The senator is upset because the GOP has used his wife’s comment about being proud of America “for the first time” as fodder for a commercial. He said attacks on his wife should be out of bounds.
On the one hand, I can sympathize. On this board, attacks on my family is the one boundary I ask participants not to cross.
On the other hand, he’s basically asking for a free pass for Mrs. Obama who is out stumping for her husband, on the road and on TV talk shows. This is presidential politics, and it is frankly naive of him to think that that can, or even should, happen. Her phrasing was monumentally dumb when she said it, and even though she endeavored to clarify (i.e, regret and rephrase) her remarks, that doesn’t make them any less a legit target for critics. It isn’t as if, for instance, the GOP dug into her background and discovered she was on antidepressants or something and was saying, “Do you want a medicated woman in the White House?” These were public statements made in a public forum, and that makes them fair game. If Obama wants his wife off limits, then keep her out of the spotlight. But if she’s willingly in the spotlight, then sorry, Senator, but she’s just going to have to endure the glare.
PAD
• 
No, compromises never make everyone happy but look at what you’re suggesting–thousands of voters who did not vote for someone are suddenly having their votes assigned to a particular person. It’s like something from a banana republic only even there the “noncomitted” votes usually stay noncomitted.
It’s also unnacceptable that Obama, who was baive enough to think that the party would actually follow the rules, should be penalized for operating on that assumption. I say, split the delegates and seat them. That way they have no effect on the ultimate outcome but they can say that they were a part of the process. Nobody should be rewarded for this debacle.
And really, shouldn’t some heads be rolling over this?
Bill, thousands of voters who did not vote for someone have *already* had their votes reassigned. 10 of the delegates that John Edwards won in previous contests have been assigned to Obama because Edwards endorsed Obama. The other 6 Edwards delegates are also going to assign themselves to either Clinton or Obama, all without a revote from the people who voted for them. It happens in every single primary season for both Democrats and Republicans.
If all three names had been on the Michigan ticket and those votes had counted, the same thing would already have happened with all the delegates that Edwards won. So giving the uncommitted votes to Obama doesn’t do anything that isn’t happening and wasn’t going to happen already.
A 50/50 split is the same thing as no delegates at all. I think it would be perfectly fair, since they broke the rules, were told what the consequences would be, and continued with their plan anyway. But fairness isn’t the only factor, there’s also the fact that these people have to work together. Giving Hillary a net gain of 22.5 delegates won’t affect the nomination, but it smoothes things over and makes the MI and FL feel like their votes mattered just a little. It’s like apologising to your wife, it doesn’t matter if you were actually wrong, you just do it and things get easier for everyone.
Wait, not 10, it’s now 12 of Edwards’ delegates that are going to Obama.
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/05/23/1058450.aspx
Jason, I don’t see this as the same thing at all. When you vote for an eventual loser like John Edwards you know that your votes will be passed on to whoever he or she ends up supporting. You voted for that person and you have given them an implicit support in doing this.
The uncommitted delegates are not being given that chance under your plan–they are just being handed to one of the candidates on the assumption that this is who the voters wanted. It’s as valid as Hillary saying she wants them all. It would be one thing if the uncommitted delegates all said they were going to Obama. Fine. But having Howard Dean tell them where to go?
It’s a good thing for Obama that his election machine seems to be a much better one than what the national party has.
Edwards’s loss was only eventual as far as he couldn’t prevent someone from hijacking his position, which is what the primary leader, Obama, did.
It’s not my plan, Bill. Giving Obama all the uncommitteds has been widely suggested for months. You’re the first person I’ve seen with any objection to it, other than one of Hillary’s campaign people.
jason, I know it isn’t “your” plan–none of us, so far as I know, are in charge of teh Democratic Rules committee (though if anyone were I can well understnd why they’d keep it under their hat).
As for being the only one who thinks it runs contrary to the basic rules of how things should be done, well, maybe so, though that in and of itself doesn’t mean it’s wrong.
A quick question from someone who lives on the other side of the world –
Why should the “uncommitted” votes go to anyone? By casting an uncommitted vote, aren’t you saying that you don’t support any nominated candidate?
That last post should have been: Edwards’s loss was only eventual as far as he could prevent someone from hijacking his position, which is what the primary leader, Obama, did.
