“Unity” Shuck and Jive: Obama Campaign Opposed Counting 100% of Florida’s Votes — But Tried to Avoid Saying So
By Deb Cupples on June 1, 2008 at 10:20 AM in Barack Obama, Credentials Committee, Current Affairs, Delegates, Democracy, Democratic National Convention, Democrats, Florida, Hillary Clinton, Michigan
The DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC) decided on Saturday to count only half of Florida’s primary votes — despite the fact that all candidates’ names were on the ballot and Florida’s Democratic legislators had no power to block legislation that moved the primary election to a date that violated the DNC’s rules.
Make no mistake: Barack Obama and his campaign opposed counting 100% of Florida’s Democratic primary vote. At the same time, the campaign wants public relations points for appearing to want to enfranchise Florida — enough points to get Floridians’ votes if Obama becomes the nominee.
This I learned from watching the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee hearing today (part of it anyway, as the live video streaming conked out several times).
At one point, RBC member Tina Flournoy point-blank asked U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler whether the Obama campaign supported making100% of Florida’s primary vote count (instead of 50%). Wexler was the Obama campaign’s chosen representative for that hearing. A simple “yes” or “no” would have sufficed.
Did Mr. Wexler directly answer the question? No. Instead, he said:“…We are here to argue for the maximum number of delegates that this committees’ rules allow.”
Given that Mr. Wexler had earlier claimed that the RBC has authority to restore only 50% of Florida’s vote, it’s obvious that Mr. Wexler was essentially saying “No, Obama’s campaign does not support restoring 100% of Florida’s vote.”
For some reason, Mr. Wexler had trouble uttering that simple, one-syllable word “No” — in front of all the media folks, anyway.
Noticing that Mr. Wexler had failed to directly answer her question, Ms. Flournoy asked it again. And again, Mr. Wexler made a similar statement that didn’t include the word “No.”
But we viewers (and Ms. Flournoy) clearly understood the Obama campaign’s position: don’t count all of Florida’s votes.Not only did Mr. Wexler tap dance like a young Buddy Ebsen, but also his argument was flawed.
A key argument of us Floridians was that the RBC never should have punished Florida Dems, because Florida’s overwhelmingly Republican legislature had moved the primary election to a date earlier than the DNC’s rules allowed.Did I mention that Wexler is an Obma-supporting, U.S. congressman who represents Florida’s voters? With friends like Wexler….
Incidentally, here’s the current breakdown of Florida’s legislature: House, 76 Republicans to 43 Democrats; Senate, Republicans 26 to Democrats 14. The numbers have been roughly the same since at least 2001. In short, Florida’s Democrats have no power to block or pass any legislation. It’s numerically impossible.
Moreover, the DNC’s own rules [e.g., 21(c)(7)] allowed the RBC to not strip any of Florida’s delegates if it had found that Florida’s Dem leaders had acted in good faith to stop the moving of the primary date.So, why did Obama’s campaign object to counting 100% of Florida’s votes (aside from the fact that doing so would have given Hillary Clinton more delegates)?
Here’s Obama’s basic argument: none of the candidates campaigned in Florida; thus, it was an unfair election. One Obama-friendly RBC member projected that if candidates had campaigned in Florida, as many as 3 million Floridians would have voted (instead of the record-high 1.7 million that actually did vote).
Yes, that RBC member pulled the 3 million out of her… ear.
Did Obama’s campaign representatives really believe that Florida’s voters were in a vacuum? We get newspapers, Internet, radio, the cable channels…. We saw multiple televised debates involving all the Dem candidates before our January 29 primary.
Furthermore, why does the Obama campaign think that Obama was disadvantaged from not having campaigned in Florida? It’s equally possible that if Hillary had campaigned in Florida, she would have won by an even bigger margin than she actually did?
And if Florida’s primary election was truly unfair because no candidates had campaigned in that state, then is it any fair to count even 50% of Florida’s vote? If the election were truly unfair, than none of the votes should have counted — by the Obama campaign’s logic, anyway.
And yet, Obama’s campaign pushed for the counting of only 50% of Florida’s votes. Sometimes, logic takes a back seat to self interest.
In short, the Obama Campaign’s argument was unpersuasive and based on something even less substantive than marshmallows.
Another thing that bothered me about the hearing was the crowd. People actually interrupted with applause (and hoot and hollers and whistles) whenever a witness or committee member said something in favor of not counting Florida’s or Michigan’s votes (i.e, a pro-Obama point).
It sounded like a sporting event or a kegger at a frat house. I half expected the camera to zoom in on a young, rambunctious lad lighting his own farts.
I’m not saying that more Obama supporters were in the audience than Hillary supporters. I have no way of knowing. It might have been that the Hillary supporters in the audience were simply more accustomed to conducting themselves in manner appropriate to such a hearing.
One other thing bothered me regarding the unruly audience: the RBC co-chairs didn’t insist that the audience settle down. Given that the DNC is a private body (which allowed citizen spectators as a courtesy), I suspect that the committee co-chairs easily could have told the audience that if it continued to erupt in hoots and hollers, the RBC would clear the room of spectators. Judges make such threats all the time, and they usually work.
Perhaps those RBC co-chairs enjoyed having pro-Obama outbursts interrupting both witnesses and committee members.
The bottom line is that Sen. Obama got what he wanted: only half of Florida’s votes will count in the (not so) Democratic nominating process. His campaign pushed for this, purportedly to promote party unity — i.e., to get votes in November if he becomes the nominee.
If Obama wants only half of Florida’s vote, then he shouldn’t expect more than half of Florida’s Dems to get behind him. At this point, frankly, Obama would be lucky to get even half — given that he got far less than half of Florida’s votes during the primary.Memeorandum has commentary.
(small, medium and large sizes; for both dogs and cats)
+ 
You could hear the rowdiness of the Obama supporters on C-Span when Wexler appeared.
