Build a Grassroots Movement to Prevent the Democratic Presidential Nominee From Being Selected by Unelected Super Delegates

There now seems to be a strong possibility that neither Hillary Clinton nor Barack Obama will emerge at the end of the primary season with enough elected delegates to gain the nomination at the Democratic Convention. The nomination would then go to the candidate who can garner the most Super Delegates (mostly Democratic office holders who are not chosen by voters in the primaries and caucuses but are automatically awarded approximately 800 out of the 2025 delegates necessary to nominate a Presidential candidate).

This would be analogous to the Supreme Court giving the Presidency to George W. Bush in 2008 and would lack legitimacy in the eyes of millions of voters. If either Obama or Clinton win the nomination through this kind of back room deal, it would be a disaster for the Democratic Party, for the nominee, and for Democratic candidates for the House, Senate, and local office.

By the end of the primary season, tens of millions of Democrats and independents will have voted in primaries and caucuses; close to two million people will have made campaign contributions to Democratic contenders; nearly 300 million dollars will have been spent on the campaign; and tens of thousands of volunteers will have made phone calls, stuffed envelopes, and knocked on doors for their preferred candidate.

If after all of this, either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama has more elected delegates, but is denied the nomination by the Super Delegates, millions of supporters of the losing candidate will be enraged. Many will stay home in November, many will vote for John McCain or a third party candidate, many potential contributors will zip their wallets, and many potential volunteers will suddenly have no time to help out.

This is not an issue only for Obama supporters or for Clinton supporters. While Clinton may temporarily lead among Super Delegates, it is impossible to know how the majority of Super Delegates will ultimately vote. Many elected officials who are Super Delegates owe favors to the Clintons and lean towards Hillary. On the other hand, many red and purple state elected officials will support Obama because they think he will be more helpful to them in local elections. It is vital to both Clinton and Obama that whoever wins the nomination is viewed as legitimate by the voters.

If Democrats hope to defeat John McCain and increase their congressional majorities, Howard Dean and the Democratic National Committee must immediately take steps to assure Democratic primary and caucus voters that their votes will determine the Democratic nominee. Before voter cynicism starts to escalate, they must devise a solution that will deter Clinton and Obama surrogates from twisting arms and making promises to garner the support of Super Delegates for a backroom deal that would override the will of the voters.

Howard Dean and the Democratic National Committee should immediately take two steps:

1. They should demand that all Democratic Super Delegates sign a pledge that would read something like this: "I pledge that at the Democratic National Convention I will vote for the presidential candidate with the most elected delegates at the end of Democratic primaries and caucuses. This pledge will become effective automatically when enough other Super Delegates have signed this pledge to guarantee that the candidate with the most elected delegates, when combined with the votes of the Super Delegates who have signed this pledge, will win the Democratic presidential nomination."

2. The Democratic National Committee should organize and pay for new primaries or caucuses in Michigan and Florida. It would be a mistake for the Democratic Party to disenfranchise Democratic voters in Michigan and Florida, two states that will be vital to a Democratic victory in November. At the same time, it would be illegitimate if a candidate wins the Presidential nomination by the votes of the current delegates from Michigan where all of the candidates except Hillary Clinton (and Dennis Kucinich) took their names off the ballot, and from Florida where none of the candidates were permitted to campaign. A new primary or caucus in Michigan and Florida is not a perfect solution, but it's better than the alternatives. Since Clinton seems to do better in primaries and Obama seems to do better in caucuses, perhaps a primary should be held in one of these states and a caucus in the other, to be determined by a flip of a coin.

I propose that an internet petition be circulated addressed to the Howard Dean, the Democratic National Committee, all Super Delegates and the Obama and Clinton campaigns in order to garner hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of signatures supporting the above proposals. Frankly, I don't know anything about the mechanics of organizing an online petition drive, but I suspect that there are readers of the Huffington Post who do know how. If readers agree with this proposal and have ideas on how best to implement it, please email me at [e-mail]. Also, I would hope this petition drive can gain sponsorship from various democratic party and grassroots organizations, both for their name value as backers, and for the use of their email lists to circulate the petition. If you are associated with any such organizations which might want to lend support, please email me. Finally, it would help if the petition drive starts out with a set of sponsors with name recognition: activists, pundits, bloggers, political figures, members of the DNC and even members of Congress and other Superdelegates. If you can be helpful in convincing relevant people to offer their sponsorship, please email me.