Even if Hillary got all the cast for her in Florida and Michigan, she still wouldn’t have enough votes to win.
If Michelle Obama is fair game, then Chelsea Clinton should be too…but she’s not.
Megan: “Why should the “uncommitted” votes go to anyone? By casting an uncommitted vote, aren’t you saying that you don’t support any nominated candidate?”
Not in this case. “Uncommitted” is not something that normally appears on ballots. It was something that John Edwards and Barack Obama specifically asked their supporters to vote for. They did it because they knew Clinton was going to pull something like this by leaving her name on the ballot. If they hadn’t, she would be claiming 100% of the Michigan delegates right now.
“Uncommitted” is the word they decided to use, but nobody voted for it because the don’t support any candidate. “Uncommitted” specifically meant “Not Clinton.”
“Uncommitted” can only mean “not committed.” Any other interpretation is claiming to see what is not present. Most specifically, it does not mean “give my vote to anyone you can find who isn’t the other person on this ballot.”
Yeah, I have to agree with that. And if Obama and Edwards knew that Hillary was pulling a fast one they should simply have left their names on the ballot as well.
””Uncommitted” is the word they decided to use, but nobody voted for it because the don’t support any candidate. “Uncommitted” specifically meant “Not Clinton.””
No.
That’s a nice idea, but it’s just speculation on your part as to what each voter who voted “uncommitted” really meant when they pulled that lever. You can no more factually or honestly say that every uncommitted vote was against Hillary than I can say that every uncommitted vote was against Obama. No one was handing out instructions at every voter station to vote uncommitted if the were against Hillary and there’s no decoder ring for what the word “uncommitted” really meant that day.
And, again, it also doesn’t take into account how many votes may be going Hillary’s way on the chance that some voters picked her as their second choice since their first choice wasn’t on the ballot. I’m sure that some people may have voted the way you suggested just as I’m sure that some people may have voted for Hillary for the reason I suggested and that some people may have even stayed home because they were told that their vote wouldn’t count and that a number of candidates pulled their names from the ballots. The MI vote as it stands now represents nothing more than a cluster and can’t be fairly or justly given to anyone in any way other than not at all or in a 50/50 split. And neither of those options really change the situation we’re in right now.
“You can no more factually or honestly say that every uncommitted vote was against Hillary than I can say that every uncommitted vote was against Obama. ”
Yes, I absolutely *can* say that.
Hillary’s name was on the ballot. Anyone who wanted to vote for her did. People also could have not voted at all, thus ‘uncommitted’ obviously meant more than just having no preference, since not voting already meant no preference. Exit polls show that she got significantly more votes than she would have if all three names had been on the ballot. So I know for a fact that anyone who wanted to vote for her did.
Also, you’re incorrect about there being no information about what uncommitted meant. There was a campaign done by Obama and Edwards to get people to vote uncommitted that day. Their supporters in MI got the word out and made sure that all the people who supported them knew why they’d gotten uncommitted put on the ticket.
The people of Michigan who voted for uncommitted were specifically voting against Hillary. If the rules committee were to decide on the 31st that Hillary should get all her delegates but Obama gets nothing because nobody voted for him, then the people who voted uncommitted would be *pìššëd*. Absolutely pìššëd.
You can’t ignore what the people who voted said about why they did it. The intent of the voters is vastly more important than exact definition of the word. The root ‘soph’ means wise, but sophistry isn’t wisdom because the Sophists changed the meaning of the word. Trying to base the Michigan decision on the definition of a word while ignoring the circumstances fits the current definition of sophistry pretty well.
The thing is we can’t know what “the people who voted” meant. You say they “said about why they did it”. By that you mean “the ones who have been interviewed” or, more accurately, “the ones who were interviewed and had their views printed”.
The truth is we don’t know what was going through the minds of all of the voters and we never ever will. Good assumptions and bad assumptions can be made but they will never be more than what they are.
hey, I have a question–on some femist site they claim that Florida and Michigan were not the only states that broke the rules but they were the only ones that got this punishment. This, they claimed, was proof that the party was in the tank for Obama. well, I don’t know about that…How is it that the national party let this happen? Seriously, theese are two pretty important states, it seems a bad idea to piss them off but you also can’t let them all get in some crazy war over who goes first or we will end up having nomination elections 2 years before the presidential elections…a nightmare scenario. So…what were they hoping? That the election would be over and done with, an obvious frontrunner who had more delegates than the others combined and then they graciously let Florida and Michigan come to the grownups table?
