"Today's results are a victory for the people of Florida who will have a voice in selecting our party's nominee, and will see its delegates seated at our party's convention. The decision by the Rules and Bylaws Committee honors the votes that were cast the people of Florida, and allocates the delegates accordingly.
"We strongly object to the committee's decision to undercut its own rules in seating Michigan's delegates without reflecting the votes of the people of Michigan. The committee awarded to Senator Obama not only the delegates won by uncommitted, but four of the delegates won by Senator Clinton. This decision violates the bedrock principles of our democracy and our party.
"We reserve the right to challenge this decision before the credentials committee and appeal for a fair allocation of Michigan's delegates as they were cast."
5 comments:
I do NOT understand WHY Obama should get all the other votes??? they were not his??Is this because he is special??I am sure we are all equal,and I am sure all the people Who came to vote ,did not want to vote just for him.....,That is just BULL!!!!! Where did MY AMERICA GO??????? It's a sad sad time in our History ,and I am ashamed of our news channels for their coverage of this !!!!!
As a Michigander with a longstanding interest in politics, I think I might be able to explain the thinking behind the DNC committee's decision, sexton.
First, some background: The way we see it, the Great Michigan Primary Debacle started in 2004, when Senator Carl Levin and other prominent politicians in the party began pushing the DNC to change the process for determining the order of the states in the primary election. It was Levin's contention that Iowa and New Hampshire shouldn't be allowed to hold their elections first every single time, that neither state represented the country or even the party very well, whether in political views or in terms of racial or economic demographics. The DNC formed a committee to discuss stripping those two states of their unjustifiable first-vote status.
The committee decided to ease the system toward equality for all states by leaving Iowa in place but adding four states before New Hampshire. Late last year, New Hampshire announced that it would move up its primary, IN VIOLATION of the DNC committee's new rule, to maintain its status as second. It was in protest of this decision that Senator Levin and MI Democratic Chair Mark Brewer pressured our legislature to break the same rule and move up our own primary to January 15th.
That, of course, is history, and you know how well it worked out: In an election year where all the other states were turning out record numbers of Democrats, our tally was down a bit from last time--the DNC made it very clear that our primary wouldn't count, that they would strip all of our delegates as a punishment, and many people decided not to bother. Personally, I was angry with the legislature for creating the problem, as I saw it, and I held out hope for a redo of the primary, an idea which was debated but fell through a month ago or so.
Now, more directly to your question: Carl Levin and Mark Brewer provided a comprehensive explanation of their reasoning for the proposed division of delegates at the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee meeting, which was covered on CSPAN; I'm sure you can find a video or transcript there or someplace else. But as for Obama getting all of the "Uncommitted" delegates, there are some very good reasons that that makes sense.
First of all, Obama's name was not on the ballot, nor was John Edwards', though he was still in the race at the time. (Edwards' name WAS on the absentee ballots, oddly enough.) Clinton's name was there, so we can assume that virtually all of the "Uncommitted" voters were voting for someone other than Hillary. Now, that doesn't, by itself, mean that they were for Obama, but there were a few conflicting messages going out in Michigan at the time. One said that, as Obama and Edwards supporters couldn't directly support their candidate in what was supposed to be a meaningless primary anyway, they should instead try to influence the Republican contest. I know a few people who did that--they all went for Ron Paul--but I don't have any idea how many it was. The other message, directed to that same group of voters, was that the best thing we could do(I was for Edwards, myself) would be to show up and cast our votes for "Uncommitted."
There were no other statewide votes in that election, nothing of any importance at all. (In fact, the only other thing up for a vote where I lived was an uncontested library board incumbent.) That means that just about nobody would bother showing up unless they had a candidate in mind whom they wanted to support. Of the candidates who were not on the ballot (the choices we had were Clinton, Kucinich, Dodd, Gravel, and Uncommitted,) only two of them, Edwards and Obama, received more than a few percent in any of the other races--Richardson and Biden, for example, got almost no support--so it is certain that nearly, nearly, nearly all of the votes for "Uncommitted" were for one or the other. Edwards has endorsed Obama, so any delegates he might have received would go to Obama anyway. That's one reason that it's fair for Obama to get all the uncommitted delegates.