Yet the NYT is only smearing Clinton supporters. It is a usual NYT distortion. For example, they claim a Clinton supporter shoved a man in a suit wearing an Obama button. Etc.
Yeah. And the Obama crowd was angelic.
Who cares what the NYT says. They don’t get to go to the voting booth for the disgusted Democrats who will be voting for McCain. In fact, they inflame and increase the numbers.
Exactly. To inform them properly of how well their inaccuracies are received, a refusal to give their web paper any hits, and their print paper any money is the only truth they hear.
It is their circulation number that dictates how much people are willing to pay for advertising. Stop providing them with income opportunities. They are an embarrassment to journalistic integrity.
I believe that those who seek to DEFEAT BO in the GE by voting for McCain should practice EXTREME vigilance at ALL levels, because these folks are ruthless and would stop at NOTHING. If they tried to destroy one of their own, just imagine what they have in store for McCain…defaming, ridiculing, CHEATING, bribing, and anything one can or cannot imagine. Manchurian candidates and their backers go ALL OUT.
Jumping in here. Associated Press reports that once Obama is the nominee he will demand that 100% of the Michigan and Florida votes and delegates be counted.
So he wants 50% to dump Hillary and then will add the other 50% to give him more votes after she’s dumped? I will not vote for this man.
hey sallory, can you give us a link to that? TIA
http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-general/20080601/Primary.Rdp/
“Robert Gibbs, a senior aide, did not rule out the possibility that Obama will seat the Michigan and Florida delegations at full strength if he is the nominee.”
He said this on ABC’s “This Week.”
It was more strongly worded in an earlier report, by AP.
And yet the teacher from New York was bruised when she was ejected for chanting for Hillary. She’d said that Obama chanters weren’t removed.
Thank you for this account, Deb. Very well laid out.
Considering what they did with Michigan, I am surprised they just didn’t transfer a couple of hundred thousand of Hillary’s Florida votes to Obama. I’m surprised they didn’t also “calculate” the number of people who didn’t vote but might have voted and assign those to Obama too.
Barack Obama will go down in history as America’s first Affirmative Action Presidential Candidate. Nice job, DNC! I’m sure the republican party leaders are laughing hysterically at your Blatant stupidity and Marxist zeal. It’s amazing you can even keep a straight face yourselves.
Reading your comment suddenly jogged my memory: one of the primary things that Rezko (and others) are being charged with is a scheme in which he used MINORITIES as a front for his business ventures so that he could get “set aside” monies that were aimed at helping minority folks start businesses. In other words, Obama’s good buddy was skilled at using the whole affirmative action apparatus to steal and evade in Chicago.
This Daley Machine in Chicago and the “charitable works” of TUCC (which is undoubtedly a tax dodge for these corrupt politicians) reminds me of the old Tammany Hall scandals. They used affirmative action and poverty relief as covers for their voter fraud and deal-making. From wikipedia”
Despite occasional defeats, Tammany was consistently able to survive and, indeed, prosper; it continued to dominate city and even state politics. Under leaders like John Kelly and Richard Croker, Charles F. Murphy and Timothy Sullivan, it controlled Democratic politics in the city.
In 1901, anti-Tammany forces elected a reformer, Republican Seth Low, to become mayor. From 1902 until his death in 1924, Charles F. Murphy was Tammany’s boss. In 1927 the building on 14th Street was sold. The new building on East 17th Street and Union Square East was finished and occupied by 1929.[7] In 1932, the machine suffered a dual setback when Mayor James Walker was forced from office and reform-minded Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president. Roosevelt stripped Tammany of federal patronage, which had been expanded under the New Deal—and passed it instead to Ed Flynn, boss of the Bronx. Roosevelt helped Fiorello La Guardia, a Republican, become mayor on a Fusion ticket, removing even more patronage from Tammany’s control.
This Democratic Party political machine played a major role in controlling New York City politics and helping immigrants (most notably the Irish) rise up in American politics from the 1790s to the 1960s.Tammany depended for its power on government contracts, jobs, patronage, corruption, and ultimately the ability of its leaders to swing the popular vote. The last element weakened after 1940 with the decline of relief programs like WPA and CCC that Tammany used to gain and hold supporters. Congressman Christopher “Christy” Sullivan was one of the last bosses of Tammany Hall before its collapse.
Tammany never recovered, but it staged a small scale come-back in the early 1950s under the leadership of Carmine DeSapio, who succeeded in engineering the elections of Robert Wagner, Jr. as mayor in 1953 and Averell Harriman as state governor in 1954, while simultaneously blocking his enemies, especially Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr. in the 1954 race for state Attorney General.
Why do they assume that only barkys voters didn’t show up. Just like the assume all the “NEW” people registering are barky supporters.
We all know what happens when you assume.
Welcome President MCCain.
Debbie Dingle was on Fox News this morning saying they are going to continue fighting and believe the MI and FL delegations will be seated at 100% come convention.
I want to know why there is no separation of “convention terms” v. “reality”. The truth of the matter is that Hillary Clinton has been the leader in popular votes for a fair while. Just because the RBC has negated them for convention purposes, does not mean they don’t exist in reality and that Hillary leads on that metric.
I can’t believe that black people who used to be considered 3/5s of a person can discount the citizens of two states down to 1/2 of a person.
Alcee Hastings, an African American official in Florida, said something simlar. That’s why he’s boycotting the convention.
Why doesn’t anyone mention that he REFUSED each and every plan to revote … wouldn’t this have allowed all those other MILLIONS AND MILLIONS to have shown themselves? What was his logic in DENYING them their chance to pull the lever for him? The arguments just never hold up ….
Oh yes, and his self righteous, AND WHAT IS THAT WITH HIS FRIGGIN’ YELLING. OMG, it’s a good thing for him, a majority of those “rules” (still laughing on that one) Avoiders were already supporting B O, or they would have rightly been disgusted with him[Wexler]. ‘ you know what I’m saying’ (wink wink)…and while he got louder, when he was being more transparent, Mr. “I’ve always fought for votes”, yells LOUDER……’NO, [excuse me while I blurt out here-SMART @SS] I don’t know what is a “Fair Reflections” rule’.