That’s undoubtedly what they were hoping for, Bill — after all, a year ago everyone figured this was going to be Clinton in a walk, so the actual “scandal” over timetables was going to be minimal.
TWL
Bill Mulligan: “The thing is we can’t know what “the people who voted” meant.”
No, *you* don’t know know what they meant because you’ve refused to listen to those people. They’ve been saying what they want for awhile and they’ve never said the things that you are saying. There are people signing petitions and filing lawsuits against the DNC to try and get things counted this way.
Exit polls are fairly accurate. They’re not so accurate that TV networks can call a race when the polls only show a 2% difference, but they’re pretty good.
Have you even looked at the exit polls yet? They’re right here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_Democratic_primary%2C_2008#Exit_Poll_Information
They show that Edwards only would have gotten 12%. Let’s say they underestimated and give him 14%. Do you know how many delegates that would have given him?
Zero.
A candidate has to get at least 15% to get any delegates at all. Otherwise his votes don’t count. They don’t ask those voters what their second choice is, so the second choice of the Edwards voters was always a moot point.
That leaves Clinton getting 46 votes for every 35 of Obama’s. In other words, she would have gotten 57% of the delegates to Obama’s 43%. Which is pretty dámņ close to the split that’s being proposed.
All of this violently misses the point. The rules committee isn’t doing this to figure out what’s fair. They already know what’s fair, the punishment that they already set out is fair.
They’re considering changing the ruling, which every referee, appeals court, and parent has a right to do, because they don’t want to overly punish the people of Michigan. Those people want to feel that their votes mattered at least a little. If their delegates aren’t seated or if there is a 50/50 split, then they will feel cheated. Whether those voters deserve it or not, the democratic party does not want to do something to those voters that makes them feel cheated.
Giving all the delegates back to the state means no punishment at all and overly benefits Clinton. So they’re not going to do that. Giving a 50/50 split doesn’t do anything to make anyone happy at all, so that would be pointless. It wouldn’t even make Obama that happy because he’s going to win no matter what.
Giving the uncommitted to Obama comes withing shouting distance of what the vote probably would have been and cutting them in half still punishes the state. Can we say for certain that it perfectly replicates the will of the voter? No, but the people of MI aren’t looking for exact, they’re looking for any sign that they matter. An approximate representation of how they voted does that.
All this quibbling about not knowing what the voters really wanted is missing the point. “Uncommitted” was a protest vote. Everyone in Michigan knew it, everyone had a chance to just *not vote* if they couldn’t vote for their guy, so we know for a fact that the first priority of everyone who voted uncommitted is to not vote for Hillary. The DNC has decided to *not* tell these people that their votes don’t matter for the sake of healing the problems that their overzealous punishment caused.
Bill, Jerry, do me one favor. Before you post again about how it’s unfair to count all the uncommitteds for Obama, just do one thing. Find a report of people in Michigan who voted uncommitted protesting the idea. This idea of giving him the uncommitteds has been around awhile. If you’re right, if there are people who voted uncommitted but wouldn’t want their vote to go to Obama, then there should be some evidence of it. I’ve seen none. If you can find some report of them actually not liking the idea, then you’re fighting for at least a few of the people of Michigan. If those people aren’t objecting, then that means your version of “fair” is taking away their request to have their vote affect the race just a little bit.
“Yes, I absolutely *can* say that.”
No you can not. To claim that you can is to claim that you personally know what was in the minds of every single voter who pulled a lever that night. You can make an educated guess, you can speak rather confidently on someone you know and you can maybe even reference someone who had an interview aired by the cable news channels, but you cannot realistically claim that you know 100% factually that every vote for “uncommitted” cast in MI was made for the reasons you say and that Hillary received zero votes from people who didn’t know about the movement to vote uncommitted.
“Also, you’re incorrect about there being no information about what uncommitted meant.”
