The Rules and Bylaws Committee of the DNC will be meeting Saturday to hear challenges to the decision to strip Florida and Michigan of all of their delegates. Interested individuals were able to sign up to speak and I understand all of the slots filled in seven minutes! I think that is pretty amazing, and shows just how many folks are plugged in to this election.
One point I’ve not seen raised about the FL and MI situation and why it is critical not to ignore them: the sheer number of participants. It was expected that once the sanctions were announced, the number of voters participating in these primaries would plummet and that those who participated would not be a representative sample of the voters in the area. (Of course, we have no such problems with caucuses, right?) But FL’s voter turnout broke records and MI’s wasn’t too shabby, either.
I think the RBC will probably seat the delegates at 50%, as the original party plan allows. As for the delegate allocation, I think it is fair to award the FL delegates the way they voted. MI is a problem. Both the Edwards and Obama campaigns urged their supporters to vote uncommitted. Most agree that the uncommitted delegates are now likely to support Obama. I say award the delegates the way they voted here, as well, and let the uncommitteds declare who they want to support.
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I’ve been following the saga of the eaglet at Norfolk Botanical Gardens, which happens to be right outside my back door. For those unfamiliar, the NBG had an eagle cam (right now deactivated since the birds have left the nest), which allowed web viewers to watch them. A growth was spotted on the eaglet’s beak. The bird was removed and various tests were run. Today we learn that the growth, which has been described as aggressive, is avian pox. Interesting that everything I’ve read on the virus is that it is it is a slow developing disease.
I hope the eaglet recovers and is able to be released.
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Lots of dissing of Governor Kaine around the blogosphere, some of it deserved, some of it not. I have my own reasons for being disappointed in the Governor but I respect both the office and the man.
I have just one request of the Governor: include the resolution of the judgeships issue in the transportation special session. As I understand it, the GA cannot take up the issue unless it is included in the call for special session. The situation down here deserves resolution. Yes, I know transportation is important, but so is having fully staffed benches.
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Speaking of transportation, gotta love this headline: “Republicans attack Kaine’s road plan, offer no substitute.” I think that sums things up quite nicely.
Don’t forget that Kaine will be in Hampton Roads next Tuesday, June 3, for a transportation town hall meeting. The event is from 6:30pm to 8pm at the Virginia Beach Conference Center.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
While I think the idea of excluding votes is bad, that’s how it has to go in this situation. The rules were made EVERYONE agreed to the rules. Then two states broke the rules. The states and the candidates knew in advance that this would happen. Now that it makes a difference to Hillary, she’s crying foul.
I have no doubt she would argue just as strongly in the other direction if she was in the lead. Any compromise on this will make the Democratic Party look like they make decisions in a random an arbitrary way. I think we’ve already had enough of that with the Republicans in charge. I’d like to see better from the Democrats.
Bryus – where did I mention HRC? Or did you assume that? If you have followed the issue of FL and MI, you would know that it is not the Clinton campaign who made these challenges to the RBC’s ruling.
Further, FL & MI weren’t the only states to break the rules, yet they are the only ones being penalized. Talk about being arbitrary! Are you even aware that the RBC violated the party plan by stripping those two states of their delegates?
Try looking at things a little more objectively.
I thought the call for the special session went out a couple of weeks ago, and judgeships were not included. I can’t find it online, however.
Here’s something I think is hilarious. Obama supporters will come on blogs and patiently explain to Clinton supporters why Hillary’s being ridiculous for blah blah blah blah blah. You have to understand that rules were blah blah blah blah blah and you can’t reward people who break the blah blah blah. If you could only understand that blah blah blah random and arbitrary blah blah blah. Had enough of blah blah blah.
As long as we’re patiently explaining things: Hillary leaves FL with a +19 delegate margin assuming for a 50% cut. Obama is up by more than 200 delegates. 19 < 200. We’ve had a lot of blah blah blah recently for something that doesn’t matter. Just give Hillary what she wants, she’s not going to win anyway.
Vivian – Hillary has to be assumed because she’s the only one to gain from this. If not for her what’s the point of arguing for including FL and MI?
What other states broke the rules? I haven’t heard of any others.
Also, what rules did the RBC break?
I am being objective with the information I have. Are there any factual errors in my statements? Everyone knew the rules and penalties beforehand and that FL and MI chose to break them anyway.
Even though turnout in both Florida and Michigan’s presidential primaries was high, I believe it would have been much higher in both states had they been scheduled later (once people realized the race was more competitive) and not been sanctioned by the DNC (a lot of people did not bother to vote because their candidate was not on the ballot and because they were told it would not be counted anyway).
It would have been truly impressive to see record turnouts more in line with the record turnouts we’ve seen all across the country in the later primary states. We clearly need to change the system, for though I do not want the rules-breakers to get fully seated as voting delegations; I also do NOT agree with the policy of giving Iowa and New Hampshire an unfair advantage for setting tone so early. It is a little frustrating that in most elections the primary is over long before we get to vote.
Bryus – no, Democrats stand to gain. Ignoring 1.7 million voters in FL and 600,000 in MI is not the way to win an election. Are you willing to concede MI/FL in the general election?
