Let the GAME BEGIN!

THE PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARIES MAY BE CONFUSING, DISORGANIZED, AND NOT ENTIRELY FAIR. BUT AT LEAST THEY'RE AMUSING. ONE OF AMERICA'S LEADING POLITICAL COMMENTATORS TAKES A LOOK AT HOW THEY WORK--AND HOW THEY DON'T.

Al Gore has been trying so hard to be exciting as he campaigns in the Democratic primary, that if he keeps it up he'll rupture his vocal cords before the New Hampshire primary on February 1. The new Al Gore has been yelling, trying to make up in decibels what he lacks in spontaneity.

"I am not satisfied! INDEED I AM RESTLESS!" the Vice President cried in Carthage, Tennessee, announcing his candidacy for President with a list of promises about what he would do to move the country TOWARD AMERICA'S NEW HORIZONS!

On the Republican side, the picture isn't much prettier. In the primary debates so far, Texas Governor George W. Bush has demonstrated his incredible ability to respond to virtually any question by pointing out that he has been elected Governor twice in Texas. He even responded this way when the original question was about what he reads.

Think of the Presidential primaries as one of those made-for-TV sports events in which the competitors climb, swim, race, bicycle, and maybe hop across a field in a potato sack before they reach the finish line. You may not be sure what it means, but you do know the winner did it better than anybody else.

The goal here is to nominate a Republican and a Democratic candidate for President. The game begins January 24 with the Iowa caucuses, in which voters choose delegates to the national convention, where they in turn will choose the party's nominee. The Iowa caucuses are not a very scientific measure of whom the country as a whole would like to make President. Iowa's a farm state, with few minority residents and no big cities.

But because it's first, it has taken on significance. Virtually every candidate has been campaigning in Iowa for months, promising to do everything under the sun to help family farmers. If Bush, the Republican favorite, loses in Iowa--or even wins by a smaller margin than anticipated--it will be seen as a sign of weakness. On the Democratic side, Gore must win convincingly, or the public will begin to ask whether his opponent, Bill Bradley, is gaining momentum.

AMID THE ALIEN CORN

A good sign of the power of the Iowa caucus is the ethanol subsidy. Ethanol is a fuel made from corn, and although the federal government has poured about $10 billion into a program subsidizing ethanol use, it still isn't very popular or economical. The Iowa corn farmers, however, don't want to hear any talk about ending a program that buys up so much corn.

Republican candidates Bush and Steve Forbes, who normally oppose federal intervention in the world of business, suddenly sing a very different tune when the subject is federal money for ethanol. The Democratic candidates support the subsidies, too. Bradley opposed them when he was a Senator, but he says that after a few months of campaigning in Iowa he saw the light. Only Republican candidate John McCain, who is pitching himself as the candidate whom votes can't buy, has come out against the gas substitute.

LESS THAN ZERO

Once Iowa is over, it's off to New Hampshire on February 1. New Hampshire's extremely cold climate enables us to determine how many of the contenders plan to follow the old tradition, pioneered by John Kennedy when he was running for President in 1960, of not wearing an overcoat.

"The report was that Kennedy had long underwear on, but he denied it," says Michael York, the state librarian.

This time of year, you always start worrying about the William Henry Harrison effect. Harrison, a candidate for President in 1840, was troubled by talk that, at 67, he was too old for the job. (One newspaper called him "a living mass of ruined matter.") Harrison decided to demonstrate his youthful endurance by giving extremely long speeches, the longest of which was his inauguration speech, which he delivered during an icy downpour. He died a month later of pneumonia.

UNDERDOG FIGHT

New Hampshire is the capital of what politicians call "retail campaigning"--town meetings and other small gatherings where people can meet and talk to the candidates in person. New Hampshire voters also like to show their independence by favoring underdogs. In 1964, when there were several well-financed, high-profile Republican candidates for President, New Hampshire voters decided they didn't want any of them, and gave their primary victory to Henry Cabot Lodge, the ambassador to Vietnam, who wasn't even on the ballot. Voters wrote his name in anyway.

The next big test after New Hampshire comes on March 7, with an explosion of 13 primaries and caucuses across the country, including New York, California, Ohio, and most of New England. Then the campaign will shift from retail to wholesale. With little time for talking to voters in person, the fight will be waged mainly in TV commercials and sound bites on the 6 o'clock news. This is where the underdogs and the underfinanced hit the wall.

It is also when having the support of the party establishment becomes crucial. Gore, backed by most Democratic party officials, will be using their help to get out the vote, organize rallies, and get volunteers to hand out campaign literature at the polls. Bush has all that organizational support too, as well as more than $60 million in donations. Even if Bradley and McCain have been doing well until this point, they will have their work cut out for them.

THE FAT LADY SINGS EARLY

By the time most of the Southern states hold their primaries on March 14, we'll probably know who the nominees are. One of the confusing facts about the system is that the voters are actually choosing delegates to go to the party conventions next summer, where the nominees will be officially selected. After California, New York, and Texas vote in March, someone will probably already have more than enough delegates to wrap up each nomination.