I didn’t say that there was no information at all. I’ve seen the discussions about this topic as well. What I said was that there was that there was no one “handing out instructions at every voter station to vote uncommitted if the were against Hillary and there’s no decoder ring for what the word “uncommitted” really meant that day.”
And that’s absolutely, 100% true. They didn’t have people set up outside of every voting area and instructing people on the “true” meaning of uncommitted. The other thing is that this story is something that may have grown more well known with the passing of time. In the early coverage of MI, the push to vote “uncommitted” in the manner of which you speak was getting less coverage than it later did. There were some indications that not everybody got the word on this. Hëll, there were even some people who voted in both states that day that were interviewed by their local news and didn’t know that their vote didn’t count because of the flap over the rules. Are you really going to sit there and say that you ”absolutely *can*” speak for the intentions of every voter from that state?
“The people of Michigan who voted for uncommitted were specifically voting against Hillary.”
Again, some did, but not all of them. And some may well have voted for Hillary that might otherwise not have.
“You can’t ignore what the people who voted said about why they did it. The intent of the voters is vastly more important than exact definition of the word.”
In some cases like this I can take what was reported with a huge grain of salt. When they were first covering this story, they were there to cover this story. When they were looking for quotes and interviews about what some of the Obama and Edwards supporters were doing with this they likely didn’t waste TV time with the man on the street that looked at them with a blank stare and didn’t know about the “plan” to vote uncommitted.
I cover the jurisdiction that has the Capitol and the General Assembly Building in it. Right after the V-Tech shootings and when major bills that were being linked to that were being discussed/passed, we had a lot of state and national press around here. I got to see some of the raw footage being gathered and I got to see how some of that aired on the local and cable news. I saw a whole lot more “man on the street” interviewees answering that they didn’t know enough about the issues or weren’t keeping up with the issues than I saw people giving well informed answers. And the “well informed” interviewees were often from one of the camps who were there specifically to support or oppose some legislative acts stemming from that. When the news blips aired there weren’t any interviews shown with the people who did the blank look and non-answer responses. And that was after a major event and over laws related to helping to prevent something like that again.
And I see that around here all the time with lots of topics. I see it when the TV news asks people about issues and I see it when the newspapers ask people about the issues. They’re going to go for the for or against opinions and not fill TV time or column space with people saying that they don’t have a clue and really don’t care enough to be bothered to keep up. Well, unless, you know, they’re actually doing a story on voter apathy or the uniformed nature of the general population…
You can’t ignore what the people who voted said about why they did it. You’re right. But you also can’t ignore the fact that not everybody there went along with that plan and the likely fact that not everyone there knew about that plan.
Jason, I’m not a Hillary supporter, I’m not an Obama backer and I’m even less for McCain. I really don’t have a horse in this race that’s thrilling me all that much so I’m not looking at this as a way of supporting anyone. I’m looking at it as a problem of how to fairly resolve a total cluster f. There are two and only two ways to deal with this. You either do not seat the delegates or you split them down the middle. That’s it.
Any other option opens itself up to a thousand issues that would rip it apart. Any other options depend on the problem that you yourself are displaying in declaring that you know the thought process of every single voter in that state. You don’t. No one does. To act on the idea you are presenting under the rational that you are presenting it under would be just as grossly unfair to some voters as any other solution may be to other voters.
In the end, you do what seems most fair but still stays within the rules and guidelines that the system had in place. At this point, since we’re past the point of re-votes and whatnot for various reasons, you either, as the rules stated and the states were warned beforehand, seat no one or, if you want to seat the delegates so as not to completely disenfranchise every voter in the state, you split them in half and give each candidate some.
“They’re considering changing the ruling, which every referee, appeals court, and parent has a right to do, because they don’t want to overly punish the people of Michigan.”
You do not move the goal posts once the game has started.
This should be “played out” under the rules that were in force at the start. Too bad if no one likes them.
Why aren’t the “un-committeds” ruled as informal? Mind you, I can’t get past the idea of “uncommitted” being on a ballot paper (if I’ve been following this correctly).
What would I know? I live somewhere else.
“You do not move the goal posts once the game has started.”
The problem is, that’s just a metaphor. Metaphors don’t always describe a situation perfectly.
