“All the rules will be going out the window.”: The Moral Equivalent of Election Theft

IDemo

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Tue Feb-19-08 04:38 PM
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“All the rules will be going out the window.”: The Moral Equivalent of Election Theft

I told myself a few years ago to quit using the phrase "I can't believe it". In an age where the outrages have become so regular a part of daily life in Bushmerica, the utterly unbelievable has become routine. Still, the daily headlines continue to push the envelope with sadly believable surprises.

It is with shock but no surprise that I read of "a senior Clinton official" telling Politico's Roger Simon that "all rules are out the window" in reference to campaign strategy, by stating that "pledged" delegates may now be vigorously recruited in the same fashion as super delegates are. This, supposedly in an end-run attempt to avoid the appearance of Super D's performing the subrogation for her at a brokered convention and denying the will of the people. While the Super D's are party functionaries or elites whose voting mandate is alternately described as 1) must reflect the will of the majority, or 2) must exercise their better judgement regardless of the will of the people, pledged delegates are widely regarded as virtual Electoral College votes. They are divided up in a number of different ways depending on the formula their state party uses, but ostensibly to reflect the intent of the voters first and foremost.

If the plan has now been officially denied by the Clinton campaign, it seems to follow a disturbingly predictable pattern of a surrogate chumming the media water, waiting for a response, and the campaign later denying any wrongdoing or involvement.

While the DNC rules may indeed indicate that any delegate, pledged or not, may change his or her mind, the expectation that they will has been virtually non-existent up until the current primary campaign. There simply has been no such closely divided contest heretofore where it would have made a difference, short of a mass migration. One could easily attempt to dismiss any complaints against such a tactic by arguing that both sides can take advantage of the rule(s), therefore, no foul. But whether one or both sides would choose to do so misses the point: while it may be open to debate how a super delegate casts her ballot, it should be taken as sacrosanct that a pledged delegate will remain true to the votes cast in his or her state's primary election or caucus. To do otherwise makes a mockery of the election process, rendering voters from all states irrelevant.

I am not irrelevant. You are not irrelevant. We are Democrats, members of a party whose very name honors the most defining part of a free society: open and fair elections. Our vote counts. Or it should.

I feel as strongly about this issue as any that have been raised in an already bitterly contentious contest. For any candidate (or their surrogates) to even suggest the possibility of circumventing the will of the people in such a manner is every bit as outrageous in its own way as the election theft of Supreme Court/Florida 2000.