The rest of the states, which trail in throughout the spring, probably won't make a difference. If you live in Montana, for instance, which votes in June, unless it's a cliffhanger, you might as well stay home.

Everybody agrees the primaries now begin and end too early. Iowa and New Hampshire are intended to give candidates without a ton of money the chance to get voters' attention. But even if someone does come from behind to win in New Hampshire, the huge wave of expensive big-state primaries comes too fast. There isn't time to create an organization or raise a lot of money for advertising. And once that raft of March primaries is over, there's going to be a long, boring wait until the actual Presidential campaigns begin in the fall.

The reason the primaries are organized so badly is because nobody actually organized them at all. For most of our history, the party leaders picked the party's nominees at the summer conventions, and all average voters had to do was choose between them in the fall. In a way, that made sense. People tended to feel that party activists knew the candidates best, and had a right to decide who the nominees should be. But frequently--this was as true 100 years ago as it is today--the voters found they didn't like either one of their alternatives. They began demanding to be allowed to do the nominating themselves.

OF COONSKIN CAPS 

The American primary system began in 1912, but the modern primaries probably originated with Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver. Kefauver was the first politician made famous by television. Something of an intellectual, he campaigned wearing a coonskin cap. (It didn't hurt that one of the hottest shows on TV was Walt Disney's Davy Crockett, about another hero who. wore a coonskin cap.) In 1951, he became chairman of a Senate committee investigating organized crime. When he put the hearings on TV, he became a household name overnight. An estimated 20 to 30 million people saw the hearings, and suddenly folks all over the country were talking about payoffs and hit men, and Kefauver was running for President.

Kefauver was not at all the candidate the Democratic party leaders had in mind in 1956. They were planning to nominate Adlai Stevenson, the former Governor of Illinois. But Kefauver, waving his coonskin cap, entered primary elections in 16 states, and won 9. Kefauver hadn't won enough delegates to clinch the nomination, but he figured he had enough to force the Democrats to pick him as nominee. He was wrong. After a long and angry roll call, Stevenson was the nominee. Kefauver grew bitter, developed a drinking problem, and died in 1963.

BIRTH OF THE PRIMARY

In many ways, Kefauver's doomed attempt to use the primaries to go directly to the people was the beginning of our modern system of nominating Presidential candidates. Once television came along and brought politicians into every living room, we all learned what the top contenders looked like, how they sounded which ones had a good sense of humor, and which ones always appeared to be sucking on something sour. But when their candidates were passed over, people began demanding more of a say. In one state after another, the parties decided to let their members make the choice in open primaries.

Yet the bones of the old structure remain. The party leadership still has a say in how the process works, and the states are very jealous of their power to decide things like the date on which their citizens will go to the polls. There's no single authority in charge who might be able to propose a more rational system.

Lately, the election officials from each state have been lobbying for a series of rotating regional primaries. The elections might begin in New England in March, followed by the Southern states in April, the Midwest in May, and the West in June. Then, four years later, everyone could switch places. That would seem like a much more sensible approach, but even if it happens, that's somewhere in the future. For now, we have the obstacle course in place, and it's time for the game to begin.

THE ROAD TO THE PRESIDENCY, 2000

From now to November, voters will winnow the field of candidates down to just one. Here's how, where, and when.

January 24

IOWA CAUCUSES

Voters troop through the cold to local meetings across the state. As the first real test, Iowa can confirm strong candidates and weed out weak ones.

February 1

NEW HAMPSHIRE PRIMARY

It is often said that you can't win the White House without winning New Hampshire, the nation's first primary. But not always: Clinton didn't win it in 1992.

February 19

SOUTH CAROLINA REPUBLICAN PRIMARY

A potential showdown, the state tends to favor military vets like McCain, but also party favorites, like Bush.

February 22

ARIZONA AND MICHIGAN REPUBLICAN PRIMARIES

If McCain can't beat Bush in Arizona, his home state, he may be history.

March 7

SUPER TUESDAY

This year's primary schedule is more front-loaded than ever--more big states vote sooner. California, Connecticut, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont all vote today, meaning the nominees could be decided by midnight.

March 14

THE SOUTHERN PRIMARIES

If either party's race for the nomination is still undecided, six Dixie states--Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas--will surely settle things today with their primaries (and are expected to favor Bush and Gore--both are Southeners, and both are supported by their party's leaders). But you never know.

July 31-August 3

REPUBLICAN CONVENTION

As the GOP meets in Philadelphia, one bit of suspense may linger: Who'll be chosen for Vice President?

August 14-17

DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION

Democrats gather in Los Angeles. Same questions: Who'll be VP? This time there's retiring President to cozy up to--or steer clear of. But can candidates do both at once?

November 7

ELECTION DAY

By now, we've spent the fall hearing TV spots from the two nominees and their Reform Party foe. First votes to be reported may come from a tiny town called Dixville Notch, where they vote at midnight just to be first. Fittingly, it's in New Hampshire.

GAIL COLLINS is a political columnist for The New York Times.