She's doing well? She's not doing that well. Obama's still ahead. And she's competing with a black man so I think she's only hanging in at all because of the racism in this country. If she had been competing against a white male candidate she probably would have lost by now. And how can you say McCain is the lesser evil of the three when he's basically another Bush (although maybe not quite as stupid)?

Its pretty much over, she has to win all of the next primaries with like an 80% margin then get a majority of the super delegates. The math on this has been done to death on the 24hr news shows, and it is pretty much mathematically impossible for her to win more delegates, which means they would have to rely on the super delegates(party insiders) to decide the election. I would expect nothing less from a politician trying to gain the most powerful position in the world. She is going to try to win by constantly reframing what winning means, by calling super delegatesautomatic delegates(very undemocratic), saying popular votes in states where the election wasn't sanctioned(Florida and Michigan) count and matter, and by going negative on him constantly. This is politics. To think the left is much better than the right when it comes to maintaining and increasing their power is to fundamentally misunderstand those who crave power.

If Obama wins the delegate count and Hillary wins the nomination due to the super delegates there is going to be a huge percentage of the electorate that thinks that the democrats elect people undemocratically. This is the hypocrisy they preached about with the Republican/Diebold 2000 Florida elections and 2004 Ohio black voter disenfranchisement. The bottom line is that she should step down if she truly cared about maintaining a healthy democracy, but that is not as important as securing her position as president. It is her right to run, and a large part of the blame should fall on the undemocratic rules the democratic party's national committee has placed in picking their presidential nominees(super delegates) and the nominee process(caucases vs primary and not letting Florida and Michigan have any impact in the process).

That being said, hopefully I can vote for Obama in November, but if not I will pick the lesser of two evils just like every other time I step in the voting box.

If there is anything the Democrats are good at, it's sabotaging themselves. Somehow, against all odds, they'll find a way to lose. I'm not optimistic about the next election, to say the least, even though I typically go 3rd party; the cynic in me is calling it for McCaine now.

So, here it is another voting Tues and one win for Clinton, one for Obama. Ugh. Why does it feel like this campaign is dragging on forever?

Anyway, I was talking to someone the other day about all this. He said this whole campaign is rigged by the Republicans. His theory is that Republicans have been voting in the Democratic primaries since the beginning in order to ensure that only the 2 least likely candidates make it to Nov. This is supposedly why Edwards and the others fell out so early. The idea is to make sure only one of the "losers" compete against McCain in Nov because there's no way in Hell this country is going to elect a woman or a black man over a white male, Republican or not. So with either Hillory or Obama running in Nov McCain is sure to win.

I'm a bit skeptical. But after watching the show, Hacking Democracy, I find it amazing we're still using Diebold voting machines. So I suppose anything's possible.

What do you think? Is this whole thing rigged by the Republicans? Or is that just conspiracy theory paranoia?

Your friend is an idiot, Clinton had been the frontrunner for a year and a half before the election, and Barack had been christened the new face of the party when he spoke at the 2004 DNC convention for Kerry. Rush limbaugh's operation chaos is designed to draw out the convention to hurt the chances of the dems to effectively combat Mccain in the general election. That is a conspiracy theory what your friend is saying about Edwards and others dropping out, they couldn't garner support in the primaries. Republican operatives will try to encourage their voters to elect the person whom they feel is easiest to beat(Hillary primarily because of a large base of hatred towards the Clintons) and also instill a sense of chaos by using loopholes in the system to drag on the process and have the democratic party coalesce around a clear nominee and create their general election messaging campaign. As for Diebold, the 2006 elections seemed to work fine, but yes, having a voting system created by a company with close Republican ties, that produces no traceable record, and has been verifiably hacked to produce false results....is totally antithetical to the concept of democracy. That being said, this election is the Democrats to lose, and if no foul play in voting machines is involved, they have no one to blame, but themselves if they lose.

Please tell me this isn't true, that these voters are just venting their frustrations when they say they won't vote for the other Dem.

"Exit polls out of West Virginia indicate only 36 percent of Clinton's supporters would vote for Obama if he were the nominee. A bare majority of Obama's voters said they would vote for Clinton over McCain."

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/05/14/clinton/index.html

That's not the first time I've read that supporters of one Dem candidate would jump ship to the Republican side if their candidate didn't win. I just find that so hard to believe. Obama and Clinton are really not that different in their ideas and neither candidate is that hateable, IMO. I'd prefer Obama win the nomination but I can assure you that if Clinton wins there is no way in Hell I'm voting for McCain instead of Clinton. I don't need 4 more years of another Bush-tard.

I'm sorry, but you have nobody to blame for this but yourselves and the representatives you elected. The rules were CLEAR, and the representatives you elected chose to defy them anyway and had the gall to be upset when said rules were actually enforced. You should be outraged, but not at Obama, not at Dean, but at your elected officials and since you elected them, yourselves.