Let's start a grass-roots movement to help prevent the Democratic Party from once again self-destructing.

UPDATE: I've received a number of emails from people who would like to get a copy of the petition when it's ready sometime next week. Please keep those coming. But I would also particularly appreciate emails from people who can provide additional help--people with personal or organizational email lists to circulate the petition; people who can help line up the support of organizations who can provide email lists or sponsorship; people who can help line up endorsements for this petition from well known figures and even Superdelegates; people who can help publicize this campaign in the media. People with other ideas on how to make this more effective.

I'm grateful for all the comments below, but too many are about convincing readers to vote for or against Clinton or Obama. This is not about which candidate you like or dislike but about insuring that the Democratic Party has a democratic nominating process, so it does not seriously undermine the ability of whichever candidate wins the nomination to defeat McCain. I'm more interested in comments about whether or not you think these are good proposals and how they can be improved.

Comments

[seewhy]

in alaska almost 9,000 turned out for the democratic caucus. and 12,000 at the republicans'. two thirds of the registered voters don't declare a party affiliation and there are 120,000 registered Rs and 70,000 Ds. the 9,000 that turned out represented a 1,700% increase over 2004. many of them are not familiar with the caucus process. the caucus location in anchorage was overwhelmed and a traffic jam prevented many more hundreds from participating. obama took the state 74% to hillary's 25%.
it's very plausible to me that the alaska superdelegates could go to the convention and not honor the voters' desires -- because the superdelegates are powerful and politically entrenched and are more traditional democrats.
not sure what would be the best way to make them accountable, but i think it's important. in alaska and a few other uber-republican strongholds, this is a pivotal time -- do you take all that newfound energy and enthusiasm obama has generated and squander it? or do you enfranchise the voters? i don't think the party should toss off these questions lightly.

[PatriotActor]

If you change the rules during the game, it calls the results into question - it's much cleaner to let the rules stand. The time to change the rules is _before_ the contest, not during.

I'm an Obama supporter. I think Clinton will be bad for the Democrats if she wins. And I think she'll probably win. But I don't support changing the rules in the middle of the primary.

Obama and Clinton knew going into the race that superdelegates would get to vote. They've both had a chance to strategize, campaign, and maneuver to win. Clinton has a home court advantage in the party elite, but then she also had a name recognition advantage (or disadvantage, depending on who you talk to) in the electorate. If Obama can eke out a win, let him - but don't fragment the party by trying to change the rules of the game while we're still playing.

After this primary is over, if you want to petition to get rid of the superdelegate system, I'll support you 100%.

I'll support the Democratic Party nominee, whoever it is, and however they're chosen. It's just too important to prevent a Republican from selecting our next Supreme Court nominees.

[rusdr61]

The superdelegate system has been around for 27 years and has never been an issue, mostly because it has not been so close before.
I agree that the only superdelegates that should be counted are the actual elected party members not VIP's or party officals. If each of the elected superdelegates from each state voted for the person that won thier state, it would be a more honest system. They can not vote how thier district voted bucause you can not know that information based on county voting records. Most districts are made up of several counties and parts of others.
If you look at the current pledged numbers
(yes everyones different) from CNN
Obama has 918 and Clinton has 885 pledged delegates. If you add the elected superdelegates to this number based on who won each state you would have the following:
Obama 918+70= 925
Clinton 885+104= 989
If you take out the 510 superdelegates that are not elected, your total delegate count would be 3560, and 1780 would be half.
Out of 3560 you have 1914 already alocated, and only 1534 delegates + 112 supers remaining. Obama would need 52% and Clinton would need 48% of all the remaining delegates, pledged and supers, to have a simple majority.
What does all this mean? Even with the non-elected supers out of the picture you will have a very close election.
The DNC made a big mistake to take away MI and Fl delegates, if they do not fix it now, we will lose both state in the general election, and we lose again.
The next election we should have five large primary days where 10 states vote in primaries not caucauses every 4 weeks or so. More people can vote in a primary, most can not spend hours at a caucaus. Far too much time is spent in IA, NH, SC, NV. I live in Oregon and we don't vote until May 20th. Maybe this year it will matter but not by much.

[rusdr61]

your right
Obama 995
Clinton 989
Point is still the same

[Necron99]

Please check your work before uploading...

[AnninCA]

This proposal would do absolutely nothing for the party.

It is simply a scheme to steal the primary election away from the party itself.

