FOR A primary that yielded only half the number of Republican delegates it might have, and that did not quite count on the Democratic side, Tuesday's contest in Florida clarified the presidential campaign considerably. Each party now has just two viable candidates - John McCain and Mitt Romney for the Republicans, and Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for the Democrats.
As such, Florida's primary exemplified a nomination process that began far too early and may be over far too quickly.
The shift in the landscape was particularly quick in the Republican race, which previously had been muddled. And the key to that shift was the evaporation of Republican Rudy Giuliani's campaign. No, John Edwards's exit from the Democratic contest yesterday wasn't a shock; Florida was, at most, the last straw. From the start he had trouble elbowing his way past his party's two high-profile front-runners. And, no, the fourth-place finish that marginalized Republican Mike Huckabee wasn't jaw-dropping, either; the former Arkansas governor seemed to peak in Iowa.
As for Giuliani, political junkies will be studying his implosion for years to come - for lessons in how not to run a presidential campaign. His decision to ignore or explicitly concede the first handful of primary and caucus states would have seemed brilliant had it worked. But the quaint, timeworn practice of "retail politics" - of building popularity and political momentum by working the voters in places such as Des Moines and Nashua - has some life in it yet. And actually competing in early primaries turns out to be a good strategy for winning later ones.
In some ways, the Democratic contest in Florida was even stranger. The state lost half of its Republican delegates and all of its Democratic ones by violating party rules that forbade most states to hold primaries before Feb. 5. Democratic candidates were forbidden to campaign there. Still, Clinton sought to have it both ways. After winning the symbolic Democratic vote - and perhaps in need of a boost after Democratic stalwart Edward Kennedy endorsed Obama - she rushed to Florida to tout her victory.
Both nomination battles could be resolved as soon as next Tuesday. If so, perhaps the subsequent nine months of jockeying between the major-parties' nominees will finally convince Congress of the need to step in and reform the presidential primary calendar.
For his part, Edwards sent a bracing message to the remaining contenders of both parties by ending his own candidacy where he started it - amid the despair and hope of New Orleans's flood-damaged Ninth Ward. Inside the bubble of presidential politics, one might forget: It isn't even February, and a great many Americans are confronting problems more immediate than a far-off general election.
