Reminiscent of the 3/5ths Compromise in 1787 that apportioned slaves as only being worth 3/5th of a white man, the national Democratic Party has returned to its roots. Except this time, instead of apportioning the influence of slaves, the Democrat plantation is putting delegates in Michigan and Florida in their place.
The long awaited “Rules Committee” meeting, after two days of profanity-laden gnashing of teeth, came up with a compromise – to give Florida and Michigan delegates half votes at the convention.
From the AP article . . .
“How can you call yourselves Democrats if you don’t count the vote?” one man in the audience shouted before being escorted out by security. “This is not the Democratic Party!”
The sticking point was Michigan, where Obama’s name was not on the ballot.
Clinton’s camp insisted Obama shouldn’t get any pledged delegates in Michigan since he chose not to put his name on the ballot, and she should get 73 pledged delegates with 55 uncommitted. Obama’s team insisted the only fair solution was to split the pledged delegates in half between the two campaigns, with 64 each.
The committee agreed on a compromise offered by the Michigan Democratic Party that would split the difference, allowing Clinton to take 69 delegates and Obama 59. Each delegate would get half a vote at the convention in Denver this summer, according to the deal.
The deal passed 19-8. Thirteen members of the committee supported Clinton, so she wasn’t even able to keep her supporters together.
The committee also unanimously agreed to seat the Florida delegation based on the outcome of the January primary, with 105 pledged delegates for Clinton and 67 for Obama, but with each delegate getting half a vote as a penalty.
A little more jackassery from the meeting.
This sort of foolishness of treating Florida and Michigan Democrats as half-people is further evidence that Obama can only win when votes aren’t counted (or are discounted in this case).
Instead of discounting delegates, the Rules Committee of the Democratic Party should have just fired all of the state Democratic Party leadership teams in MI and FL as the penalty for not staying on the plantation.
Magnolia Tribune
