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Some superdelegates will go with (the) pledged delegate count, but many will go with the candidate they think can win," Hattaway said. "We have a very compelling case to make on that front, given that we're winning general election swing states, must-win states and must-win constituencies."
Big freaking deal! Its the Dem primary, not the general election, as if ALL of the Dem voters in CA and NY are suddenly going to run to McCain instead of Obama.
All of the traditional Red States in a DEM PRIMARY that she has won it make no difference whatsoever.
If Obama is the nominee, you can rest assured 99.9% of the Dems that voted for Hillary will be voting for Obama. Plus, Obama has more cross-over appeal than Hillary and will pick up additional votes from Independents and Republicans, while Hillary will not.
Heck, even national polls are signaling that Obama will have an easier time defeating McCain.
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Hillary is a republican in democrats' clothing. She's in the pocket of special interest and is turning to the exact tactics that Dems have railed against for the past 7 years (fear, bassackwards logic, underhanded personal attacks, etc...).
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
__________________ America cannot have an empire abroad and a Republic at home.
(CNN) — Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe said Wednesday Hillary Clinton has overcome Barack Obama in the total popular vote.
“Senator Clinton took the lead in the popular vote last night because voters believe she is the candidate best able to beat John McCain and lead our country," McAuliffe said.
Is he right? That depends on which measure of the popular vote is used.
Four different scenarios of the total popular vote have been kicked around: (1) only counting primary contests without factoring in Florida and Michigan, whose contests were not sanctioned by the national party, (2) counting primary and caucus contests without Florida and Michigan, (3) counting primaries and contests and Florida but not Michigan, and (4) counting all primaries and caucuses including Florida and Michigan.
Clinton trails in all four counts, but by significantly different margins. In the first scenario she trails by by about 397,000, in the second she's behind 699,000, in the third she has a 405,000 vote deficit, and in the fourth scenario she trails by 77,000 votes.
The fourth scenario does not give Obama any votes out of Michigan, where he did not appear on the ballot.
The only scenario in which Clinton would appear to have the lead is a fifth scenario that only counts primary states(LIAC thought here: this is an invention of the Clinton camp that flys in the face of Party established rules!) – including both Florida and Michigan – and excludes any votes cast in the party’s caucuses. In that count, Clinton currently holds a lead of about 225,000 votes.
...To wit: If Hillary Clinton has more juice on that rules committee than Barack Obama does, they might very well seat Michigan and Florida, and Hillary might actually win this thing. And anyone who doesn't recognize the significance of yet another episode of this sort of backroom cabal settling things has never lived, as I have, in a Third World country.
In places like Russia and Uzbekistan, the votes are less important than who's counting them, and the only math that matters is the aggregate of a bunch of phone calls whizzing across the capital in the middle of the night, in which the only important considerations are purely geographic in nature: Who's controlling the TV stations? The election commission? The police station near the Kremlin? The army in the Western District? At 4:08 a.m., which (read: whose) federal judge is most likely to answer his telephone? Like a game of poker, you can't guess the outcome until you know who's holding what cards.
That's where we are now, in this Clinton-Obama race. The voting thing is basically done. The rest of it comes down to a bunch of frenzied phone calls between lawyers, party hacks and superdelegates, a bunch of people you've never heard of before and will never hear of again. This ain't democracy — it's approximocracy...
Quote:
...We know, because the superdelegates themselves are admitting it, that party officials whose votes are still in play are being besieged by phone calls from the political Mount Olympus. Ed Tinsley, a county commissioner from Montana, got two calls apiece from Madeleine Albright, Chelsea Clinton and Tom Daschle. It got so intense after a while that Tinsley's friends started to prank-call him, pretending to be various Important People clamoring for his support.
"Yeah, my buddies were goofing around a little bit there," he says with a laugh. "It's slowed down some since I declared for Obama — but I still hear from the Clinton campaign, e-mails telling me Obama can't win and so on."
In California, where many superdelegates pledged to Clinton are reportedly considering changing their minds, the heat has been unrelenting. One superdelegate recently reported getting at least 100 letters from the Clinton camp insisting that she toe the line. Across the board, there have been reports of superdelegates strong-armed and badgered, with the angry exchange between Bill Richardson and the Clintons (whose supporters called him a "Judas" after he committed to Obama) being the most famous. The high number of superdelegates who refuse to discuss their preferences publicly for fear of getting on the wrong side of the winner speaks to the fear of negative consequences that surrounds this whole process.
Moreover, in the courting of superdelegates there is tremendous potential for corruption, as the system is almost totally unregulated. Craig Holman, a legislative representative at Public Citizen, describes the superdelegate system as an ethical "Wild West," one in which no rules prevent candidates from channeling favors or even money to uncommitted party officials. "This is the first time we're seeing the potential for mischief," Holman says. One easy way to buy off superdelegates, he suggests, would be to hire them as media consultants, allowing them to take a cut of the candidate's political advertising. "Buyers generally get five percent commissions," Holman says. "That's a lot of money, because these media buys can be in the millions."
NOTE - THIS IS ASSUMING THAT THE MI "UNDECLARED" IS SEATED FOR OBAMA. IF NOT, OBAMA STANDS LOSE APPROXIMATLY 70 DELEGATES OFF OF THE 156 ADD NUMBER BELOW BY MY ESTIMATION, BUT I CANNOT FIND ANY SUPPORTING DATA TO CONFIRM.
Hopefully after this election, SDs will no longer be part of the process...
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Here's to the Army and Navy and the battles they have won; here's to America's colors, the colors that never run. May the wings of liberty never lose a feather. ....
Hopefully after this election, SDs will no longer be part of the process...
Highly doubt that they will be eliminated - they are there to award party members and ensure that the DNC has a substantial say in the primary process.
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