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I'll admit that, coming from the outside, the American primary system has always seemed absurd to me. Maybe this is a result of being Australian instead, but I am much more accustomed to the approach where the party selects its own leader, and the public don't get a say. We get to vote later on. But of course the party get to choose their own leaders. Why wouldn't they?
It's become tradition in America that the way the parties do that is with primaries, but there's no in-principle reason why they couldn't do it any other way, and frankly I suspect it would be better for America if they did. If the party establishments or members of congress had gotten to pick their presidential candidates (approximating the way it works in Australia), Bernie Sanders would never have been a concern, Donald Trump would never have become a political figure at all, and America would have been spared long, divisive primary seasons. As it is, they have a system that rewards extremist candidates playing towards the base, rather than one that rewards trying to appeal to a genuine majority, and that seems like a poorly-functioning electoral system to me.
On the positive, at least, it means the American elections provide some very high quality popcorn.
Well, party leaders often can get pulled into their own insular "bubble". The leader of a party is sometimes chosen despite being a poor candidate simply because of their internal connections. Corruption can happen. Why wouldn't the rank-and-file want more control over their candidate, not less? Why would voters trust someone else, much less a party elite/insider, more than themselves?
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Parties can choose whoever and whatever they like, for whatever position they want. But democracy is sacred enough in America that there's always pressure for parties to select their candidates through a democratic process with an open vote, and sometimes parties cave in, probably because they think it will get them votes in the long run. No one wants to alienate that weird fringe who might wind up voting for the mainstream candidate, so why not give their fringe candidate a chance to compete in the primary? Of course that only works if your mainstream candidate is viable, or if you're good at rigging the process.
Yes, there are a number of reasons why Americans have primaries - it's just become an expectation at this point, it lets you judge popularity with the base because America is a system where turnout matters, and so on. It's more that in the aggregate I think it creates a weaker system than the alternative.
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