It's Up To The Superdelegates to Prove Democrats Believe in Democracy

[Nbadan]

It's up to the superdelegates to prove Democrats believe in democracy
It will be a travesty if party apparatchiks choose a presidential candidate against the wishes of ordinary voters
Gary Younge in New York The Guardian,
Monday February 18 2008



In December, the president of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov, stood for re-election. Karimov, a one-time ally in the "war on terror" who in 2002 had one opposition leader boiled alive, has long faced criticism from human rights groups and the United Nations. Having already served two terms, he was he was not even eligible to stand. A minor detail for a man like Karimov. His three opponents all endorsed him and did not ask Uzbeks to vote for them. Those who would not endorse him were disqualified and imprisoned. Karimov won the day with 88.1% of the vote.

There is a profound difference between holding an election and having a democracy. Elections are the best means that we have come up with so far for giving people a voice in the running of their affairs. Democracy is the system which ensures that voices are heard by empowering them with the ability to change those who run our affairs.

Elections, in and of themselves, are a purely technical matter. The authorities name the day, tell the voters, provide the booths and the equipment. The voters make their choice. The authorities then tally the results. But, as we know from countless incidences, from Kenya to Florida, the technical elides effortlessly into the political. Which day? Which voters? Where are the booths? How does the equipment work? Who's counting? Whose votes count? All this has a bearing on the result. That's why democracy, if it is working, gives us the right to kick out the authorities.

Since the beginning of January, the Democratic party in the US has held elections that have provided great excitement and held the attention of much of the world. We are about to see if its commitment to democracy is equally impressive. Having started this election season with scenes of rural folk gathering in frontrooms and schoolhalls to stand up and be counted, the final decision is now likely to be made by party apparatchiks accountable only to themselves. Or worse still, the courts.

For the one thing we do know at this stage is that unless something dramatic happens, winning the Democratic primaries and winning the Democratic nomination will not be the same thing. The elections we have all been watching account for 80% of the total voting delegates who will nominate the candidate. The remaining 20% goes to "superdelegates" - Democratic legislators, governors, former presidents and vice-presidents, and other party officials.

At present, Barack Obama is winning by a narrow margin. By most calculations, voters have given him around 133 more elected delegates than Hillary Clinton - a mere one-eighth of the total in states yet to vote. Predictions of Clinton's imminent demise - like most other predictions in this race - are premature. It is far more conceivable that she will turn this around by April than it was on New Year's Day that Obama would be the frontrunner. This race has the peculiar distinction of being both volatile and close.

So close in fact that the superdelegates will almost certainly determine the outcome. If they do, it will not just have the potential of making the entire process a travesty of democracy but also a tragedy for the Democratic party. For if the superdelegates go against the popular will of the voters, whoever emerges as "victor" will enter the presidential election shorn of democratic legitimacy and devoid of electoral credibility. Indeed in much the same shape as George Bush emerged in 2000 after Florida.

Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/feb/18/hillaryclinton.barackobama)


There is no 'requirement' for any political party to choose it's nominee through a "democratic" process....but after 8 years of a non-democratically elected president, the worst thing that could happen for Demos and democracy is for the Clinton camp to take the nomination, despite losing the popular-vote backed delegates, based on the votes of party insiders....I'm not willing to proclaim that it will splinter the Demo party, like some have posted in another thread, but Clinton will surely lose....

[JoeChalupa]

I support the will of the people.

[xrayzebra]

So does Billary, so long as she wins. But she is people, some
people say.

[Nbadan]

American democracy at work...

Superdelegates get campaign cash


Many of the superdelegates who could well decide the Democratic presidential nominee have already been plied with campaign contributions by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, a new study shows.

"While it would be unseemly for the candidates to hand out thousands of dollars to primary voters, or to the delegates pledged to represent the will of those voters, elected officials serving as superdelegates have received about $890,000 from Obama and Clinton in the form of campaign contributions over the last three years," the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics reported today.

About half the 800 superdelegates -- elected officials, party leaders, and others -- have committed to either Clinton or Obama, though they can change their minds until the convention.

Obama's political action committee has doled out more than $694,000 to superdelegates since 2005, the study found, and of the 81 who had announced their support for Obama, 34 had received donations totaling $228,000.

Clinton's political action committee has distributed about $195,000 to superdelegates, and only 13 of the 109 who had announced for her have received money, totaling about $95,000.

Boston (http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2008/02/superdelegates.html)

This is so desperate it's pitiful, many of Obama's donations go back to 2005.....If anything, this shows that Obama is better at supporting the Democratic party than Hillary (she raised more money than he did but gave only about 25 percent as much to other Dems)....

