No? Trying to reinstate disqualified votes that favor you only because everybody else played by the established rules and didn’t campaign doesn’t constitute gaming the system to you?
If it does happen and those delegates put her over the top, I will loudly and vociferously call shenanigans. This isn’t some dubious “Diebold fixed the election” nonsense, this is right in front of God and everybody.
You can call it what you want, but I can’t help seeing what I’m seeing.
Another Clinton bashing thread, ho hum. You know, its ok that the Board leans to the right, and all, but the same thread, over and over…
Can we please leave “cunt” out of this?
If we’re going to have a good ole fashion Hillary gripe session that all Americans can gladly take part in, it would behoove us all to leave these kind of slurs alone.
Dude, don’t bogart. Puff puff pass.
But Clinton lied. \
regards
gonzomax
I think there has to be something at least arguably illegal being done. This isn’t even close.
Tampering with voting machines (if it was done) is clearly illegal. No ifs ands or buts about it. What Hillary did might be a bit slimy, but it doesn’t come even close to that level.
Well, I’m no fan of Hillary’s, but I think you are seeing something that isn’t there.
Can we still call Bill a dick? 
She’s independent-minded, isn’t she? Feisty. Not afraid to go against party line, that one. She gets the job done.
I live in Michigan. I support Obama. My vote is one of those that Hillary is trying very hard to ignore. I’ll sling whatever slurs I feel are appropriate.
On the other hand, disenfranchising a swing state due to a decision by the Republican legislature was arguably not the smartest move.
Gaming the system, yeah. Throwing an election usually means you’re deliberately trying to lose it–didja mean “fixing” the election?
It looks pretty sleazy to me, I agree. I read a column suggesting that it can only poison the convention. If Hillary wins without Florida, then she’s tainted by this event (albeit mildly). If Obama wins, but Florida’s delegates would’ve pushed Hillary over the edge, then we get a contested election that hurts the Dems going into November no matter which way it’s decided.
Daniel
Come on, now, people - is there any doubt that all “missing” delegates, on either side, will be restored once the nominees are decided? Is there any possibility of leaving empty seats, even only figuratively, at the quadrennial festivals of unity and determination, right in the middle of a media promotion event? Don’t be absurd. Of course not.
Nobody’s been disenfranchised here at all. Anybody who wanted to vote has been completely able to. No candidate was off the ballot, and none’s views have even been unheard by anybody with even the slightest interest.
The party-insider drama is meaningless. To claim that this is “rigging” an election, “in front of God and everybody” :rolleyes: is just lip-foamingly silly. But it’s obviously not beyond the reach of those who are reaching for ways to rationalize a visceral personal hatred. Which, unfortunately, is a depressingly large number of you.
I have to agree with **Liberal ** on this one. (Did I just type that?)
She was just on CNN talking about trying to get these delegates’ votes to count. That is very slimy.
Bill’s campaigning the last week has been pretty low.
Sadly this is true. Just the Democrats shooting themselves in the foot again, I guess.
Jim
Yes, there is doubt. It is entirely plausible that no one will have a majority of delegates by the time of the convention. The delegates are awarded proportionally in all democratic races, and then basically evenly if the contest is close at all (witness NH and NV). So long as Obama and Clinton both get 30% in most of the congressional districts on Feb. 5th (and this is very likely), and Edwards stays in the race, neither Obama nor Clinton will get a majority.
Therefore, there may not be a nominee by the time the decision has to be made about whether to seat FL and MI.
Wrong. In Michigan, Obama and Edwards pulled their names off the ballot. Anyone wishing to vote in the democratic primary for either of those two candidates had to vote “uncommitted.”
Richard, you’re neglecting the minus-10-percent rule for allocation, and the number of superdelegates. Those are among the reasons no nomination has come close to being undecided by the primaries in half a century. This race is not unusually close, what’s unusual is the extreme importance being ascribed, improperly, to a very few early states. Yes, it’s theoretically possible, but kindly reconsider its plausibility after next Tuesday, okay?
Harborwolf, what’s the difference?
What’s the difference between voting for an actual candidate versus voting “uncommitted?” Really?
Well for starters I’m actually committed to a candidate. Had uncommitted won, the delegates would be free to vote for whomever they choose, like Hillary. For another I didn’t want to vote for possibly Edwards, Obama, or another unknown candidate that also wasn’t listed. Noone campaigned in the state so the voters didn’t get a great chance to hear what the candidates could do for them. I’d be willing to bet that a quite a few voters didn’t even bother to vote because their candidate wasn’t on the ballot and their vote wouldn’t even really count.
Enough differences?
Are you talking about this rule?
Explain to me why it matters?
On the issue of superdelegates, who constitute about 20% of the delegates IIRC, why is it probable that they will go overwhelmingly to one candidate or another? Even a 15/5 split might not be enough to give someone a majority.
I think we’re talking about more than a theoretical possibility. It’s still quite unlikely, I agree. But if it were entirely theoretical Hillary wouldn’t be fighting so hard to get MI to count.
I, personally, didn’t find anything too sleazy about Florida. I didn’t look too hard though. Celebrating there was a little distasteful.
Now Michigan, that’s a different story. You don’t have to look too hard to find some cloak-and-dagger politics going on there. To me, it showed Hillary was willing to play the mercenary and abandon the party to gain a leg up. As much as I despise the political parties, I’m really not ready for another rogue candidate getting to the White House.
That said, if Obama won in Florida and didn’t try to get those delegates to count, I’d be very surprised too. Let’s not act as if Obama is a saint here. I support him myself, but he’s still a politician. The only leg up I give him right now is that he had the integrity to take his name off the Michigan ballot. It’s up to everyone else to decide if he would have done that were he leading in Michigan’s polls.
I’d like to think he would have. However, I KNOW Hillary wouldn’t.
Except that she started showing up before the polls were even opened, being greeted by the mayor amongst a throng of reporters, posing with her plane for photo ops with the press, making public appearances and signing autographs.
If she were a decent human being she would be ashamed of herself. I’m actually kind of ashamed of some of my fellow Democrats here who are attributing the negative response to this dirty trick as being right-leaning anti-Clinton bashing. Not so. I’m as big a tree-hugger as they come, and this sickens me.