This was all politically biased and nothing to do with the voters and RULES and LAW as they showed us. Pitiful display we saw yesterday.
From D. Brazile’s comments on “This Week”- Florida delegates will eventually get their full vote at the convention so we need to do what we can to get Hillary there so she can get the benefit of those votes. Michigan is a lot hairier. I think the suggestion of counting the uncommitted as uncommitted would have worked. Of course, that would not have help obie.
The Marxist Party plans to coronate Obama long before the convention.
Not even relevant at this point, what they do.
You know, like the MSM, they cheat so much, and SO ineptly, they’ve become superfluous, a joke, like a bunch of children, in daycare.
Would you trust guys with the intellect of Pouffle, to run the country?
They’re not legitimate contenders, they’re a stupid joke.
They do plan to try and coronate Obama. Why else would they schedule the DNC nomination to take place on the anniversary of the MLK, “I Have A Dream” speech?
Donna Brazille is a fascist, and anyone who watched the RBC meeting yesterday would quickly conclude that 1) she is an Obama supporter, 2) her rediculous “my momma” lecture (boiled down to “what about all those make-believe votes that were never cast?” argument) was pedantic lunacy at its best, and 3) SHE flippen voted AGAINST the measure to seat the FL and MI delegates 100%!
The DNC rules committee made a mockery of their own meme, and that was that rules matter. The MI decision was clearly not reflective of the DNC charter rules. It was a political compromise vote, based on nothing more than giving Obama his way.
After months of reading how Hillary was hurting the party because she wouldn’t quit, Obama ensured that there will be no unity now. He chose to wrap up fast rather than pay attention to the signals that screwing Hillary over would backfire. His choice. He obviously had the power to do it.
His campaign mistakes are now hitting. His race speech has gone from being over-praised to being jeered at in editorials since the latest church expose. This decision by the DNC fooled nobody. The public is well aware that he insisted on an unfair decision, and the marchers made their voice heard. They WILL defect. There is no longer any doubt about that.
He’s strong-arming SDs right and left. Now, it appears there will be yet another bombshell about Michelle this week.
The rock star is crashing.
“Sometimes, logic takes a back seat to self interest.”
The painful part is how the amount of time that self-interest rules has steadily gone up from “sometimes” to generally to “well you can count on self-interest to over-rule democracy.”
There is something lurking in the back of my mind that says that the Axelrod/Dean wing of the party (most of it in power) is eagerly looking forward to EXTENDING this country’s loss of constitutional freedoms. Their idea of rules are very similar to the idea that Bush and Rove espouse. A really bad place in the pit of my stomach says this is the consolidation of Bush, not the renunciation of him.
This is frightening and sad. Richardson’s quote in the NYT this morning about supporting O is soo telling. The blatant sense of “let me grab this power while I can” is demoralizing.
I tend to agree, its a power grab. They’ve thrown away any pretense of Democracy and respecting the will of the voters.
When I look upon the faces of those on the rules committee I see plutocrats and two bit gangsters trying to game the system for themselves and their cronies.
The best thing the rank and file can do is walk away from the party. Let the DNC shrivel up and die. Let the DCCC and every other party organ as well. Cut their fucking funds off.
That rules hearing was a sham. Ickes was a voice of reason amongst the sea of illogic. Everyone who voted against seating 100% of Florida because of the rules and then threw the rules out the window for Michigan have certified their hypocrisy. Obama just made sure that his run for the Presidency will fail. He just doesn’t know it yet. Stealing those four delegates is going to cause more division and more chaos than any other issue.
Thanks for a good post. You are correct in pointing out the logical fallacies in Obama’s argument and the actions of the Democratic RBC not only fly in the face of reason but are antithetical to the parties code of ethics and the Constitution as so well stated by Ickes and others at the meeting.
OBAMA IS A FASCIST AND A THREAT TO DEMOCRACY…
I must say that I was simply side-swiped by the “solution” that the MI party presented and I had not expected this lame insane calculation that relates to nothing.
Did anyone else on this blog know this was coming? Understand the “MI compromise” before yesterday?
the Michigan compromise has been bandied about for a while…NQ folks have been discussing the compromise for a couple of months…check the archives…It’s one thing to see somehing comin and quite another to witness. As far as I can see there are only 8 people on that committee who can look anyone in the eye and hold their heads up….and they were the ones who voted against the putin tactical hijack….
Thanks, workingclassartist. I think I may have encountered some discussion somewhere but I never encountered the entire scenario as laid out by (what I thought to be a decent guy - ha) Levin.
It was a stunning tour d’force of getting to an end product without any kind of logical structure. The logical reasoning was simply a walk in a very corrupt woods. And this for Unity. Think again!!
It seems more and more to be the case that quite possibly we actually have two Republican nominees in the offering: they’re just calling one a Democrat for convenience. McCain, Rep runs against Obama, Rep.
Yes, you are right: it smells of Putin - only he is more honest and has improved his economy….
I covered Michigan’s plan in early May at Buck Naked Politics:
http://bucknakedpolitics.typepad.com/buck_naked_politics/2008/05/michigan-dems-w.html
The letter that Levin/Kilpatrick/Dingell(there was a 4th, I am not sure it was Brewer) sent to the DNC outlining their proposal I did see online a few days earlier - I can’t remember exactly where, I think it was the NYT (no surprise there). I thought it was pretty outrageous but didn’t think the Clinton supporters on that committee were going to let it pass - unfortunately, of the 13 supporters, only 8 (including Ickes) were with Clinton, so 5 defected (such as that Reiley person - I think that was the one who read the proposal- and Fowler).