DNC rules say that if a state moves up its primary, then their delegates are cut in half. That’s not what the DNC did. So if you want to keep with the sports metaphor, the referees misapplied the rules right from the start. The decision went to the league commissioner and he’s reviewing how the goal will be called.
The rules said one thing and the DNC did another. That action has caused serious problems has now been determined to be causing more problems than he helped. So they’re adjusting the rules to be closer to what they were supposed to be originally. They’re not so much moving the goal posts as they are moving them halfway back.
Jerry. You’re right, I don’t know the mind of every single Michigan voter. But I have a pretty good general idea what they had in mind when voting for either uncommitted or for Clinton. I know enough to say with 100% certainty that a 55/40 is closer to what they wanted than either a 50/50 split or a 55/0 split. So yes, I can’t prove that every vote will go exactly where the voters wanted. However, I can say that giving Obama the 40 and cutting the delegates in half is closer to voter intent than any of the alternatives. So while it may not be completely fair, it’s still *more* fair than anything else.
And that’s why I think it’s a good idea. The original rules were 50% cut, so saying they get nothing is not going by the rule book. The ruling that the DNC handed to MI is within the power of the DNC, but appealing that ruling is also within the rule book. If rules make something fair, then that means that “fair” is whatever the DNC Rules committee says it is because their authority is within the rules.
This is a compromise. It won’t make anyone happy, but there is good reason to believe that it will make people the least unhappy. That’s better than nothing.
No, *you* don’t know know what they meant because you’ve refused to listen to those people. They’ve been saying what they want for awhile and they’ve never said the things that you are saying. There are people signing petitions and filing lawsuits against the DNC to try and get things counted this way.
Jumping Jesus on a Pogo stick, Jason, I am perfectly willing to believe that the vast majority of those who bothered to vote uncommitted wanted to vote for Obama. I’ll go further–had Obama been on the ballot MORE would have showed up to vote for him.
But unless you have some incredible mind powers you haven’t revealed or a notarized letter from each and every voter you don’t KNOW what was in their minds. You even said so earlier! As for the delegates in Michigan, you’re right that we don’t know that all the uncommitteds would have gone for Obama. that’s all I’ve been saying! We may disagree on whether or not it’s ok to assign uncommiteds to just one candidate but I’m sorry, you seem to be really moving the goalposts on this discussion.
Giving a 50/50 split doesn’t do anything to make anyone happy at all, so that would be pointless.
As someone once said, Compromises never make anyone completely happy, so this one will be as much of a success as any good compromise can be.
And actually I think that Obama and his voters would be quite happy with that choice. It doesn’t change the overall math, which means he stays ahead.
hey, I’ve got no pull in the way the Democratic party runs this thing (and if I did I’d be too embarrassed to admit it after this screw up). They can do what they want. personally, I think the plan to give the uncommitteds to Obama will cause more grief than the 50/50 split but I’m happy to leave the decision in the hands of the DNC. I’m sure they will try to do what is best for the final outcome, without regard for less important aspects.
“I’ll go further–had Obama been on the ballot MORE would have showed up to vote for him.”
Why wasn’t he? Seriously. Why weren’t all the names (Obama, Clinton et. al.) on all ballot papers in all states? I’m trying to understand your system – but I am at a total loss.
Bill: “But unless you have some incredible mind powers you haven’t revealed or a notarized letter from each and every voter”
Okay, that’s two people who’ve made that strawman arguement now.
I don’t need to know the mind of every single person. Even in real elections where all the votes count we don’t know everyone’s minds perfectly. We don’t know how many people voted because they really care and how many voted because they got to the booth and arbitrirly decided. I don’t need to know every voter’s brain to know generally what they want. And what they generally want is spelled out by their votes and their actions since then. Giving them generally what they want is better than giving them the opposite of what they want.
“And actually I think that Obama and his voters would be quite happy with that choice. It doesn’t change the overall math, which means he stays ahead.”
A 55/40 split doesn’t significantly change the math, either. So he’s just as good either way. He knows it, he’s started out asking for 50/50 and has since softened to taking a compromise. So he’s fine and dandy either way. The only thing that helps him now is getting the Democratic voters of MI as little pìššëd øff as possible. 50/50 or doing nothing doesn’t accomplish that.
