Op-Ed
So, the Democratic National Committee has bent the rules for Senator
Clinton and effectively given her 87 delegates and Senator Obama 63 from
two states that were not supposed to be counted. That gives Clinton a
grand total of 1,580 pledged (more or less) delegates, and Obama 1,711.
While, technically that still leaves Obama with "the lead," there are 86
pledged delegates remaining to be awarded in Puerto Rico, Montana, and
South Dakota. This means that Clinton can still pull it out if she picks
up 153 percent of the remaining delegates, an improvement on the 181
percent she would have needed to pick up if not for the Michigan-Florida
deal.
Clinton clearly has the momentum. In addition, the backroom deal on Michigan and Florida's "pledged" delegates helps to blur the line between pledged delegates (awarded by actual voters and caucus goers, except in Florida and Michigan) and super delegates (awarded by Party control freaks). The distinction is, of course, blurred to virtual nonexistence by any media story covering the election, as over 80 percent of media stories now do.
Clinton clearly has the momentum. In addition, the backroom deal on Michigan and Florida's "pledged" delegates helps to blur the line between pledged delegates (awarded by actual voters and caucus goers, except in Florida and Michigan) and super delegates (awarded by Party control freaks). The distinction is, of course, blurred to virtual nonexistence by any media story covering the election, as over 80 percent of media stories now do.
Something called the "GI Bill" passed both houses of Congress with large majorities in recent weeks. It really would provide educational benefits to veterans, but it's not a bill. It's an amendment. It could be introduced as a bill, pass again with large majorities, and probably even override a veto. Or it could die from repeated vetoes after being passed repeatedly, a goal the Democrats have treated as their ideal dream outcome for all sorts of other bills over the past year and a half. Of course, even if the GI amendment is signed into law, the current president may eliminate it with a "signing statement."
It makes sense for Florida to be sanctioned by the DNC. If the Democratic Party is going to win elections, you can't have states capriciously violating agreed-on rules. But an equally critical reason to dock its delegates is that for a relatively unknown challenger like Obama, taking on someone as massively visible as Clinton, in-person campaigning is essential, and he had no chance to do it there. Obama's campaigning has played a critical role in every contested race in his once-underdog fight, both those he won, and those where he closed the gap, though lost.
With Hillary Clinton rejecting the compromise that Michigan Democratic leaders just crafted, the Democratic Rules Committee has a dilemma. Clinton keeps demanding that Michigan's delegates be apportioned according to the January 15 vote, where she was the sole major candidate on the Democratic ballot. But there's another twist that no one has raised—the impact of a Rush Limbaugh-style crossover on the Michigan vote. Limbaugh's "Operation Chaos" quite likely gave Clinton Indiana, provided much of her 4-point Texas margin, buttressed her Ohio win, and decreased Obama's margin in Mississippi. But no one talks about the impact of crossovers on Clinton's self-proclaimed Michigan victory, without which her unopposed candidacy would still have gotten less than 50 percent.
Given the disappointment of so many Hillary Clinton supporters that the woman they thought would be America's first female president will not be, the more they hear the suggestion that Sen. Barack Obama's win is illegitimate the more likely they are to bolt. If Senator Clinton's voters embrace that story that "a man took it away from a woman,"
denying her a victory she rightly deserved, they're at risk of staying home come November, or holding back from the volunteering and the get-out-the-vote efforts necessary for the Democrats to prevail.
That's why it's so unfortunate that Clinton continues to claim that "we are winning the popular vote." Because that statement is a lie - and it undermines every word she has spoken about the need for the party to come together.
Look at Clinton's math. She leads only if you give her 328,000 votes for the Soviet-style Michigan election, while giving Obama zero for not being on the ballot. And we count her full Florida margin, though Obama couldn't campaign there and do what he did in state after state by erasing all or most of once-massive Clinton leads once he began to campaign.
That's why it's so unfortunate that Clinton continues to claim that "we are winning the popular vote." Because that statement is a lie - and it undermines every word she has spoken about the need for the party to come together.
Look at Clinton's math. She leads only if you give her 328,000 votes for the Soviet-style Michigan election, while giving Obama zero for not being on the ballot. And we count her full Florida margin, though Obama couldn't campaign there and do what he did in state after state by erasing all or most of once-massive Clinton leads once he began to campaign.
An American soldier’s sexual assault of a 14-year-old Okinawan girl has caused a diplomatic crisis that could result in Japan’s refusal to increase its participation in the Iraq war, creating a rare situation indeed: an instance in which rape matters to the U.S. military.
President Bush apologized. Condi Rice even told Japanese leaders that the United States would “try” to prevent such incidents from happening again. My opinion: “Try” is already an admission of helplessness.
The military has no idea what to do with its rape problem because it’s part of the core contradiction out of which today’s military tradition has grown. Military rape, and the denial and/or blame-the-victim vehemence with which it is generally greeted, exposes, perhaps like nothing else, the lunacy of so much of our foreign policy, which is built on assumptions of that tradition that have long been abandoned in most other spheres of life, beginning with the need for a dehumanized, soulless “other” who is the “enemy.”
President Bush apologized. Condi Rice even told Japanese leaders that the United States would “try” to prevent such incidents from happening again. My opinion: “Try” is already an admission of helplessness.
The military has no idea what to do with its rape problem because it’s part of the core contradiction out of which today’s military tradition has grown. Military rape, and the denial and/or blame-the-victim vehemence with which it is generally greeted, exposes, perhaps like nothing else, the lunacy of so much of our foreign policy, which is built on assumptions of that tradition that have long been abandoned in most other spheres of life, beginning with the need for a dehumanized, soulless “other” who is the “enemy.”