Please Read This~ and Larry should post it prominently
DEAN-BRAZILE MINORITY COUP SPLITS DEMOCRATS;
SENATOR CLINTON IS THE REAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY
By Webster G. Tarpley
Washington , DC , May 31 2008
Today the Rules Committee of the Democratic National Committee has taken a giant step on the road to political suicide. Today’s decision to cut in half the voting strength of the Florida and Michigan delegations effectively disenfranchises the voters of these two vital and indispensable states, and reduces them to second-class citizenship. Even the infamous three-fifths compromise embodied in the US Constitution of 1787 treated a slave better than the Democratic National Committee is treating the voters of Florida and Michigan . Without these two states, any Democratic ticket is doomed to defeat in the November election. The Democratic Party does not exist for the primary purpose of obeying its own rules; it exists for the purpose of winning elections, and the goal of such winning is that the interests of the people may be served and defended. This basic truth of equity has now been trampled on by the Dean-Brazile-Obama Wall Street puppets.
Howard Dean, Donna Brazile, and their retainers have argued that they owe it to black voters and to fervent youthful idealists to make sure that Obama gets the nomination. In reality, the Democratic National Committee has proven over and over again that it does not care a damn about black voters, nor about young voters either. Dean and Brazile get their orders from Wall Street bankers like Rockefeller and Soros and their associated think tanks, and it is these Wall Street interests that are demanding Obama be nominated to carry out a program of draconian domestic economic austerity and a final confrontation with Russia and China , as prescribed by the Brzezinski Plan.
By their actions of today, Dean, Brazile, and the Obama campaign have already split the Democratic Party. It is they who must assume the historical responsibility for the impending scission. If you exclude half of Michigan and half of Florida , you have already split the party, and this is what the Obama camp has done.
Obama has never won elective office in a truly contested election, and there is no way he can win a normal presidential election in 2008. He can only hope that the intelligence networks controlled by his Wall Street backers can destroy Senator McCain with piloted scandals at some moment in September or October. This is how Obama got his senate seat. So Obama will either be defeated, or else he will owe his presidency to the FBI.
Obama’s candidacy is already beset by at least five distinct orders of scandal. First is the fact that he is the product of a nest of racist foundation-funded provocateurs associated with Reverend Wright’s Trinity United Church of Christ, with the renegade theolib priest Father Pfleger being merely the latest in the series of these racist hate mongers to come to the attention of the public. Second is the fact that Obama is a product of a nest of Weatherman terrorists, including Obama’s close friends Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, who have sponsored his career at a number of critical points. Third is the fact that Obama is sunk up to his eyeballs in a cesspool of corruption and graft associated with the Daley-Blagojevich Cook County Democratic machine and ongoing criminal conspiracy known as the Illinois bipartisan Combine, which features the Levantine gangsters Antoin Rezko, Nadhi Auchi, and former Iraqi Electricity Minister Aiham Alsammarae. Fourth is a complex of scandals involving murder, cocaine, and illicit sex, associated with the names of Larry Sinclair and of Donald Young, the gay choirmaster of Wright’s church who was found murdered last Christmas morning. Fifth are the relations between the Obama campaign and terrorist patsy groups in the Middle East. The relations of Robert Malley with Hamas have already led Obama to dump Malley. The next phase may well involve the sponsorship in Washington of Ilyas Achmadov, the envoy of the murderous Chechen terrorist organization, by Obama’s top controller and guru, Zbigniew Brzezinski. These five echelons of scandal mean that Obama is out of the question as a viable candidate of the Democratic Party.
According to a recent Rasmussen poll, about one third of Democrats and one half of Clinton supporters want Senator Clinton to be on the November ballot without regard to what the Democratic bosses may decree. These results were gathered in a situation when this option was totally taboo for the controlled corporate media. With some elementary mass political education, these numbers would rise considerably overnight. What is needed now is the certain trumpet.
We now stand on the edge of a cliff, peering into the abyss. The catastrophes for the United States which are now coming into view on the horizon of an Obama regime are many orders of magnitude beyond the destruction wrought by Bush, Cheney, and the neocons. The initiative is now in the hands of Senator Clinton. Today, Dean (a loser of 2004) and Brazile (a loser of 2000) have irrevocably split the Democratic Party, even as they showed their own moral insanity and unbelievable political stupidity. Senator Clinton must now deal with the consequences of what Dean and Brazile have done. Mrs. Clinton must now declare herself and her majority faction to be the real Democratic Party, the heirs Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy, and launch a fight that will go all the way to victory in November. In a contest fought out among McCain, Obama, and Clinton, there is no doubt that Clinton would emerge as the winner.
Clinton needs to say something like this:
“I represent a clear majority of the Democratic Party primary voters. This majority must rule, and will rule, despite what a discredited gaggle of unelected and unaccountable party bosses and machine hacks may decree. The infamy and moral insanity of today’s meeting of the Rules Committee shows that the Democratic National Committee has been seized by an illegitimate insurgent group intent on carrying out a coup d’état. The Democratic National Committee has been hijacked by Wall Street interests whose unspoken agenda is alien to the needs of the American people. I call on Democrats to fight back. This is your party, and not the party of Howard Dean. My campaign is the real Democratic Party. I call on my supporters to seize control of the party apparatus in every state, and to make sure that my name will be on the ballot in November, so as to guarantee the American people the choice of at least one candidate who is actually qualified to be president in this crisis. In the midst of war and economic depression, we cannot permit another failed presidency on the part of yet another feckless and incompetent demagogue who has come out of nowhere to contravene the clear will of the voters in his quest for the highest office. Our national survival is once again at stake. Democrats, rally to me! Because of who I am and because of the grave responsibilities which I face, I call upon you to support me, whatever may happen. The Democratic Party is not the plaything of wealthy elitists. We are the New Deal Democrats, the party of Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy, and with your help we will secure the future.”
Even though I see that one of his books is advertised on the site, I think the assertions of this writer and his association with Lyndon LaRouche need to be further vetted before being placed “front and center” at NoQ. There appear to be numerous different factions who have seen the benefit of stroking Obama’s ego and co-opting him for their purpose. I wonder if there is anyone who has put all the pieces together.
