Columnist Jon Ralston: Who will win on Primary Day?

Saturday, Sept. 2, 2000 | 3:45 a.m.

Jon Ralston, who publishes the Ralston Report, writes a column for the Sun on Sundays and Wednesdays. Ralston can be reached at 870-7997 or by e-mail at ralston@vegas.com

IT'S HARD to discern which is dumber -- voting up to two weeks before an election, before you have all the information, or predicting the outcomes of balloting before votes are cast.

The legions who vote early -- probably about a quarter of the total vote -- have no excuse except sloth. No empirical evidence exists that early voting boosts total turnout. All it does is increase and highlight what is wrong with American politics today -- willful ignorance by too much of the electorate. For that, there's no excuse.

As for displaying my Delphic powers, I have an excuse: I'm a pundit. That's what pundits are supposed to do. No, not make fools of ourselves. I refer to the imperative to tell the benighted masses what will happen before it does. It's a reflex. Or, perhaps, a sickness. But predict I must.

I will spare you most of the caveats, especially with primary elections -- low turnouts make it even more difficult, sub rosa movement is harder to detect, anything can happen on Primary Day and often does. But to retain my membership in the Pundits of America Club, which I wear as a badge of arrogance, here I go again in the three most important primary contests:

The move to oust Kincaid is based on a flimsy premise -- that her vote against that outrageous Wal-Mart ordinance shows her to be unfriendly to labor. But, the Culinary folks believe, bad behavior must be punished on an issue its leaders elevated to paramount status for its brethren in the food and commercial workers union.

This time, though, the union will fall just short as Kincaid's name recognition, grass-roots and the labor split will make the difference. Kincaid, 53 percent; Smith 47 percent.

And Malone may have spent his entire war chest reinventing himself and attacking Maxfield's credibility, but he has enough to turn out his voters on Election Day. But with no cash left, he will have a hard time holding on in the general election against Lois Tarkanian.

And unlike some politicians, all a pundit has is his word, and a pundit never goes back on his word. Well, almost never. Malone, 51 percent; Maxfield, 49 percent.

Using a sophisticated array of mail pieces and phone banks, the Clinton camp, fueled by gaming money and overseen by casino lobbyists, has a chance to defeat Neal outright in the primary. Even if that doesn't happen, Neal is probably mortally wounded and will not survive in November unless he can sway Republicans.

The key for Clinton is how much of the vote Chris Montanez can garner. Montanez has dropped out, but his name is on the ballot and he will get some protest votes, enough to get Clinton through. Neal, 49 percent; Clinton, 46 percent; Montanez, 5 percent.