Well, well, well. Another campaign season for president is winding down, and none too soon. The voters are tired, the candidates are tired and, I am sure, the press is tired also.

In 1960, John Kennedy announced in January of that year. In 1968 Bobby Kennedy announced in March. Now we have races that start the year before, start in earnest and with the attendant fund-raising that goes with it. This phenomenon started with the candidacy of our own Jimmy Carter. Hamilton Jordan devised the early entry strategy and it has been followed by every challenger since.

But there is another major problem with this current process. This year's major theme, once again, is the continual self-destruction of the national Democrats.

I am not the first to point this out, but here is something for every Democrat to ponder. Since the rules for nominating a Democrat for president were changed in 1968 (more on that in a minute), not one nominee has been elected president —- not one —- except two Southerners. Only twice in the past 40 years has the national party's policy yielded a person who can win a general election. And that owed more to the fact that they were from the South and perceived as being more moderate than to any internal party procedure.

What caused this losing formula? After the debacle that was the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, the Democratic National Committee put together a commission, headed by Sen. George McGovern, to restructure the selection process. He, of course, won the nomination in 1972 (he knew the new rules better than anybody else). This formula required delegate quotas on age, race and gender. This favored activist groups. Later they added superdelegates. Those activist groups have dominated ever since.

So what you see playing out now is that no matter the outcome, half the delegates will be mad. It is a system that splits the party instead of uniting it. It is a system that still invites accusations of favoritism. It is a system that, most importantly, nominates someone outside the mainstream of most American voters.

So when the general election starts in September, the Democrats will be starting out behind, as always.

Even in those years where there has been a "bounce" from the convention and the Democrat was ahead in the polls, the lead was erased over the ensuing weeks.

It is past time for national Democrats to realize that you cannot please all the people all the time. Structure a system that can produce a nominee who has a real chance at winning, no matter who the Republicans nominate. Structure a system that rewards the eventual nominee with an infrastructure that allows them to hit the fall campaign with momentum. In short, structure a system that makes sense. I do not know what that system would look like, but anything is better than what has been in place for 40 years.

> Steve Anthony is former executive director of the Democratic Party of Georgia.