Nobody has given a good reason not to give Obama the uncommitteds. They’ve talked about how we can’t possibly know the minds of every, single, individual voter, but they haven’t justified why we need that. The people of Michigan aren’t *looking* for an exact count, they’re looking for some concession that shows their votes mattered. 55/40 does that better than 50/50.
So what’s the reason, guys? I’m not asking if it fits your definition of ‘fair’ or not. I’m asking what gets better with a plan other than 55/40 and the delegates cut in half? Whose life is improved with any other plan? If you can tell me that, then I can debate that rationally with you and maybe I’ll even see your point. If you can’t tell me how another plan gives better results, then this is just going to go around in a circle forever.
Megan: “Why wasn’t he? Seriously. Why weren’t all the names (Obama, Clinton et. al.) on all ballot papers in all states? I’m trying to understand your system – but I am at a total loss.”
This isn’t *actually* the election. This isn’t our government’s system or anything that anyone voted for. It’s pretty close to it in some ways, but most of what’s being debated is the specific rules of the Democratic party.
Another weird thing, some rules are decided by the states. Florida didn’t allow the names to be pulled, Michigan did.
Obama and Edwards didn’t put their names on the ballots because it made the MI primary less legitimate. Technically it was already illegitimate, but they guessed that if the votes came out in Clinton’s favor, she’d start trying to try to get those votes counted.
By not having their names on the ballot, they had a good arguement that has kept those states from getting added back in until now. If they’d been added back in earlier in the race, then Obama’s lead would have be cut significantly, which would have been a propaganda victory for Clinton that might have swayed voters.
Nobody knows if it really would have helped her, but any little thing has the possibility of swaying matters significantly. Obama went up in the polls massively just by winning the very first caucus, so crazier things can happen.
Obama is willing to compromise now because compromising is better for him than making this harder. A 55/40 split with the delegates cut in half gives Clinton a 9 delegate advantage. His lead is around 200, so there’s no chance that a 9 advantage for Hillary hurts him. However, he needs the Michigan democrats in the fall, so smoothing things over with them has a possible advantage for him.
“Why wasn’t he? Seriously. Why weren’t all the names (Obama, Clinton et. al.) on all ballot papers in all states?”
Michigan’s politicians moved the date of their vote up and their vote was held early. They were warned ahead of time that their delegates would be stripped from them if they jumped ahead of the other states that were scheduled to vote before Michigan.
When they chose to go ahead with their primary early, the candidates all agreed to withdraw their names from the ballot. While Hillary agreed to do so, she, unlike the others, didn’t actually have it done. The results were a vote made with Hillary on the ballot, but none of the other leading candidates on the ballot.
Overall this created a cluster of immense proportions with several problems for working out how to, if to, seat the delegates now.
1 – Most of the population was aware that their vote wouldn’t count.
2 – Some voters who wanted to vote for a specific candidate no longer on the ballot may not have come out to vote because of that.
3 – Other voters may have voted for Hillary rather than claiming an “Uncommitted” vote.
4 – Not everyone who did vote “Uncommitted” was aware that it was something more than simply “Uncommitted.”
You also have to throw in the matter of Hillary’s about-face on the matter. Hillary was very much on the side back when of those who warned Michigan that they would have their delegates stripped. Of course, that was when she was Hillary “The Sure Thing” Clinton and was going to be the guaranteed winner of the race. Now that she’s in a position of looking at someone else having a lock on the deal, she’s suddenly become a champion of the disenfranchised and a major proponent of having every vote be counted.
If anyone really believes, after how hard Hillary has worked to stir discontent over this, that she will simply allow any resolution that does not serve her then they’re addle minded. This is either going to go down as was ruled before or it’s going to go down her way. Well, it might not go down either of those two ways, but if it doesn’t you can pretty much count on Hillary to create even more strife and divisions over it.
I do feel that the voters were unjustly punished here though. They didn’t do this, their politicians did. In the case of Florida, it wasn’t even the Democrats who did it.
But realistically, neither Florida nor Michigan can be looked at as true representations of the vote that they would have been. Michigan is even less a representation of what an actual vote would have been due to the garbage that Hillary pulled by vowing to remove her name from the ballot and then not doing so. It’s a mess and there are no truly good ways out of it. Still, allowing Hillary to bully her way past the rules or to have the rules/ruling changed for her after the fact would cause just as much, if not more, damage to the party in the long run.