In fact, if any such scheme DOES gain favor, it will, I predict, be the end of the Democratic party entirely.

Those who wish to change rules about the role of Super Delegates are trying to manipulate the outcome.

And that is just not going to happen.

[AnninCA]

Obama supporters don't get to play this both ways.

You want to change the rules mid-stream?

Then Florida and Michigan will be seated.

End of story.

You want to go strictly by who wins?

Then Kerry and Kennedy both must switch to Hillary. She carried Mass.

[Nonamnesiac]

RERUN THE MICHIGAN AND FLORIDA PRIMARIES

The most democratic (Democratic?) way to resolve the Michigan/Florida divide is to rerun both primaries, perhaps on the same day as the Puerto Rico contest (June 7, I think).

The DNC should pay for half of the cost for running the primaries and the other half should be paid for however primaries are normally funded. In this way, a potentially party-dividing resolution at the Convention would be avoided in a manner that is equally fair and unfair to the candidates but wholly fair to the Democratic primary voters of that state. The so-called "super" delegates from Michigan and Florida should be forced to vote however the voters of the state vote. If it is a "winner-take-all" state, then the super delegates should vote however the majority in the state vote. If delegates are proportionately apportioned, then the super delegates should vote however the voters from the district from which they come vote.

Admittedly this resolution means a very different primary than it would have meant when the states original primaries occurred, as, among other things, there would only be 2 candidates on the ballot. However having another primary would be democratic and would also give the states what they were seeking by moving the election in contravention to DNC rules, in that each state's primary would be of major importance to determining who the candidate is. At the same time, having another primary would put to bed a division that could literally jeopardize the outcome of the national election in November, as the delegates from those states would not be the subject of a bitter tug-of-war that could anger significant proportions of the campaign workers from those states necessary to get out the vote (who is exactly who state delegates to the Convention are).

Rerun the primaries in Michigan and Florida.

[realitytrumpsbull]

How about changing your party affiliation to Independent, and basically denouncing the DNC/RNC for the sordid little racket that it is? Once upon a time, 'back in the day', there was an interest in having a free and independent United States Of America. IS that still the case, or are we willing to put the deed to the ranch on eBay in exchange for several container ships worth of cheap chinese crap? Penny by penny, degree by degree, socialism is on the march...who REALLY won WWII? Hmmm....

[jdr8271]

I think there should be a new vote in Michigan, but not Florida. The Florida vote was perfectly legitimate in my view. They where both on the ballot. Neither one actively campaigned there.

There needs to be a new primary in Michigan.

Super delegates are stupid and so are delegates. The winner of the popular vote should win.

[sky2evan]

JDR:

Your FL idea is obviously not fair to the person with lower or no name recognition. If it had only been Clinton and Edwards on the FL ballot, how would that be fair to Edwards? Candidates should be allowed to campaign before voters make a decision.

[BatedBreath]

This blog is not about who is the best candidate... It _is_ about making the Democratic party democratic, and not a party ruled from the top down. Let's get behind this petition no matter who you prefer for a candidate. Let your voice be heard!

[EngineerBill]

I liked the second step about new primaries for Florida & Michigan. I have problem with the first one for this reason. What if one candidate has more delegates but poll after poll shows the other candidate to be more popular within the party? Holding the super delegates to this pledge would then force them to choose the less popular candidate. How about a pledge that they support the acknowledged more popular candidate regardless of delegate count?

[2LaneIA]

I think you are absolutely right about possible outcomes if MI and FL delegates are seated now, as is, and the superdelegates hand the election to the candidate with fewer elected delegates. I remember just how angry I felt when Bush v. Gore was decided, and I see this situation as having the same potential.

Your solution sounds good, and should be discussed on its merits. All of the candidate bashing that is going on in the comments is not constructive.

I want to win in November, even if I have to support the candidate that I do not support now. If Democrats think that we can win after spending the months leading up to the convention in savaging each other, we have learned nothing from our history. After the convention we have a short window to switch from neener neener to selling our vision for America. That is not much time, if we wait until then to start being civil to each other.

[LuluDoll]

This is absolutely untrue. The right has been preparing for Hillary for years and they do not know what to do with Obama. It is the primary, the people need to vote for who they think would be the best nominee. Keep in mind, Obama is building a movement with "we the people" that is what is frightening the establishment. The right does not know how to run against Obama and he will win if nominated. Don't fall for fear tactics!

