The candidate with the most (pledged) delegates should be our nominee...

[DemocratSinceBirth]

If it was Bernie I would be crestfallen but there is no more sacred principle than the popular vote and nothing more ennobling than a candidate following it.

I remember the 1990 Nicaraguan election between Daniel Ortega and Violeta Chamorro where Daniel Ortega was defeated and voluntarily transferred power. It was the first time in fifty years that a peaceful transfer of power had occurred and that one elected president had given way to another. It was the election Jimmy Carter oversaw... He told Daniel Ortega this was a chance to be great.

He was eventually rewarded for his fealty to democracy and the rule of law and is president now.

To repeat there is nothing more sacred than the will of the people and nothing more ennobling than a candidate following it.

[Tom Rinaldo]

1. With two exceptions, I agree.

Exception number one would be hotly contested multi-candidate election where no candidate won an outright majority of the pledged delegates and it was manifestly apparent that the majority of the party did not support the candidate who held a plurality, but not a majority, of delegates.

Exception number two comes up for me only because the nominating process plays out over the course of several months rather than on a single election day at a fixed point in time. That would be if some significant new information becomes available to the public midway through the primary season about the leading candidates that radically alters voting patterns once that information became known, I can see a Party not always nominating the candidate who holds a slim majority of pledged delegates entering the convention if that candidate lost significant support during the latter stages of the campaign in light of new information becoming known that earlier voters were not aware of.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

2. A person better have a damn good reason to negate my vote.

And with all due respect your second argument sounds like highfalutin language to camouflage the fact someone wants to thwart the will of the people. In fact the currency of that argument is less than a week old.

[Tom Rinaldo]

7. I agree with your post header

...but not the text below it. I tend to think in abstracts and look for possible exceptions to rules because I think outside of digital electronics the choice is seldom purely binary. I have always been uneasy about early voting for the reason I cited. I support early voting as an option only because our nation makes it so damn hard for everyone to vote on Election Day - not making it a holiday, and not having enough poling places, machines etc.

I think democracy works best when all voters have the same information available to them to the extent possible. Time is a major variable. New health issues may erupt, new scandals may erupt that force voters to reconsider their preferences. But I agree with you that the bar should be pretty damn high before new developments rise to the level of justifying reconsideration of a candidate winning a nomination.

But on a separate but related note, right now I feel that the primary process tends to negate my vote here in New York, and even more when I used to live in California. With the media so focused on covering the horse race aspect of the nominating process, once a candidate jumps out to an early lead momentum really starts to govern the process more then substance. If The first Super Tuesday after New Hampshire was contested primarily on the West Coast and Mountain States rather than in the Deep South, do you honestly feel that Hillary Clinton would now be considered as strong a favorite to win the nomination as she currently is?

[KitSileya]

14. She is the favorite to win the nomination not because of the order of the states she's won

But because she's got a pretty much insurmountable lead in delegates. Even if all the states Bernie won and those he is expected to win went first, he would have such a small lead that one Florida or SC would demolish it. That's what proportional delegation means.

[JaneyVee]

3. Hear hear!

[DemocratSinceBirth]

4. Daniel Ortega is a giant!!!

[Agnosticsherbet]

5. If Clinton loses the Popular Vote and the Pledge Delegate Race,

it would be wrong of her to usurp the will of the people.

I hold Sanders to that same standard.

[geek tragedy]

6. the pledged delegate winner will be the nominee.

Sanders campaign embarrassed themselves with that nonsense. As if the party establishment is going to overthrow itself in a coup while also invalidating the will of the voters.

Come on.

[Sheepshank]

8. Acquiescing to the will of the majority simply makes sense....

.....somehow the non-sense seems to be lauded here very frequently.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

11. The sanctity of the ballot box is inviolate...

All decent people should loudly and boldly call out anyone who wants to alter this fundamental principle which is at the bedrock of our democracy.

[JonLeibowitz]

9. Last Week Daniel Ortega was a monster and Bernie a bad American for defending his govt

Now he is a cudgel. Interesting times.

Also I should inform you that the pledged delegate count is not a proxy for the popular vote.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

10. It's a rough approximation...

Daniel Ortega is a giant. There is nothing more ennobling than submitting to the will of the people and nothing more ignoble than trying to thwart it. It is my fervent desire we can all agree on that.

[oasis]

12. "peaceful transfer of power"

How sweet it is.

[rock]

13. Correct

No will of the people, no Democracy. It really is that easy.