[DarkReign]

Fucking illegal, IMO. I understand the difference between primaries and general elections, so save your breath...but this is as borderline illegal at worst as I can think of and completely unethical at best.

[E20]

It's up to Super Delegates
http://orlyowl.com/upload/files/oh_noes.PNG
OMG!! Oh noes!! 0n1y teh suPer delegattes can find teh sa\/e for us now111
http://www.networkinvasion.com/forum/images/avatars/gallery/Custom/superman.gif

[spurster]

You can't just add up the votes because the states vary: caucuses, open primaries, closed primaries, not mention different dates and Michigan and Florida moving up their primaries too soon. Did you also know that Washington state is having a primary vote after their delegates have been already been selected in caucuses?

[FromWayDowntown]

Or maybe she can just completely disenfranchise voters by convincing the pledged delegates to change sides before the first ballot at the convention:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0208/8583.html

Clinton targets pledged delegates

By: Roger Simon
Feb 19, 2008 05:48 AM EST

Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign intends to go after delegates whom Barack Obama has already won in the caucuses and primaries if she needs them to win the nomination.

This strategy was confirmed to me by a high-ranking Clinton official on Monday. And I am not talking about superdelegates, those 795 party big shots who are not pledged to anybody. I am talking about getting pledged delegates to switch sides.

What? Isn’t that impossible? A pledged delegate is pledged to a particular candidate and cannot switch, right?

Wrong.

Pledged delegates are not really pledged at all, not even on the first ballot. This has been an open secret in the party for years, but it has never really mattered because there has almost always been a clear victor by the time the convention convened.

But not this time. This time, one candidate may enter the convention leading by just a few pledged delegates, and those delegates may find themselves being promised the sun, moon and stars to switch sides.

“I swear it is not happening now, but as we get closer to the convention, if it is a stalemate, everybody will be going after everybody’s delegates,” a senior Clinton official told me Monday afternoon. “All the rules will be going out the window.”

Rules of good behavior, maybe. But, in fact, the actual rules of the party allow for such switching. The notion that pledged delegates must vote for a certain candidate is, according to the Democratic National Committee, a “myth.”

“Delegates are NOT bound to vote for the candidate they are pledged to at the convention or on the first ballot,” a recent DNC memo states. “A delegate goes to the convention with a signed pledge of support for a particular presidential candidate. At the convention, while it is assumed that the delegate will cast their vote for the candidate they are publicly pledged to, it is not required.”

Clinton spokesman Phil Singer told me Monday he assumes the Obama campaign is going after delegates pledged to Clinton, though a senior Obama aide told me he knew of no such strategy.

But one neutral Democratic operative said to me: “If you are Hillary Clinton, you know you can’t get the nomination just with superdelegates without splitting the party. You have to go after the pledged delegates.”

Winning with superdelegates is potentially party-splitting because it could mean throwing out the choice of the elected delegates and substituting the choice of 795 party big shots.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has warned against it. “I think there is a concern when the public speaks and there is a counter-decision made to that,” she said. “It would be a problem for the party if the verdict would be something different than the public has decided.”

Donna Brazile, who was Al Gore’s campaign manager in 2000 and is a member of the DNC, said recently: “If 795 of my colleagues decide this election, I will quit [the DNC]. I feel very strongly about this.”

On Sunday, Doug Wilder, the mayor of Richmond and a former governor of Virginia, went even further, predicting riots in the streets if the Clinton campaign were to overturn an Obama lead through the use of superdelegates.

“There will be chaos at the convention,” Wilder told Bob Schieffer on “Face the Nation.”

“If you think 1968 was bad, you watch: In 2008, it will be worse.”

But would getting pledged delegates to switch sides be any less controversial? Perhaps not. They were chosen by voters, but they were chosen to back a particular candidate.

And it is unlikely that many people, including the pledged delegates themselves, know that pledged delegates actually can switch.

Nor would it be easy to get them to switch.

If, however, after the April 22 Pennsylvania primary the pledged delegate count looks very close, the Clinton official said, “[both] sides will start working all delegates.”

In other words, Clinton and Obama will have to go after every delegate who is alive and breathing.

[Holt's Cat]

Yeah, trying to turn pledged delegates who are there based on actual primary and caucus votes will be pretty bad. No doubt the Clintons will find a way to blame that on Obama.

[Wild Cobra]

And people wonder why so many of us hate democrat politicians. They do not stand for democracy, but how they can wield power and control things. There are very few traditional democrats left. Nearly all left are authoritarians of one type or another.