The Democratic electorate of these two states comprises individual Democrats, individuals who typically have no control over when the states' primaries are held. This is particularly true in Florida, where the state government is Republican-dominated. You are single-handedly disenfranchising these people.To tell you the truth, I hadn't thought about the whole thing except as it related to the race on the Democratic side. Steve makes a very strong argument. It's not like the individual citizens of Florida had much of a chance to influence the Democratic party power brokers who were making the decisions. The whole thing is a mess.
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Why Florida and Michigan Should Count
Steve Bates over at Yellow Doggerel Democrat, has an interesting post about why the Florida and Michigan votes should count in the Democratic primaries. Here's a tidbit.
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24 comments:
Thanks for the link, KT.
"It's not like the individual citizens of Florida had much of a chance to influence the Democratic party power brokers who were making the decisions." - KTC
... or to influence the Republicans in their state legislature and state house, who set the primary date to their own partisan advantage. IMHO, we need a national primary date for federal elections, especially presidential elections. Yes, I know, there may be constitutional issues with that. But it would resolve more than a few problems with the way we choose a president.
Again, thanks for the shout-out. I like your blog!
Steve, I hadn't realized that the Republican party polluted the Democratic primaries like that. Now that I think of it, the state government prints the ballots and hires the poll watchers, so of course the party in power has the control.
So just why did the Democrats disenfranchise the voters? How much control did the state parties have over the scheduling?
Oh, I forgot... my blog is the Yellow DOGGEREL Democrat. There are a couple of people who blog under the names YellowDog, Yellow Dog, YellowDogDemocrat, etc.; I wouldn't want to infringe their names. Doggerel is rough, rude poetry; I don't write as much as I used to, but my doggerel is mostly political.
Again, thanks for the link.
Ah, KTC... we were posting at the same time.
"So just why did the Democrats disenfranchise the voters? How much control did the state parties have over the scheduling?" - KTC
That's a good question. According to Bloomberg, the rules list Feb. 5 as the earliest allowed primary date. Florida held its primary on Jan. 29, only a few days early... so few days, indeed, that IMHO it is difficult to imagine it was an accident rather than a political decision by Florida's GOP-controlled government.
I could buy an argument about the Florida primaries, but not the Michigan one.
With only Hillary being on the ballot there it doesn't really make much sense and if Democrats there are upset about it they can blame their own party.
As for Florida it makes a little more sense since all the candidates were on the ballot, but is is a fundamental rule that you don't change the rules in the middle of the game. If Florida Democrats don't like the situation well they can blame their own party.
You got to love how the "Democrat" party doesn't count some votes and can use super delegates to trump any vote for that matter.
Jeff, let me see if I have this straight. According to your reckoning...
* Michigan's Democratic Party is in control of the state government; therefore, they set the primary rules; therefore, they are to blame. Well and good... I agree with that.
On the other hand,
* Florida's Republan Party (no, that's not a typo; I'm just removing an "ic" just as you did from "Democratic") is in control of their state government; therefore, they set the primary rules; therefore, the Democratic Party is to blame.
WTF? Where's your consistency?
(BTW, Jeff, in using "Democrat Party," you place yourself in the company of the late unlamented Sen. Joe McCarthy. Are you sure you want to do that?)
(Correction: for "set the primary rules" please read "set the primary dates.")
So what was the point of the national party punishing the Florida Democrats? Who stood to gain out of that?
Steve, I corrected the title of your excellent blog. Thanks for catching that.
Steve, back off on the semantics attacks until you've read Jeff's blog for a while. He's about as good a guy as there is. I doubt his mistakes are intentionally nasty.
In the meantime, thanks for popping over here and participating. You're teaching us knuckle-dragging conservatives a lot.
The Florida Democratic party could have held a caucus or vote by mail, but decided not to. The Republicans came to a sensible compromise of a smaller delegation: Howard Dean and the Florida Democratic Party got into a pissing contest.
Even so you can't say that the Florida Democratic party was railroaded into holding their primary early; they had options, albeit expensive, that they chose not to take.
"So what was the point of the national party punishing the Florida Democrats? Who stood to gain out of that?" - KTC
That's a darned good question. I'd love to know the answer. It proximately benefits Obama, of course.
But as you probably noted in my blog post that started the matter, I am extremely frustrated with my party leadership about this. The default policy should always be in favor of (small-d) democratic processes; this outcome is about as far from that as possible. Especially in the case of Florida, it seems to me that Pelosi allowed the GOP-dominated state government to decide for the DNC whether Democrats in Florida have delegates who are allowed to vote at the convention.
"Steve, back off on the semantics attacks until you've read Jeff's blog for a while." - KTC
I'll give it a try. The phrase "Democrat Party" is, of course, a red flag, an intentionally offensive misnomer apparently coined by the greatest Red-baiter of all time, Joe McCarthy. If Jeff had not inserted that gratuitously, I'd have left it at pointing out the inconsistency in his argument.