Remarks made on May 24, 2008, in Radford, Va., at the Building a New World Conference: http://www.wpaconference.org
In a December 31, 2007, editorial, the New York Times faulted the current president and vice president of the United States for kidnapping innocent people, denying justice to prisoners, torturing, murdering, circumventing U.S. and international law, spying in violation of the Fourth Amendment, and basing their actions on "imperial fantasies." If the editorial had been about Bush and Cheney robbing a liquor store or killing a small number of people or robbing a small amount of money or torturing a single child, then the writers at the New York Times would have demanded immediate prosecution and incarceration. Can you guess what they actually demanded? They demanded that we sit back and hope the next president and vice president will be better.
I read a nice column within the past week or so on CommonDreams.org by a college professor named David Orr. He opened with these lines:
In a December 31, 2007, editorial, the New York Times faulted the current president and vice president of the United States for kidnapping innocent people, denying justice to prisoners, torturing, murdering, circumventing U.S. and international law, spying in violation of the Fourth Amendment, and basing their actions on "imperial fantasies." If the editorial had been about Bush and Cheney robbing a liquor store or killing a small number of people or robbing a small amount of money or torturing a single child, then the writers at the New York Times would have demanded immediate prosecution and incarceration. Can you guess what they actually demanded? They demanded that we sit back and hope the next president and vice president will be better.
I read a nice column within the past week or so on CommonDreams.org by a college professor named David Orr. He opened with these lines:
So we blink, take a breath, stare once more at the vote total: 149 nay, 141 yea. War funding request denied!
This is a first, fleeting and fluky though it may be. Look quickly and imagine a Congress that doesn’t feed the war god every time it pounds the table. Look quickly and imagine what courage can accomplish. We can breach the fortress of special interests that is our government and let historic change flow in.
Well, maybe. This isn’t the time to get carried away. If the “victory” for peace last week in the U.S. House of Representatives turns out to have historic significance, it will be because history has a sense of humor.
I say this not to denigrate the passionate effort that peace-minded citizens put into it; their lobbying and calls to power have created a constituency that 147 Democrats and two Republicans were unable to ignore.
This is a first, fleeting and fluky though it may be. Look quickly and imagine a Congress that doesn’t feed the war god every time it pounds the table. Look quickly and imagine what courage can accomplish. We can breach the fortress of special interests that is our government and let historic change flow in.
Well, maybe. This isn’t the time to get carried away. If the “victory” for peace last week in the U.S. House of Representatives turns out to have historic significance, it will be because history has a sense of humor.
I say this not to denigrate the passionate effort that peace-minded citizens put into it; their lobbying and calls to power have created a constituency that 147 Democrats and two Republicans were unable to ignore.
Well, why shouldn’t the Pentagon put its four-stars on the tube to ladle out patriotic talking points to the American public like mess hall stew?
There’s a straightforward quasi-honesty to government-managed news, which only has a weird feel because the Penta-pundits had to pose as impartial analysts and play along with the image the networks wanted to project: seriousness, independence, etc. How demeaning that their meetings with the Secretary of Defense had to be secret — an embarrassment awaiting ultimate exposure by the New York Times.
Let us consider the awkwardly evolving nature of war. Even as its psychological support diminishes among a public grown skeptical of any enterprise that requires ultimate sacrifice and absolute faith — and influenced, at least at the margins of its consciousness, by a permanent and growing pro-peace movement — it is more necessary than ever, as the engine that drives such a large part of the economy and makes so many people rich. The war machine can’t simply be dismantled. War must remain “inevitable.”
There’s a straightforward quasi-honesty to government-managed news, which only has a weird feel because the Penta-pundits had to pose as impartial analysts and play along with the image the networks wanted to project: seriousness, independence, etc. How demeaning that their meetings with the Secretary of Defense had to be secret — an embarrassment awaiting ultimate exposure by the New York Times.
Let us consider the awkwardly evolving nature of war. Even as its psychological support diminishes among a public grown skeptical of any enterprise that requires ultimate sacrifice and absolute faith — and influenced, at least at the margins of its consciousness, by a permanent and growing pro-peace movement — it is more necessary than ever, as the engine that drives such a large part of the economy and makes so many people rich. The war machine can’t simply be dismantled. War must remain “inevitable.”
John Edwards just endorsed Barack Obama. If Edwards' 19 delegates take his advice and vote for Obama, then Obama now has 1,620 pledged delegates to Clinton's 1,441. There are 189 delegates left to be pledged in remaining states. Clinton needs to win 184 of them (or 97 percent) in order to win, whereas Obama only needs 6 more delegates to put him over the top. To be clear, these are the numbers for pledged delegates, not including super delegates. Obama leads in that category as well, but I don't think anyone will or should stand for super delegates deciding an election.
There are, of course, states that have not yet voted. I'd love it if they could have a say in this thing. If it were up to me I would put every primary on one day in late October. It's not my fault that this particular race is over. It's not over in the way races are for candidates whom the corporate media hounds out of the race following one or two states. This one really is over.
Florida and Michigan are not included. The candidates did not compete in those states, and allowing them to do so now would involve a change in the rules mid-election, which seems highly unlikely.
There are, of course, states that have not yet voted. I'd love it if they could have a say in this thing. If it were up to me I would put every primary on one day in late October. It's not my fault that this particular race is over. It's not over in the way races are for candidates whom the corporate media hounds out of the race following one or two states. This one really is over.
Florida and Michigan are not included. The candidates did not compete in those states, and allowing them to do so now would involve a change in the rules mid-election, which seems highly unlikely.