedule.

It isn't designed from the top down.  That is, yes, the RNC (in concert with the DNC) blessed IA/NH/NV/SC as the chosen four, but everything after that was left to individual state legislatures to decide.

[Mr. Morden]

It isn't designed from the top down.  That is, yes, the RNC (in concert with the DNC) blessed IA/NH/NV/SC as the chosen four, but everything after that was left to individual state legislatures to decide.

They could easily have made up some excuse of "respecting the rights of the early states" to impose delegate penalties on these states for going early. Or subtly encouraged the establishment friendly states to also go in the beginning of March to create a 2008-style Super Tuesday.

Well, there are delegate penalties for going early.  The penalty is that you can't use WTA delegate allocation.  If it does turn out that this race is a Democrats 2008-esque delegate maximizing marathon rather than a momentum race, then the later states will have disproportionate power.

[Yes, as I've said before, there are only something like 7 or 8 states that are statewide WTA, but the later states are also more likely to be WTA by congressional district.  California, for example, is WTA by congressional district, plus an additional share of delegates that are WTA for the statewide winner.]