Oh, and KTC, I don't see any "knuckle-draggers" here. I'm certain I won't persuade anyone of the validity of my views. I just have to express them nonetheless. Rattle my cage, and I screech. :)
anonymous (couldn't you even make up a screen name?) - calling an arrangement that disenfranchises only half of Florida's GOP voters a "sensible compromise" reveals a peculiar understanding of the notion that Americans get to elect their policymaking public officials.
How do those Florida GOP voters feel about having their influence at the national convention cut in half? Does it seem a "sensible compromise" to them?
What you call a "pissing contest" seems to me simple advocacy of a one-person, one-vote principle. It is anything but "sensible" to abandon that principle.
I had no idea about the McCarthy thing and I consider myself pretty politically literate.
Steve, the Obama angle seems a bit weird. Way back when this all went down, Obama was a fringe candidate. I don't think anyone was thinking about that. It sure looks like it was a pissing contest to me. The voters got screwed in the meantime.
KTC, here's a wiki on the subject of "Democrat Party." Apparently it predates McCarthy (though he used it astonishingly often in his speeches; I've seen the films). Based on what I read in the wiki, it has always been used as a deliberately offensive partisan slur, never as a mere foreshortening of the name of the party.
As to "Republan," I don't know if someone else originally came up with it, but I independently coined it about two years ago when that "uniter not a divider," George W. Bush, engaged in a spate of "Democrat Party" brickbats in his speeches. (Of course he knew what it meant... he is the consummate political operative, and little else.) These days I use "Republan Party" only in direct response to "Democrat Party."
Interesting thread.
The whole thing really is just one giganic mess. And no, I'm not talking about MI and FL in particular, I'm referring to the whole primary system.
NH says (by state law) it must be first (so are they now claiming their state laws apply to other states? What would happen if some other state like DE passed the same law?).
IA (and others) hold caucuses (which disenfranchise all members of the military who are not able to be physically present).
TX holds both an election and a caucus on the same day.
The democrats have their "super delegates" which are completely outside the influence of the voters.
The whole thing is "covered" by news media with incredible (and obvious) bias, which don't report on issues or stances, but tell us about how good they look, or the size of the crowd, or how inspiring someone is.
And this is how we chose candidates in a democracy?
Why not just use a Magic 8-Ball (TM)?
Actually I've given this a lot of thought, and have a proposal - too long for this comment. I posted it over at my site.
"Steve, the Obama angle seems a bit weird. Way back when this all went down, Obama was a fringe candidate. I don't think anyone was thinking about that." - KTC
I would agree that it's weird, and I don't think the Obama campaign or his supporters directly caused the conflict. (FTR, I voted for Hillary, though I could easily support Obama.)
As to the timing, back when this first broke, many of us Dems expected the matter would somehow be resolved by the convention, but Pelosi's firm denial of Florida delegates came only a couple of days ago. That's why it's back in the news, and that's why I'm upset about it.
ohioan@heart - you're right; it's a mess. I read, and need to reread, your proposal for an alternative; it looks as if you've given a great deal of thought to the matter.
BTW, I treasure the memory of the three summers I spent in Ohio back in my younger music-making days, attending Oberlin College Baroque Performance Institute. Beautiful state you've got there!
(Yours too, KTC, though I've never been to San Diego, always to the Bay Area instead. My s.o. Stella tells me San Diego is lovely.)
What you call a "pissing contest" seems to me simple advocacy of a one-person, one-vote principle. It is anything but "sensible" to abandon that principle. Steve Bates
Except that either side could have had that if they had compromised on the timing of the vote. You lay all the blame at the feet of the National Democratic leadership, but the Floridian Democratic party was equally inflexible. A mail in primary after February 5 would have been fine, they (the Democratic leaders of Florida) chose to be stubborn and not follow the rules.
Primaries, and as we all know from 2000, U.S. Presidential elections have never been one-person, one-vote. Even your own state of Texas apportions delegates in the primary based upon how many people voted in prior elections, while also holding a caucus.
Generally Hillary supporters are all spun up about Michigan and Florida, while Obama supporters are eager that super-delegates follow the elected delegate totals; despite the fact they were expressly instituted to freely vote their conscience. There is the strong odor of self-interest to both sides.
well whatever happens, they need to deal with FLA & MICH if they want a unified paty in the end
Steve,
I like your blog. As a Floridian I agree that the voters did not push the primary date up, it was the Republican controlled state. I think DNC made a huge mistake in deciding to punish the democratic voters. This could really hurt them in November. They should seriously consider seating the Florida delegates as-is, no one here wants to pay for a do-over. BTW, here is a link for a online petition to count Florida.
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/seatourdelegates/index.html
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