Obama the coward.
Real men speak out. Cowards do not.
http://www.liberalrapture.com/2008/05/obama-coward.html
The DNC is so “rule” crazy….over any stupid rule, so why don’t they abide by this rule “LADIES FIRST” ?
Now THERE’S an old rule that I could support!
I want an unearned Michigan delegate too.
Since the DNC is giving away delegates to people who chose not to be on the Michigan Primary ballot - I would like to say that:
. As in years past, this year I chose not to be on the Michigan Democratic Primary ballot.
and
B. I would like a Michigan delegate in Denver. I am not greedy. I only want one unearned delegate - not four like Obama. We can go to cocktail parties and vote platform planks like: “Whose better- Obama or Jesus?” or “Should Mystery Date become the official Democratic Party board game?”
Does anyone else who chose not to be on the Michigan Ballot want one, too? I mean I was a Democrat between March of 1981 and June of 2008 - that should get me at least one unearned delegate.
The DNC’s phone number is: 1- 202-863-8000.
Let’s all call and ask.
I thought of that too, but I want a bunch of delegates for my Old Ladies Rule party. I have stayed off the ballot in MI for lo these many years , so I deserve at east 49 delgates.
I thought of that too, but I want a bunch of delegates for my Old Ladies Rule party. I have stayed off the ballot in MI for lo these many years , so I deserve at least 49 delgates.
sonia,
Why don’t you credit john over at liberalrapture for this? I see you link his post upthread but these are his words.
I was not there but I`m willing to bet that there was a faint smell of cousin Odinga in the room.
RBC was channeling that famous Walter Mercado yesterday. That is how they knew who would have voted and how. PHONY HACK!
From now on Wexler is the generic 2000 hanging chad to bar Floridians their voting rights. But Hey, that is all the black voters once got anyway, a half vote. Wexler is the racist-in-chief under Obama, only one half vote for Floridians. You are only half as important as the rest of the nation. You are 2nd only to Michigan who according to Obama is worth 0000000000000000000–zilch. This is Obama’s DNC’ way of saying thank you to all the American voters.
The Obama Way of Ending Divisiveness
When Barack Obama says he wants to end the divisiveness in politics, I believe him. When Obama says he wants to bring about unity, I believe him. When Obama says he wants to work for a new politics free from bitter partisanship, I believe him. When Obama says he wants to have vigorous debate, a robust discussion or a national dialogue to bring this about, I believe him — TO BE LYING –
FROM AMERICAN THINKER(posted at realclearpolitics)
great post, Deb, thank you for this. I do think that most people who have not maxed out on the kool aid see from the RBC’s decision that Obama is just another ruthless political thief. Hope and change my ass.
Leibniz08 | 2008-06-01 10:51:54
Do you have a link for the Tarpley piece?
Medusa,
Thanks. I don’t have a link to the Tarpley piece.
Thank you governor Dean for your support for Obama at the expense of the American voter. Thank you DNC, you have now taken more power unto yourself along with the AD 2000 republican controlled US Supreme Court that selected GW Bush for president. Florida and Michigan, the other half of the nation’s democratic party (the Party of Clinton) will pray for the day when your voting rights will be reinstated. God Bless.
Wexler’s spin, when he was being grilled about seating the full FL delegation, was as laughable as it comes - his little display really put a point on how idiotic the entire farce was.
And Wexler who was “seeking” impeachement of Cheney.
First heard about him on K**, when I still read it.
Any politician associated with K** must be a corrupt POS, I take that as a blanket truth, now.
If it comes through K**, it’s corrupt, with no credibility.
I’d investigate the whole Congressional rot, top to bottom.
Obviously, I agree with you — except that Wexler is not all bad. He really did fight for FL’s paper trail — and now we have one.
I’m just strongly disappointed in him over the RBC/FL thing.
You know, like the MSM, they cheat so much, and SO ineptly, they’ve become superfluous, a joke, like a bunch of children, in daycare.
Would you trust guys with the intellect of Pouffle, to run the country?
They’re not legitimate contenders, they’re a stupid joke.
Here is Michigan and Florida. Which side gets to vote per the DNC?
Welcome, yoz guys, to Chicago style machine politics, were the king makers always win because THEY make the rules.
You like the Pizza, don’t you?
This is the true Obama talent, winning on TECHNICALITIES not Performance. It doesn’t matter what you want, you’re going to eat it and like it. Be a good cog in the gears of this machine and vote for Obama like you’re told. (you know I’m adding fuel to the fire here)
This is what I really want:I hope that Puerto Rico comes out strong for Hillary today to give them a poke in the eye. I’m angry but I can still see straight.
The Democratic Party and the NDC’s Rules Committee are firmly in the hands of the Obama camp. That’s why it came up with what amounts to an utterly undemocratic ruling that allotted votes and delegates to a candidate whose name was not even on the ballot.
Moreover, the whole presidential nominating process of the party is undemocratic–otherwise the candidate ahead in the popular vote would get the nomination. I have written on this on my blog
“This is Barack Obama�s party now” Indeed. Watching yesterday’s NDC’s Rules Committee in action, it was clear that the Obama camp is now firmly in control of the party. The pro-Obama Michigan ruling was highly undemocratic; how can you allot a percentage of the vote and delegates to a candidate whose name was not on the ballot? Read more on this and the otherwise undemocratic presidential nominating process of the Democratic Party at:
http://www.reflectivepundit.com/reflectivepundit/2008/06/obamas-victory.html
and hope that Democrats will force the party to democratize the system by which they select they select their candidates.
Unfortunately, it is too late this time around…
Just out of curiousity, where were all of you “outraged” people trying to get these votes “franchised” in 2007 when the announcement was made that the states would be stripped of their delegates? Or earlier this year, after the state primaries?
