While many have been waiting with varying degrees of patience for the conclusion of the Democratic primary season next week, the true end may be crafted not in some far off primary voting booth but in a Washington, DC hotel this weekend. That’s where the rules committee will meet to decide the fate of the delegates from Florida and Michigan. Early indicators are not looking good for the Math Troopers in the Clinton campaign.
A Democratic Party rules committee has the authority to seat some delegates from Michigan and Florida but not fully restore the two states as Hillary Rodham Clinton wants, according to party lawyers.
Democratic National Committee rules require that the two states lose at least half of their convention delegates for holding elections too early, the party’s legal experts wrote in a 38-page memo.
Limiting the number of delegates to one half, in accordance with current party rules, will likely push the elusive nomination prize even further from the reach of Senator Hillary Clinton. Large scale protests outside of the hotel where the meeting will be held are already being planned. Most of these seem to be organized by Clinton supporters whose latest claim in a long series of benchmarks is that Senator Clinton is ahead on the popular vote count.
Having reviewed these claims myself, they seem to require some “new math” which may well involve bat wings and eye of newt. To reach the desired answer to this equation, a couple of assumptions are required. The first is that (while it’s vitally important to make sure every vote is counted) votes in caucus states do not count. Apparently the caucus process provides an inordinate advantage to black and/or male candidates while being unfair to white and/or female candidates. As a side note, you will get no argument from me that the caucus process, simply put, stinks. They range from “pretty bad” (as in Texas) to “outright egregious” (to wit, Iowa.) But I have long felt that they are unfair to voters, not individual candidates.
The second required assumption is that the vast number of Michigan voters (where Obama’s name wasn’t even on the ballot) who failed to vote for Hillary Clinton included either zero or less than one in ten who would have voted for Obama had the choice been available. Apparently Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel were hugely popular there. (Who knew?)
In any event, assuming the anticipated protests don’t do anything to convince the rules committee to go against the advice of their lawyers, the Michigan/Florida debate may finally be drawing to a close – and, along with it, the Democratic nomination process. Regardless, it still seems likely that we should have our “final answer” (with a hat tip to “Who wants to be a millionaire“) in the next couple of weeks. With no elections left after next week, there should be little reason remaining to stop the superdelegates from trotting over to the Obama camp, finally putting this story to rest.