[WAdem]

Unfortunately, most on this page are making their choice based upon what right-wing talk radio tells them to do. Many have not experienced the Atwater/Rove tactics and, therefore, lean towards Obama as a breath of fresh air in DC. If he is nominated, I can assure you the GOP will use their usual scorched-earth campaign to drive his negatives higher than Clinton's. Dems will then lose the WH again to the Republican slime machine. The GOP wants Obama. They know they can defeat him in the general election, whereas they have nothing more to throw at Hillary. She is our best hope for change in 2008 despite what Karl Rove, Chris Matthews and Rush want.

[krissymax]

WAdem I agree with you on Obama. He has been given a free pass in this election. Look at the coverage of all the real contenders compared to Obama.

MSNBC has been blatantly shilling for Obama. I have been watching Chris Matthews for years. At least five months ago, his bias tactics took an obvious turn. He was taking pot shots at the Clintons at every possible moment. He seemed to favor Rudy. Then about three months ago, he would spend his entire show cheerleading Obama. Matthew has never played Hardball with Obama's camp. NEVER!

Then his tone and jabs spread to David Shuster. The "pimping" Chelsea comment was a Chris Matthews classic. What an idiotic statement, Chelsea has a graduate degree and she is clearly an adult approximately 27 or 28 years old.

MSNBC has been bias and obviously helping Obama by scewed reporting. It started with New Hamshire, msnbc was ready to declare Obama the winner and they were just stunned that Hillary won. Same with Nevada. Instead of focusing on Hillary's win, they focused on Bill Clinton.

Then in SC they cheerleaded Obama's win like it was utterly amazing. Even though the primary had over 50% African American voters. And Obama received approx. 80% of them. This is an important factor to consider. Their reporting ignored it!

I watched msnbc on Tuesday night, after Georgia they had virtually crowned Obama the winner. On and on about how great he is.

By the end of the night, you would never have known that Hillary won the popular vote or that if you add the super delegates already pledged she was at least 80 delegates in the lead. Msnbc has a huge preception problem that comes from Matthews. Even Olbermann has started to take pot shots at Hillary.

What is going on?

[schmuckwithearlaps]

I sense a massive right wing conspiracy here!
The MSM is teaming with a small group of Obama supporters who are trashing the Hillary camp. Then in November, when McCain wins by a million votes, it will be the million people who sat on the fence or even voted for McCain because they tired of months of attack by all the subtle messages saying that if you do not support Obama you are a racist, and that if you dare say something mildly critical of Obama you will be apologizing in every venue of color forever. Some Obama supporters are gloating over the fact that their opponents, being good white liberals, can't fight back and have to bottle up their resentment and rage over false accusations of racism. Who wins? Let me hint, he's 71 years old with white hair and a bad temper.

[drab]

Obama babies insist that the Fl and MI delegates not be seated rules are rules.But when the rules for super delegates don't favor them lets change the rules,what a bunch of hypocrites.

[wendytheretard]

Howard Dean is asking for donations and setting a plan on how we are going to beat J. McCain.

My response
I don't want 4 more years of partisan politicians, you want my money?

Obama 08

[krissymax]

Obama is guilty of Washington politics as usual, but is getting a free pass in the media. According to the New York Times February 3, 2008, Obama's campaigns have received at least $227,000 from Exelon Corporation a nuclear power company. In addition, David Axelrod, Obama's campaign manager worked as a consultant for Exelon. Exelon is one of Obama's BIGGEST contributors.

What if anything did Mr. HOPE AND CHANGE give to Exelon in return for their generous contributions?

In 2005, Obama voted for Dick Cheney's Energy Bill. You remember the one drafted in secret by corporate executives including Enron.

What did the 2005 Energy Bill give nuclear power? A $4.3 Billion dollar tax reduction. That's huge!!!

Hillary did not vote for it because it was widely viewed as a corporate give away drafted IN SECRET BY DICK CHENEY.

What else has Obama (Mr. Change) given to Exelon? The Time's article focuses on an Obama Bill concerning reporting nuclear leaks. AFTER Exelon's input the rewritten bill submitted by Obama in October 2007, changed the reporting requirement from MANDATORY to VOLUNTARY.

DON'T BELIEVE THE FAKE CHANGE MESSAGE OF OBAMA. HIS ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN HIS WORDS.

[YcCoSQ]

the Clinton campaign has already been a disaster for parts of the Democratic Party.

The longer they are portrayed as viable the more damage is done.