It seems pretty clear that the “outrage” is opportunistic, based on the fact that these states are NOW in a position to help YOUR CANDIDATE. Sorry, folks. Your “outrage” doesn’t change anything.
My outrage was in the voting booth. The one place that we have been taught our voices would be heard. Where I voted for Hillary Clinton for Democratic nominee and where I have consistently voted against the Republican machine in Florida. Outrage, by its definition, is not something that can be manufactured. It is a response to a perceived insult, injury or injustice and is truly how I feel. So go back to your hovelwhere your opinion apparently means something.
It’s their party now and welcome to it.
Obama’s ‘new politics’ turned out to be old republican tactics: nonstop race baiting, but with age and gender baiting added; the usual simple minded cliches disguised as policy; false accusations and childish sneers; and of course voter fraud.
We may vote for the candidate, but we should have too much integrity to give him our support.
His followers won’t understand why. And explanations are useless simply because they know zip about core Democratic values.
It’s horrible to say, but we’re dealing with the hick side of the party: vulgar, unprinciplied, and obsessively self righteous. The cultural divide is huge. They’re too ignorant to come to our side. And I won’t go to their’s.
Mr. Tarpley’s analysis of the situation(see above comment) is impeccable. i have thought this way for some time now.
we must get this expose out there in every way possible.
shit.
this is getting real scary folks.
i don’t care if the coup calls Sen McCain the devil himself to discredit him….
I WILL NOT VOTE FOR THE OBAMACOUP.
Hillary must forge on to Denver.
Obama Throws Grandma, then Wright, and Now the Whole Damn Church Under the Bus
Let’s just say it’s been an evolving process… from the very beginning Obama has been defending his pastor, and his church, as they have been exposed as hate-mongering, anti-American, and racist.
Then as the heat became a bit too much, Obama gave the ‘most important speech on race relations’ in Philadelphia. In that speech, he defended Rev. Wright and threw his “white grandmother” under the bus.
http://www.theconservativepost.com/WordPress/?p=454
Okay, but if he throws Michelle under the bus, I’m going to scoot over. It’s crowded enough under here, the last thing I want is her angry voice in my ear.
A Utopian dream world where angry frustrated wannabe republican ops actually have talent, brains, and well adjusted personalities, and something other than the back table at starbucks, put there so the employees don’t have to look at his ugly op face, all day, since he never actually has anyplace else to go, or anything else to do.
Ah, yes, the future.
Gee Brent-Tampa, let me phrase this as carefully as I can…go fuck yerself! There now, ain’y that better?! Cry havoc and let slip the dawgs of chaos. On to Denver and if the elitists are bound and determined to continue the McGovern, Dukakis,Kerry school of lickspittle candidates without a snowballs chance in hell of getting elected so be it. The dif is this time they are driving away a HUGE percentage of their political base. Face it, the dems could lose every single AA vote and Hillary would STILL beat McCain. As it stands NOW obamalamadingdong loses to McCain. Give the latest viseos time to perculate, throw in the HUGE numbers of Clinton supporters who at BEST won’t vote and frankly most will actively work for and vote for McCain and you have a loss of HISTORIC preportions in American political history. This in a year when the Dems should be able to nominate a TURNIP and still handely beat any repugnantklaner. Heckovajob Deany!
“go fuck yerself!”
Hmm. Very adult of you, I must say. And you clearly could care less about the reason why we have elections–to get the person who has the POLICIES that most reflect your own. There is very little difference b/w Clinton and Obama on policty. There are HUGE differences b/w Democratic policies and McCain’s.
If you insist on whining because your candidate failed to win the nomination, that’s your right. But no need to attack ME for it.
You asked for it. You got it. Why complain here?
Besides, it’s pretty hard to “win” anything the DNC doesn’t want you to. They’ve now set a new precedent: “We think 100,357 voters mistakenly voted for the wrong candidate (just like the Messiah Obama has been known to push the wrong button when voting), therefore we are changing their votes to the candidate we like.”
That’s the new precedent the DNC’s RBC has set, and no amount of obfuscation will ever change that. Thank you for your support of the “People Who Know Better Than You” over the will of the people.
Brent,
You’re right, attacks aren’t needed.
I do disagree with you about Hillary supporters’ “whining” simply because their candidate “failed” to get the nomination.
Hillary supporters are upset about far more than that — and the handling of MI and FL are only a small part of it.
As for Obama, I suspect that SOME of his political stances may be better than some of McCain’s.
On the other hand, Obama hasn’t been honest with the public (e.g., lobbyist and corporate donations), and he doesn’t have a real public-policy record.
All that said, I don’t really know WHO Obama is or where he stands. That said, how can anyone validly assess how Obama compares to ANY other candidate?
What really gets me is people at some Obama Party sites angrily denouncing Clinton supporters who say they’ll vote for McCain instead in November. These Obama supporters (check the big cheeto for Meteor Blades’ tirade) are incredulous (shocked, shocked, I tell you!)that Democrats would vote for McCain–”do you want another four years!!”–they demand.
I guess they forgot that what brought us the initial 8 years was DISENFRANCHISEMENT of DEMOCRATS in 2000. They were outraged by it then; some of them say they’re still outraged by it.
But now, they’re angry that we’re angry about DISENFRANCHISEMENT of DEMOCRATS. Now, they want us to get over it.
So, why should I care if we get another 4 years of Republicans, when DEMOCRATS DISENFRANCHISE DEMOCRATS just as Republicans did, and then, like Booman, they celebrate it?
I’m re-registering as an Independent. And, when people like MB, and Todd the Twit at mydd, and Booman spew nonsense about “4 more years with McCain,” I’m just gonna say, “I am not a member of any political party that disenfranchises voters. I vote for the candidate, not the party. And, sometimes I vote against the party because they disenfranchise voters.”
What about the delegate selection process? Why still go through with the process if the DNC isn’t giving Florida any delegates?