Here is a pretty good roundup I found by doing a quick Google search. It includes the references to the documents and shows that, in addition to MI & FL, the rules were broken by IA, NH & SC. And it also discusses the 50% penalty.
You may be being objective based on the information you have, but the information you have is incomplete.
Scott – FL Dems encouraged turnout, on the belief that they would get their delegates seated. I don’t know exactly what MI Dems did.
Randy – I didn’t realize that the call had already gone out but I see from the GA website that it was issued 5/16.
Too bad the judgeships weren’t in there 😦
Thanks for the link Vivian. The rules should be followed, that’s why they’re the rules.
I wonder why there has been no press on those three states breaking the rules? As an aside, I have never understood why they think they have the exclusive right to go first. What makes them any more fit or representative than any other state? Yet, they have an undue influence on who the candidate will be.
I find it offensive that people’s votes aren’t being counted, especially in the Democratic party, the party that actually represents the people. That, combined with the whole super delegate concept just remind me of the kind of shenanigans that the Republicans like to pull.
However, I don’t think it’s right to count the delegates when the elections were flawed. The candidates agreed not to campaign there and most took their names off the ballot in MI. It’s impossible to reflect the TRUE intention of the voters in those states given the results. Voters didn’t have the opportunity to vote for all the candidates.
I don’t think there is any “right” solution, but I also don’t think seating them is fair.
The party leaders of Florida and Michigan knew the rules beforehand, and chose to break them. I find it hard to believe that EVERYONE who would have voted in the primaries (had they counted) would have voted in the new popularity contest. Why bother? So those people who didn’t vote in the primaries because they were meaningless are being disenfranchised. The results or the two primaries do not truly represent the electorate of their states, and so they shouldn’t count.
Bryus,
On the flawed elections point…
In Michigan the voters had the option of voting for none of the above. Also, were voters prohibited from submitting write-ins? It was not a requirement, as far as I am aware, for the candidates to have taken their name off the ballot. And why did some choose to do that in Michigan and not Florida?
Florida and Michigan both have access to all major forms of communication. Despite candidates not actively campaigning there, the voters were not without avenues to educate themselves on the candidates and their positions. There were numerous televised debates. If nothing else the voters there could have just watched C-SPAN to get the same effect of live campaigning.
Therefore, I don’t see how you say it is impossible to reflect the TRUE intentions of voters in those states. They had an election just like elections in any other state. Did the 2006 election in Virginia not reflect the TRUE intentions of Virginia voters? At a point in time, those primaries most certainly reflected the intentions of the primary voters there. Let me reiterate point in time, because if you are referring to sentiments today; of course, people’s opinions change based on new information.
Vivian,
Does it really matter what the Rules and Bylaws Committee decides at this point ?
Frankly, the result will be the same whether they seat none of the delegates, all of the delegates, or only half of the delegates:
http://tinyurl.com/5yrxg7
tx2vadem – It’s this simple.
The conditions at the time left left open the possibility that people did not vote because they hadn’t heard from all the candidates, or they didn’t think their vote would count. How many voters don’t have access to cable/satellite channels or the internet, it’s pretty arrogant to assume they all do.
In Michigan they didn’t even have a name on the ballot to vote for. As for the “uncommitted votes” those are votes against Hillary, not for any candidate. Any attempt to hand them out is pure speculation.
Bryus – I don’t know why there isn’t more MSM coverage of the other 3 states breaking the rules.
JeffCon – the Republican-controlled FL legislature made the call there and set the date, knowing full well that both parties’ primaries would result in sanctions. The Democrats couldn’t do anything about it. If you look at the FL Democratic Party website, you will see that information, along with the fact that they attached the date to a bill for paper verified voting. As I said before, the FL DP encouraged people to vote (thus the turnout records) so I disagree, for FL at least, that those votes didn’t represent the electorate. (Besides – how did you make that argument with a straight face, given the undemocratic nature of the caucuses?)
Doug – yes it matters. I think I was pretty clear on that in my comment at 12:45 as to why.
Bryus – I think it is a bit of a stretch to say that the uncommitted votes were against Hillary when both the Edwards and Obama campaigns encouraged people to vote uncommitted. Remember, everyone was still in the race at the time. In fact, the only two names not on the ballot were Obama and Edwards. There was a lot of posturing going on amongst the candidates at the time and almost all of them said they were going to remove their names from the ballot but only those two did.
As for the voters in FL/MI not hearing from the candidates – again, I think that is a stretch. Newspapers everywhere wrote about the campaigns – have been doing so for months leading up to the primaries. So the information was there.
I can’t speak for the details of what happened in MI but in FL, given the efforts of the FL DP to turn out the vote, I think you’d be hard-pressed to make the case that the voters didn’t participate because they didn’t think their vote would count.
Michgan and Florida broke the rules, and knew beforehand what the consequences would be. Now they have to live with those consequences. If FL and MI were allowed to seat all of their delegates, we will be holding 2012 primaries in 2011.
No-one has a right to vote in the primaries. (We don’t even have the right to vote for President.) The parties can choose their candidates in any way they see fit.