Via The Thicket: “National Conference of State Legislatures’s (NCSL) new 2012 Presidential Primary Calendar, and its companion, a state-ordered table, 2012 State and Presidential Primary and Caucus Dates…Jennie Bowser created the lists and checked them against a multitude of official sources. She says, “this year, it was more complicated than ever to assemble this data.” Here are a few of the complications:

• State legislatures decide the dates of primaries (except in the states where parties do);
• Political parties decide the dates of caucuses (except in the states where the legislature does);
• The two major parties don’t always use the same dates in a given state;
• More states changed their dates this year than in any of the last three presidential cycles (and Texas’ date could still change); and,
• Some primaries are “beauty contests” only, designed to bring attention to a state but not to choose delegates to the national conventions where presidential nominees are officially selected.
• To understand all the vagaries in presidential nominating events, the National Association of Secretaries of State has just released a comprehensive report, NASS 2012 Presidential Primaries Guide. In it, you’ll learn the state-by-state details on how the date is chosen, how the primary is funded, who can vote in the primary, and where to find official results.”