I am sick of the mindset this sort of bitching is indicative of - that we deserve a do over or some sort of bail out when the rules we all agreed to actually get enforced.

It's the same logic that has our Congress bailing out Airlines and banks over and over again. The same logic that has pro-athletes renegotiating contracts when they are STILL under contract. The same logic that will have us bailing out homeowners, those who go bankrupt again and again, and who were irresponsible and bought houses they clearly could not afford. Nobody seems to ever be held accountable for their fuck up anymore, and that is part of the reason I think this country is in such a mess.

Put it this way, I make a good living, I'm not in debt, but as a single young professional, I realized I COULD NOT afford a subprime mortgage or ANY mortgage on a decent home in my area at this time. Millions of others didn't realize that. They bought things they could not afford (and yes, the lenders are partly at fault for giving out money like candy, but if I could realize it was a raw deal, they could have too). And so what do I get for being RESPONSIBLE?

I get a whopping $600 of my OWN money back, and the government will inevitably bail out many of those who acted irresponsibly - which I will certainly end up paying for.

This is WRONG. Actions have consequences, they NEED to have consequences, else what is the point of having contracts or rules and acting responsibly? As it stands, I'm going to get FUCKED for being responsible, for not buying things I cannot afford.

No more "do-overs" when the contract YOU AGREED TO actually gets enforced.

Sorry.

Bad analogy.

Look at what Florida did: KNOWING full well they could face sanctions on both the Democratic and Republican sides, the legislature still choose to go forward and move up their primary in order to get more attention for the state.

The CONSEQUENCES WERE KNOWN, they went forth anyway, because at the time they didn't think it would matter and would get them a bit of that press attention usually reserved for New Hampshire.

These were the elected officials of the people of Florida, and they didn't do this is secrecy. The people of Florida COULD have protested, but they didn't, because they didn't think it would be important at the time either.

Now that it is important, they want to disregard clear rules and warnings that were given to them prior to these actions. Fuck that.

Here's a story from 2007 that spells it out plainly:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/04/us/politics/04florida.html

from the article:

Their intentions, motivation, lack of respect for the clear rules and warning is evident.

It's a shame their elected officials fucked them like that, and an shame nobody in Florida spoke up while they were being fucked, but hey, at the time, nobody thought they were being fucked. Then they want a do-over after that bites them in the ass? Are you kidding me?

Personally, I keep up on state and federal legislature weekly, if not daily, and write probably 15 letters a year to my representatives. I think everyone should do the same, and if they don't care enough to do the same, they've little recourse but to whine about it - which they do and have every right to do.

So, yes, boo-hoo, Florida, I understand why you're pissed. Suck it up and deal with it, because it happened on your watch. Vote the silly fucks who moved your primary out of office next time around - you should. In the mean time, deal with the consequences like adults.

How do you sanction the representatives without sanctions the voters when the rules stipulate EXACTLY that?

Right, because only that guy voted for it an no democrats did at all, lol.

Read it:

http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Bills/billsdetail.aspx?BillId=35049

There were a TOTAL of 3 Nay votes by members of Florida's House and Senate for the bill in three rounds of voting. The bill was nearly unanamously supported by BOTH parties.

Why be pissed at the DNC? Both the DNC and RNC told Florida EXACTLY what would happen if they moved the primary, the Florida legislators simply didn't think the rule would be enforced or matter. Don't forget the Republicans sanctioned FLA too, cut their delegate weight in half.

Irrelevent to this discussion.

The rules are being followed - both the DNC and RNC have done EXACTLY what they said they would do. If, as a Democrat, you don't like said rules, you should petition your party to change them. Fair warning was given.

IMO, all states who violated should get the same treatment. You agree though, that FLA violated the rules, hence, my argument stands. The selective enforcement of the rules is something you should address with the DNC, and not germane to my argument.

As it stands, FLA DID violate the rules, and was warned what would happen if the did.

If you get pulled over for speeding and the guy next to you going just as fast doesn't won't change the fact that you were speeding. End of story.

That's irrelevent. These are the DNC rules, and even if selectively enforced, they were the agreed upon rules and certain states thought they were above them. Turns out, they aren't. Too bad.

I can't explain why it's not being enforced across the board, but like I said, it doesn't change the facts. Again, you should address this with the DNC.

 NO, the FLA dems did NOT oppose the bill, they voted for it in droves, see my link above (it was co-sponsored by about a dozen people and propsed by two as well, several of which I'm sure are Dems), and YES, they DID violate the rules, as you admitted. Like I said, end of story.

Oh, I KNOW it matters. Like I said in my first post in this thread, the Dems always seem to find a way to shoot themselves in the foot.