I wonder how the Presidential Election would play out for you over there, if you had compulsory attendance at polling booths on election day?
I wonder how the Presidential Election would play out for you over there, if you had compulsory attendance at polling booths on election day?
I think that would possibly require a change to the constitution. At any rate, I’d be against it. We don’t need people who don’t care showing up and just pushing the button for the first person on the list. Compulsory voting sounds a bit too totalitarian for my tastes. Besides, next thing you know we have compulsory gun ownership and compulsory free speech and what do you have then? a bunch of guntoting idiots blabbing endlessly about who they voted for. It’s a prescription for trouble.
I do feel that the voters were unjustly punished here though. They didn’t do this, their politicians did. In the case of Florida, it wasn’t even the Democrats who did it.
I’ve heard this before and it amazed me that the Democrats would allow the Republicans to screw around with their election and then punish their won voters in reply. I mean, the DNC has done some dumb stuff but that doesn’t even make any sense at all. It’s a wonder the Republican didn’t do it in every state they could. so I tried to look up this law–correct me if I’m wrong but didn’t the Democrats in Florida also support this thing? It looks like it passed by margins usually reserved for Resolved: We love our Moms! and other crowd pleasers.
So I’m not sure the idea that it was the republicans who forced the democrats to do this holds much water, which is good for the democratic party because otherwise they would be dumb beyond all belief.
Who the hëll is splitting FL and MI 50/50 supposed to not pìšš øff? The majority whose influence you’re diluting whether you split or stick to the ruling to strip? I can pìšš øff FL and MI for half of what it’s going to cost to settle this.
“The vote passed with bipartisan support 118 to 0 in the House, 37 to 2 in the Senate.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_(United_States)_presidential_primaries,_2008
Would you not simply vote for legislators who would make voting voluntary?
What is the cut-off where you live? Any party member? If you have any cut-off, why should any variance in access to being listed on the ballot be counter-intuitive to you?
Who the hëll is splitting FL and MI 50/50 supposed to not pìšš øff?
People who want Obama to win. Which seems to be the majority.
“so I tried to look up this law–correct me if I’m wrong but didn’t the Democrats in Florida also support this thing? It looks like it passed by margins usually reserved for Resolved: We love our Moms! and other crowd pleasers.”
At one point in that process, since they couldn’t override the majority or the Governor on this, Florida Democrats had been talking about making the primary results nonbinding and holding caucuses like Iowa’s after Feb. 5 to deal with their delegates. After the fact, some guys like Senator Bill Nelson said that the local party should not anger voters by appearing to disenfranchise them or be in a position where the perception is that it’s taking away people’s right to vote.
That still shifts some of the blame onto some of the Democratic politicians in Florida, but I’m not sure that the Senate vote would have been the same if the final decision of some of the local party’s leaders would have been known to everyone beforehand.
That’s detached from reality. If the democrats simply stick by their word to exclude those votes, then Obama stays on track to take the nomination. The only virtue of splitting the votes seems to be making the democrats look indecisive.
Since they haven’t decided, I’d say they are making themselves look indecisive. In fact, I would not be surprised if the rules committee decided to put off the decision for a future date and just hope Hillary goes away.
I certainly don’t expect them to stick by their word. Do you?
Splitting the delegates punishes the states by making their primary pretty much a wash but at least they can say their delegates were seated. It doesn’t hurt Obama and it doesn’t help Hillary.
According to Ed Schultz, Hillary Clinton is still behind Obama by the same percentage as she was in mid-February.
For all her bragging about her recent wins, she isn’t gaining ground. Because the Kentucky polls closed 3 hours before the Oregon polls, it appeared to many people as if Clinton had made massive gains that day.
And because of her stupid words recently about how Obama might get assassinated, I no longer consider her Presidential material. Had this been the first time she said those words, I might forgive her, but it appears it may have been the 4th time she mentioned it.
As far as no one is saying “stand by for the real delegate goal,” no one is indulging in any indecision.
