Now it seems that the Democratic nominee for president of the United States will be determined by those two states that flouted party rules and whose delegates will not be seated. If you will remember, I predicted that this would become a huge problem for the Democrats. Any ideas for how this should–or will–be handled? (Here’s a call for a Democratic do-over.)
A mulligan for Florida & Michigan Democrats?
March 7th, 2008 | Politics
8 comments ↓
I don’t think there should be any do-overs. FL and MI knew the consequences of moving their primaries and Obama made the choice not to campaign in MI. They need to deal with it and the Democratic party needs to realize they have a flawed system for nominating a candidate.
I’m really surprised that the major story about this is not about the sheer hypocrisy of the Democratic party (if a party can be hypocritical). The supposed “party of the people” doesn’t think those people will make the right choice and give the elites a rather large say in who gets nominated. It may have been a token to party bosses originally, but why isn’t anybody talking about getting rid of the super-delegates? (At least I haven’t seen/heard any serious discussion of that.) If I was a Democrat, I’d be really upset at the system.
Personally, I’m fine with walling off Florida or giving it back to Spain. That state has issues.
One way of looking at it is that the consequence of Florida and Michigan moving their primaries before the sanctioned date was to lose their influence at that point in the race. The desired outcome was always that they move their elections to Super Tuesday or later. Redoing these elections accomplishes that, though sadly after their state leaders played political chicken and foolishly ran a financially wasteful election.
Anyhow, is this limited to the Democratic party, as EconJeff suggests (@1)? Doesn’t the Republican party also have unpledged delegates? Didn’t they also penalize states that jumped ahead of the sanctioned date (though only by halving their delegates)?
Also, EconJeff, I find it odd that you rail against elite superdelegates being able to overrule the will of party members, while at the same time advocating that state party leaders should be able to cancel the will of two states’ party members by their choice of election date.
tODD- I don’t think this type of politicking is limited to Democrats, though I don’t hear about any plans for Republican states to get do-overs. (I know, the “need” isn’t there.)
Unpledged delegates are not the same as the super-delegates. Republicans, at least from what I’ve heard, elect the unpledged delegates at during the primaries. But also from what I’ve heard, you don’t have to vote for anybody who is unpledged, but can only choose pledged delegates. If a Republican wants an unpledged person, they have the choice. (This is what I’ve heard/seen, and it may differ by state.) Democrats don’t really get a choice about whether they want Bill Clinton to be super-delegate. He’s one by default. So is Jimmy Carter and other big-wigs.
I’m not sold on it being incompatible to be against a system which pays lipservice to being for the common man but leaves them out of that decision (to any extent) and being for the rule of law. Democrats chose rules I disagree with (super-delegates) and I think they should play by the rules they chose. I can still think they should change those rules. Related, yes, but not contradictory.
I think the difference between democrats and republicans in this case is that it is the democrats who have complained in recent years about the Electoral College robbing the people of their direct vote, and also about individuals losing their vote because of ballot mistakes (overvotes, undervotes, etc.). They have made the case that the peoples’ vote is sacred and to be protected to the last man/woman at almost any societal cost. But in their own party primary for President, they continue to maintain an elitist system where fully one-third of the delegates are unelected super delegates, essentially designed to protect the party from the effects of the people’s votes.
I suspect that after this fiasco, they will re-structure their nomination process before 2012.
The democrats made a clear strategic mistake in punishing the early states of FL and MI by completely stripping them of their delegates. It was a rash thing to to to states that are swing states that you need to win in November. I thought it was an act they would later regret at the time, and it has proven to be the case. On the other hand, the republicans stripped only half of the delegates, still giving those states a sizable say in the outcome of the nomination (FL was McCain’s key win, after all).
Hillary Clinton will win this fight, and MI and FL delegates will be seated at the convention. The Clintons will always do whatever they need to do to prevail. It is their way. Probably some kind of re-vote (I am guessing it will be caucuses or an insider party convention rather than a state-wide vote) will occur to give cover to the maneuver.
The demonrats have another problem, explained by Mark Stein in a humorous column, Torn between 2 white liberal guilts:
One Historical Guilt gives upscale white liberals a chance to demonstrate their progressive bona fides in unison. Two Historical Guilts shrivels from transformative feel-good fluffiness into sour tribalism. Like Hillary’s “I Am Woman” routine, Obama’s cult of narcissism – “We are the change we have been waiting for” – would have been a shoo-in against Biden, Dodd and Edwards. But the gaseous platitudes wafting up to Cloud Nine are suddenly very earthbound.
Apparently, the situations in Michigan and Florida are different. The governor of Florida is a Republican, as are almost 2/3 of each house. See -
http://www.makeitcountflorida.com/page/content/makeitcount-faqs/
and look at the question -
“The Rules say you had to try to stop the primary move, but Democrats voted for the law. What gives?”
In any case, it’s a tempest in a teapot. Voters in both parties always get “disenfranchised” in any primary. If your state votes late, you don’t get to vote for your favorite long shot. If your state votes early, you don’t get to vote against the front-runner. So the Ds have a close race. It still would have been close if proper elections had been held in those two states. That’s what “super” delegates are for. What a bunch of babies.
How would they limit who votes in the Michigan do-over primary? We don’t register “Republican” or “Democrat” in this state. Unless they do something to stop me, I would vote in it even though I voted in the Republican Primary already.
Leave a Comment