Although the DNC has said it will not recognize delegates from Florida, the Party plans to appeal to the eventual Democratic nominee for President to be seated at the Convention. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the Chair of the 2008 National Convention, and DNC Chairman Howard Dean both confirmed that this does not minimize the importance and impact of the vote on January 29th. With this in mind, the Party will continue the delegate selection process to elect the actual delegates to the Democratic National Convention and will use the results of the January 29th Presidential Preference Primary to determine the apportionment of those delegates.
I got this from fladems.com and have been posting it everywhere.
They were ALWAYS going to seat the full delegations of both Mi and Fl.
It’s just not going to happen until after they get a nominee.
Yesterday’s tv show was pure theater.
I think the only thing HRC expected was to be able to put a challenge on record.
Doesn’t that make you feel good? The anointed leaders of our party are talking down to you. I didn’t get my pay on the head, yet.
Oh look, Obama is building unity already! He’s got Democrats and Republicans working together to keep him out of the white house.
http://www.liberalrapture.com/2008/05/letter-from-republican.html
He’s amazing! He’s united the garlic noses, the argula eaters, blue collar workers, Catholics, women, gun clingers, the bitter, the poor, Republicans, Fox news viewers, latte drinkers, and hispanics! What a guy.
Yttik
Well put!
Lets face one thing. Dean and his crowd have been in the bag for Obama since the beginning. They most likely encouraged George Soros to hit up all his buddies to donate to the cause. Everyone just needs to do one thing, when you seen the names of those whp undertook the Obama cause as their mission, vote for someone else. The democratic party left us all in 2000, it just took some time for us to realize it.
Change your party affliation and encourage those who believe the party should be in the middle, not the extreme left, to do the same thing. This crowd will understand come November, when they loose again.
Hopefully, Hillary will not give up. I can’t figure out how someone can claim victory yet, he doesn’t have the required number of pledged delegates. If Hillary is the person I believe she is, she won’t turn her’s loose anytime soon.
Do you remember in February when it began to look like the SD would be the deciders, to borrow a term from our current leader, what was the Obama reaction, there will be blood on the streets of Denver if that happens. My how times have changed since then.
I wonder how comfortable all the folks Obama has promised something to like a cabinet post or the VP slot feel know. In a few short months he has thrown his blood family under the bus, his pastor and now his church. I hope that the folks who support him are watching, they could be next!
OVER JUST 4 DELEGATES!!! The entire process has been a pig with lipstick, but to award these 4 delegates without any justification was the make-up remover.
I continue to ask, How is Howard benefiting Howard by all of this?
He’s not - there’s already circulating whispers that Obama is already seeking Dean’s replacement on the DNC. Obama IS known after all for throwing people under the bus after he’s done bleeding them dry of any political usefulness - see grandma who raised him, Wright who introduced him to God, Trinity church that gave him Black credibility and helped him achieve office in Chicago, and perhaps after tomorrow - his wife, who was his legitimacy to the American slavery history.
I live in the Banana Republic of Michigan, where the Political Bosses run the Democratic Party like a Dictatorship, where Party Bosses assign your vote to someone who made a consious decision to REMOVE his name from the Ballot AGAINST THE WISHES of these very same Party Bosses. I have been following politics since 1960 and I have NEVER seen anything like this in my life. In Michigan we have had “not committed” in the past, just as we had this year. These Delegates that represent the “not committed” vote are obligated to go to the National Convention not bound to any candidate. Instead the DNC and the Michigan Democratic Party will gife to Obama ALL of the “Not Committed” delegates plus 4 delegates that Hillary Clinton won by virtue of the 55% of the VOTES she received. This Party needs a name change, maybe someone can help them with that because they are no lomger DEMOCRATIC at all.
jim aaron,
How about Jackass Party or Dem Patsys?
Jim,
I’m from Florida and feel pretty shafted. But I have to admit that my siblings in Michigan got even worse treatment than we did.
I’m sorry.
I can’t believe how far removed the Obamabots are - they actually feel that Obama’s “concession was a mark of true leadership”! I have a difficult time of even typing those words!
Their weird reasoning:
- You should be glad you even got that as Obama had the votes (by a margin of one) to split MI by 50/50, which is what he wanted and would have passed - this is true, but just because he had them in his pocket doesn’t make it right. They are suppose to rule based on principles and ethics, not partisanship.
- The reason why they reached this “magnanimous compromise” was because the Clinton supporters on the committee, realizing how this would look, implored them during that private 3 hour lunch meeting to reconsider for the sake of party unity and for the necessary win by a Democrat of MI in the general.
- the best these idiots could come up with besides 50/50 delegate proportioning? 69-59 and stealing 4 Clinton delegates for a person not even on the ballot. A person who at most, probably only received half of the 40% uncommitted vote as Edwards was polling really high in MI. To second-guess the actual voters, to hijack another candidate’s delegates, to use exit polls to determine actual elections while negating those actual elections, to substitute one’s own judgment as to how many actually MIGHT HAVE voted or stayed home, is ridiculous and completely undemocratic.
That, Obamabots is why we say you are devoid of reasoning, of ethics, of morality, and most importantly, of the true principles of what comprises America — democracy.
may 31, 2008…..the day democracy died….well, obama does see dead people and now he can see dead democracy, when democrats leave this communist new democratic party. better mccain, than a voter thief and i am glad that the dnc was televised for all the world to see our united states is really not “united”. it is corrupt and so ripe for revolution, now !
“…why should I care if we get another 4 years of Republicans”
bmc, what is that line in the movie The Princess Bride, where they learn how to survive in the Forest of Doom (or whatever it was called) and say they’ll just go back there and live…?
That’s what this reminds me of. The six-fingered man is trying to threaten us, but we already learned how to dodge the quicksand and rodents of unusual size, so we’ll just go squat in the forest some more rather than kowtow to petty tyrants.
Thank you for this thoughtful post Deb. It is important to have all the details so well spelled out so that noone forget, ever, about this.
Thanks again!
ANdy,
thank you!
