The Dems' Florida Boycott Heats Up

[DeepModem Mom]

TIME: The Dems' Florida Boycott Heats Up
By TIM PADGETT/MIAMI & MICHAEL PELTIER/TALLAHASSEE
Sunday, Jan. 27, 2008


A cardboard cutout of Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama outside an early voting center in Miami, Florida, Jan. 18, 2008
(Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

There is one upside to the Democratic presidential candidates' pledge not to campaign in Florida before Tuesday's primary election: it means one less petty political donnybrook in the increasingly nasty race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. But for Democrats, it's hard to find any other silver lining in the fact that their eventual nominee will have no primary face time with voters in such a crucial swing state. "I don't think there is any real chance the Republicans can win the presidency in November without taking Florida," says Steve Geller, a Florida Democrat and the state's Senate minority leader. "But the Democratic Party shouldn't be taking that risk when just eight years ago the whole nation was agonizing over 500 votes in Florida."

The Democrats are taking that possibly ill-advised risk because Florida stunned the nation last year when it leapfrogged its primary from March to January. It was an act of rebellion against what the state called an archaic system that gives the traditionally early primaries, especially in small states like Iowa and New Hampshire, inordinate influence in determining presidential nominees. But the shift also violated Democratic National Committee rules — and prompted the DNC to declare that it would not seat Florida's 210 delegates at the party's convention next August in Denver, essentially declaring that Florida's primary wouldn't count. That also led Clinton, Obama, John Edwards and other Democratic hopefuls to sign a pact not to stump on the peninsula for the primary. (They signed a similar pledge for Michigan, which also jumped the Feb. 5 Super Tuesday primaries and held its primary Jan. 15. But unlike Michigan, all three major Dems are on the ballot in Florida.)

Like Geller, most Florida Dems are furious with the DNC ruling; U.S. Senator Bill Nelson even sued the DNC last year, but lost. But many also believe the DNC is bluffing — that the eventual nominee, not wanting party divisions to spoil his or her convention moment, and not wishing to exclude the nation's fourth largest state from that moment, will pressure party leaders to include Sunshine State delegates....

For her part, Clinton agrees, and as the weekend wore on, she looked to some observers to be dangerously close to breaking her pledge not to campaign in Florida. On Friday, she issued a statement pledging to request that Florida and Michigan delegates be seated if she's the presumptive nominee going into the convention....Clinton's stance on the delegates, not surprisingly, is not exactly an act of courage, or for that matter, principle. As the only major Democrat who didn't remove her name from the ballot, she easily won Michigan, and she leads Obama by more than 20 points in most Florida voter polls; if she's the presumptive nominee, welcoming Florida's delegates to the convention will simply pad her victory margin. The tougher call would be for Obama to issue the same promise: should he lose Florida but arrive in Denver as the presumptive nominee, calling on the DNC to include the state's delegates could theoretically cost him the nomination.

Which is perhaps why the Obama campaign seems resigned to the DNC decision that Florida's primary results, like Michigan's, will not count....

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1707293,00.html?xid=site-cnn-partner