Another reason is one that Mr. Brewer and Senator Levin pointed out before the committee a few days ago: We've held district meetings to select the delegates, which, as I understand it, is the process we've traditionally used, and it resulted in a body of delegates who are uniformly for Obama. The arguments given at the DNC hearing had more details; this isn't something I've read about or seen covered by our time's pathetic, corporatised media.
As for the four delegates which, according to Harold Ickes, were "stolen" from Clinton: The whole argument against the arrangement is ridiculous! In the first place, we knew going into it that the primary was not going to count; the DNC made that quite clear, and newspapers all across the state reported it. That cannot have done otherwise than to affect the outcome, and to make the whole thing a deeply flawed primary that doesn't reflect the will of all Michigan Democrats. Thus, it makes no sense to use it as the sole basis for assigning delegates. In the second place, five percent of voters went to the polls and wrote in a candidate's name. All of their ballots were voided; again, none of those voters could have intended to vote for Clinton, as her name was at the top of the mostly-empty page. Most, statistically speaking, would have gone to Edwards and Obama, whose names were absent. That would shrink Clinton's margin of victory a bit, and that's one of the factors Michigan's Democratic leadership tried to work in.
Remember, the people who worked out the apportionment of delegates are accountable to the members of the state party, not the national party as a whole, so they did their best to work out the fairest arrangement they could based on incomplete evidence as to what the voters wanted. It just happens that the fairest way isn't one that benefits Clinton very much, and certainly not enough to win her the nomination.
That's my two cents, anyway.
I've never dropped by this site before, so I might forget to check back for responses; you can contact me at devoutatheist42@gmail.com if you wish to disagree with me or otherwise comment in private.
Cheers, and here's to a Democrat in the Oval Office in '09,
DA42
Hillary should receive the full count of her Florida, votes..Obama broke the agreement..
Obama said "I did not campaign in Florida", (so Florida vote shouldn’t count) -
FACT
-According to Boston Globe, HeraldTribune and other sites, Obama airs “ads” on
Cable stations in Florida. Even with the Florida cable ads, Obama still lost.
From heraldtribune.com Obama’s Florida ads bust pledge
See the Video here http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2008/01/obama_airs_nat
Obama just doesn’t get it… He needs to explain theses beliefs and stop insulting
Christians by claiming to be one..This is not Christianity !!
The Obamas have practiced Black
Theology from the writing of Marxist, James H. Cone… for 20 years !!!
this is what his church taught his daughters on Sundays…
“Black theology refuses to accept a God who is not identified totally with the
goals of the black community. If God is not for us and against white people,
then he is a murderer and we had better kill him. The task of black theology is
to kill gods who do not belong to the black community. Black theology will
accept only the love of God which participates in the destruction of the white
enemy. What we need is the divine love as expressed in black power which is the
power of black people to destroy their oppressors here and now by any means at
their disposal. Unless God is participating in his holy activity, we must reject
his love.”
and Obama himself… before TUCC….
Malcolm X’s autobiography seemed to offer something different,” Obama wrote.
“His repeated acts of self-creation spoke to me; the blunt poetry of his
words,
his unadorned insistence on respect, promised a new and uncompromising order,
martial in its discipline, forged through sheer force of will.”
While working as a community organizer for a group of churches in Chicago,
Obama
was repeatedly asked to join Christian congregations, but begged off.
How can this man represent all Americans ?
We can make a difference, lets’ tell the ArchBishop that muzzling “Father”
Pfleger for the 100th time, just won’t cut it. We want him removed, he is a
disgrace to the Catholic church and everything Holy…
Petition site…please pass it on…
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/removable-of-father-michael-pfleger
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