No doubt in my mind that the “fix” was in for Obama orchestrated by Dean/Brazile. Below are two quotes of Dean’s in a Mar. 5th interview on NPR’s All Things Considered with Rober Siegal…I have the transcript. Seems Dean was willing to throw Florida voters over a cliff to annoit Obama in S.C. and that Dean refused to consider that the Republican Florida legislature changed the primary date, not democrats.
“The problem with Florida, moving forward, was not only was it incredibly disrespectful to all the other states who voted for and kept their word, it also stepped on South Carolina which was our way of including large numbers of African-Americans in the process to select the Democratic nominee, who cannot become president without a large number of African-Americans winning in November”
“We’re not interested in disfranchising Florida and Michigan voters. They’re important to us. But what we are saying is we have to be respectful of the other 48 states who stuck by the rules, played by the rules and we most certainly have to be respectful of the candidacies of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, who knew what the rules were, and changing the rules halfway through the game is incredibly unfair to both of those candidates and frankly would split the Democratic Party. So we’re not going to do it.”
I’ve argued that many times (Fl’s Republican legislature). Karen Thurman was fighting tears when she argued it to the RBC committee in August.
Yes, evidence strongly suggests that the DNC “powers that be” simply did not want to fully count FLorida — even as far back as August.
I don’t pretend to know their reasons, because my mind-reading skills are still in New England (dodging Florida’s heat and humidity).
I think everyone should start telling people around the truth:
Obama and the DNC stole delegates (all 59 of them at this point 55 Uncommitteed until August + 4 that are for HRC per the will of the people that voted ; that is more than cheating that is fraud. Aided by the DNC Obama stole the nomination.
Obama is not a legitimate nominee.
Time for a change- I like New Deal Democrats as a title. Come on Bill and Hillary, you don’t owe the Democratic Party anything at this point.
Okay: the news is Obama is the new boss of the party. The Obama Party.
Let’s work together to vote that party out of office.
http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/trailmix/2008/05/barack-in-charge.html
I wonder if some of our video wizards can put together all those instances of cheering from Obama minions at the hearing and make a video of it and also of Wexler repeating Obama’s position of not supporting seating full delegation. PAGING FLINEO!!!
Obama unity trolls: Bite me.
NObama! No way! No how!
Oh Uppity:
The BO-maniacs are already doing that: they claim MI popular vote should not cound for HRC unless all the rest go to Obama.
Even BTD at TalkLeft is counting the MI vote for Obama (he does it at 75%).
It is preposterous: double cheating; fraud all the way!!
Andy,
Of course the Obama folks are looking at things in the most Obama-favorable way possible. WHat can we say?
All of us who seek to DEFEAT BO in the GE by voting for McCain should practice EXTREME vigilance at ALL levels, because these folks are ruthless and would stop at NOTHING. I believe that the Repug Rovian machine has been surpassed and perfected. They tried to destroy one of their own, just imagine what they have in store for McCain…defaming, ridiculing, CHEATING, bribing, and other nameless acts that one can or cannot imagine. Manchurian candidates and their backers go ALL OUT.
Exactly
That won’t fly. The votes are a legal matter as certified by the state. Obama got none. Delegates are another matter and Hillary can appeal the allocation.
Democrat Party? Ha. They can’t even spell democracy and equality.
And in the true tradition of Al Gore, Barack Obama doesn’t want certain votes counted.
Can anyone in the Democrat Party spell FUBAR? Or do they know what CF stands for? If not, someone had soon school them.
Best thing I learned today –obamalamadingdong.
Florida Democratic legislators, confronted with the choice between vetoing a bill calling for a paper trail on electronic voting to which Republicans added a provision moving up the primary, which veto the Republican governor promised to overturn with the help of the Republican legislature; or vote for paper ballots and trust the Democratic national party would understand and, in accordance with the exception provided for in DNC rules, withhold any punishment. These starry-eyed Florida legislators failed to foresee the zealous advocacy these otherwise law-abiding attorneys on the Rules and By-laws Committee would demonstrate to make Senator Obama their candidate, so enamored of him that they would disenfranchise Florida voters. As for Michigan… Who could imagine these movers and shakers of democracy would allocate the votes of our citizens from “Uncommitted” to any candidate or, adding insult to injury, argue that exit polls provide a sufficiently accurate picture from which to determine how many votes should be taken away from Senator Clinton and given to him?
Saying ‘theses votes don’t count’ in FL and MI only acknowledged the DNC said they wouldn’t count but in no way conceded, they would never count. I figured, the DNC just wanted to prevent other states from moving up their primaries. And, for the most part, it worked! As far as I can see, even without considering whether FL and MI votes could be fully restored under exceptions to the rule, the DNC had no need to punish them for voting early, now, anyway! Only, evidently, the DNC had something else in mind than just the primary calendar. Indeed, Donna Brazille now admits that, the votes from Florida, her home state, will count, in full, at the convention, so the delegates from these states can vote for the man the SD’s have already named as the nominee.
HI Brent,
Myself, I thought there would be an appeal and wanted to see how it went before making noise.
The appeal has, at long last, happened. And now I’m making noise.
[...] In looking at the why, it becomes clear that there is more to it than simply the politics of this election. If all that was in play was the 2008 race then Obama’s handlers should have pushed for a full seating, without penalty, of FL and MI. It almost certainly would not have prevented the super delegates from voting for him and pushing forward his nomination. It would have been a hugely popular move and almost certainly would have taken the fight out of many Hillary supporters. Instead Obama’s mouthpiece opposed the full seating, but like Obama himself tried hard to avoid having to say anything of substance out loud. [...]
[...] the full inclusion of Florida’s delegates in the Democratic convention as a “‘Unity’ Shuck and Jive,” a “shuck and jive” that will now have electoral [...]
Вот это да… По моему мнению, об этом пишут уже на каждом блоге
Ну - это очень старый артикль!
По моему скромному мнению, не стоит обольщатся на эту тему.