“Mike at May 27, 2008 09:17 AM”
Who are the people throwing their hats into the ring for pre-selection? Are they different in all your states? Or are the same people putting their names forward? It it’s the same people putting their names forward in each state, why would the ballot papers be different?
As an outsider, the whole thing is just perplexing.
US school kids are taught that in most cases a petition with a required number of signers will get you on a ballot. That explanation seems to satisfy the curiosity of most Americans.
Florida and Michigan moved their primaries up to increase their influence on the general outcome. This would have bucked what was agreed to by the parties nationally, and those states were told iirc they would be stripped of half of their republican delegates and all of their democratic delegates.
Hillary Clinton was leading the polls nationally, so the other democratic candidates had less to lose by simply supporting the decision to strip these states of their delegates and withholding all validation of those primaries by staying off of them.
You seem to want explanations to more than what you’re asking. Maybe you can research it, and let us know. That method may offer a better retention than getting casual answers from someone whose intuition is formed by the culture to which you find yourself an outsider. Otherwise, answering any of my questions may provide a point of entry with which to provide explanations that may mean something to the intuition of you as an outsider.
I live in another country with a different system – that’s why I consider myself an “outsider”. We may speak the same language, but I’m not American.
Does your country’s firewall only permit Peter’s site in your google search returns for political queries? So how acquainted are you with democracy?
This was a nice discussion over this topic. No, it’s not the only site that lets political queries through. I’ve been following this discussion and in the media here where I live.
BTW, the last time I checked, Australia (where I live) was a democracy – at least it was when we went to the polls last November for our Federal Election (held every 3 years) and our State elections in March last year (held every 4years).
You should have portrayed yourself as a subversive in an oppressive regime. If you had played your cards right, Bill would have given you access to launder money in his bank account.
Alan Coil posted the following:
Just to be clear: The reference is to a vote by the Florida legislature. But Alan’s post neglects to mention what was being voted on. The implication being made by people who post this factoid (and Alan isn’t the only one, so I’m not accusing Alan of being deliberately deceptive; it’s quite possible he was himself misled)is taht this was a vote on whether to move the primary forward. And that is dishonest.
It’s true that moving the primary forward was one part of the bill being voted on. But another part was considerably more important — a provision to require paper trails for electronic voting machines.
The question of paper trails is a major concern with a lot of people. Getting legislation passed to require paper trails, so that there is at least a possibility of an honest recount in the event of a disputed outcome, is a high priority for many Democrats. So it’s important to note that the Democrats in the Florida legislature could either vote for requiring a paper trail (and, in the process, vote for moving the primary forward), or they could vote against moving the primary forward (and, in the process, vote against establishing a paper trail).
To call this simply a vote on whether to move the primary forward, and to say that it was passed with bipartisan support, is misleading to the point of being dishonest.
It may be that some Florida Democrats favored both provisions. To know that, we’d need to look at their votes at various stages of the bill, in which these very separate issues got coupled together. Unfortunately neither your post nor the link you provided doesn’t give that information.
Indeed, the Wikipedia item you link to doesn’t even include the sentence you quoted anymore. Perhaps it got edited out for being misleading? Oh, well. Anyway, here’s a link to a Florida newspaper story describing what all is actually in the bill you were referring to: St Petersburg Times, May 8 2007: “This Bill Does A Lot More Than Advertised”. As you can see if you read the article, the main point of the law appears to have been getting rid of touch-screen machines, with the moving of the primary forward an additional provision that got tacked on.
Sorry, Alan, but I think you were a little too trusting, and passed on an incomplete and dishonest factoid without checking it out adequately.
Megan–he can’t help it.
You seem like a very patient person–do you spend much time working with children?
You’re the least patient person here and you work with children. You and Jerry are anxious to shove Hillary out of the primaries by giving states that she won half to Obama.
“As an outsider, the whole thing is just perplexing.”
Hey, sometimes it ain’t perplexing to just the outsiders…
Well, as the old political philosopher once said “Everyone has a plan until you get punched in the face”. the idea of this primary season was to get a winner nice and early so they could save money and not have people arguing and getting mad at each other. Hey! How did THAT work out!
In theory it would have worked, assuming the front runner does not stumble. Oh well, hindsight is always easy. It’ll be interesting to see what changes they make for next time (a lot will depend on who wins, of course).