Of delegates and superdelegates
There was an interesting piece in the Sunday NYT on the history of delegates in the Republican and Democratic parties.
From nytimes.com: "The two parties’ nominating systems reflect the philosophical differences between them. Or, as a prominent Republican strategist, Mike Murphy, suggested, perhaps jocularly, in a recent appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Democrats are hung up on ideas of fairness and equity.
“Democrats, being the nice liberals they are, grade on a curve,” he said. “They give you delegates for coming in second.”
“Republicans,” he continued, “being mean social Darwinists, we tend to punish the second-place guy with a lot of winner-take-all primaries.”
In other words, the Republican who kills the buffalo gets all the meat; the Democrat has to crouch around the campfire and share it with his brethren and sistren.[..]"
Thomas Jefferson felt that Democracy depended on an educated electorate. I wish I believed that Americans have a longer attention span than catchy chants like 'yes we can, yes we can.'
But then the record turnout for the primaries and caucuses gives me hope that Americans are paying attention to politics after being asleep at the wheel for so many elections.
I just hope something doesn't happen to turn off voters before November. My greatest fear is a destructive convention in Denver.
If Obama is denied the nomination because of the superdelegates...if he wins the popular vote and then loses because of the delegates, I think we will see rioting in the streets by young people. How terrible to have a re-run of the nightmare of the 1968 Convention.
Democrats started this superdelegate thing a couple of decades ago...people really didn't pay much attention to it because it never comes into play. Well, now it might come into play and people don't like it at all.
To be fair, the superdelegates were designed to play a pivotal role at the beginning rather than the end of the primary season. Way back before the power of blogs, a frontrunner could become a frontrunner just from having the support of a majority of superdelegates.
So in essence, Democrats may have more or less shot themselves in the foot, at least where ordinary voters are concerned.
It's nice to think of a national primary, held maybe on the first Tuesday in March or April...everyone votes, every vote counts, etc. But then it's also nice that during the caucuses voters get to see and talk to the candidates face to face. And small states get to play too. With no caucuses, campaigns would just turn into big airport rallies.
Basically what this boils down to is Democrats created the superdelegates to make sure the nominee was one that was ELECTABLE.
And look at the choices that the superdelegates in their wisdom have given us: Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, Al Gore, and John Kerry.
Okay okay...they came up with one winner, Bill Clinton.
To make matters worse, superdelegates have received over $800,000 from Obama and Clinton in the form of campaign contributions during the last three years, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.
Obama has doled out more than $694,000 to the superdelegates from his political action committee, Hope Fund, or campaign committee since 2005.
Clinton has not been as openhanded. Her PAC, HILLPAC, and campaign committee appear to have distributed $195,500 to superdelegates.
Wonder what Thomas Jefferson would think about all that?
Lefty organization Move-On has gathered over 200,000 signatures on a petition to Democratic Party superdelegates. It reads: “The superdelegates should let the voters decide between Clinton and Obama. Then support the people’s choice.”
The superdelegates MUST respect the will of the voters if they want unity in the Democratic Party and victory in November.
Just a thought -- if the GOP had superdelegates, does anyone still think that John McCain would be their nominee?
