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By George Packer
$14.99
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By Michael Jerryson (Editor), Mark Juergensmeyer (Editor)
$20
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Flickr / J. Kernion
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A group of Democrats convened by Barack Obama has recommended that the Democratic Party eliminate the influence of “superdelegates,” who have had an unrestricted vote in the nomination process because they were not selected based on the primaries or caucuses.
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Mark Penn has taken no shortage of blame for the downfall of Hillary Clinton’s presidential aspirations, but the former campaign chief has a few ideas of his own about what could have been. Penn writes in the New York Times that Team Clinton should have taken on Barack Obama from the beginning and should have courted young voters and women more aggressively, but money “may just have had a lot more to do with who won than anyone imagines.”
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AP photo / Mike Derer
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The Democratic Party held its final primaries Tuesday, but Barack Obama wasn’t leaving anything to chance. Before the polls even closed, his campaign lined up a steady stream of superdelegate endorsements that, according to the Associated Press and others, put Obama over the top.
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Flickr / seiu_international
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Hillary Clinton scored a huge win in Puerto Rico on Sunday, though she still needs an argument for the superdelegates. The candidate was hoping for major gains in the popular vote, but a local politico tells CNN that Puerto Ricans, who can’t vote in the general election, were less enthusiastic than mainland primary goers: “Most people in Puerto Rico, I would venture to guess, they are not even aware that there’s a primary going on.” Update: Clinton’s fuzzy math.
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By Joe Conason — When the Democratic Party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee meets Saturday to determine the status of the votes cast in the Michigan and Florida primaries, its members should try to look past self-serving campaign arguments and bumbling party leaders’ silly attempts to save face.
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By Eugene Robinson — If this campaign goes on much longer, what will be left of Hillary Clinton?
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By Eugene Robinson — Clinton wants only one thing—the presidency—and she wants it now, not later. If success means using the Florida and Michigan “issue” to tie the party in knots until the convention, so be it.
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Flickr / throwthedamnthing
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Voters in West Virginia are widely expected to hand Hillary Clinton a huge, if moot, victory on Tuesday. Barack Obama will deal with the predicted hiccup by avoiding it altogether. The presumptive Democratic nominee will not be in the state and he will not give a speech, hoping that superdelegates either don’t notice or don’t care.
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msek.com/pollchicksonline.com
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After seemingly endless months of campaign-trail tension, Hillary Clinton gave indications Saturday that lines of communication were open between her camp and Barack Obama’s about how to unify the Democratic Party once the nomination question is finally settled—but, as she reminded Clinton-supporting superdelegates during a conference call, it ain’t over yet.
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AP photo / Susan Walsh
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The aftereffects of Tuesday’s Democratic primaries in North Carolina and Indiana are registering in the ongoing contest for superdelegate supporters: By late Friday, Barack Obama’s “super” group was just 166 short of the 2,025 delegates he needs to win the nomination.
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By Eugene Robinson — Hillary Clinton has campaigned as if the Democratic nomination were hers by divine right. That’s why she is falling short—and that’s why she should be persuaded to quit now, before her majestic sense of entitlement splits the party along racial lines.
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AP photo / Carolyn Kaster
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By Bernard Weisberger — Throughout the primary campaign, Democrats have been explaining, equivocating and ultimately fretting over the role of superdelegates, but those unelected power brokers are themselves the result of previous party contortions. Perhaps the time has come for a new model.
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Flickr / marcn
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Hillary Clinton will surely stir controversy with racially charged comments that appeared Thursday in USA Today. The candidate noted an article “that found how Sen. Obama’s support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me.” “There’s a pattern emerging here,” she added. Audio update.
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time.com
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Everyone from Tim Russert to Time magazine seems to have decided that there’s absolutely no way Hillary Clinton can get the nomination. What happened? Sure, her chances of winning enough pledged delegates are nearly impossible, but wasn’t that true after Pennsylvania? Wasn’t it true before Pennsylvania?
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — Lately, the campaigns of both Democratic contenders have changed—and those changes have made both stronger. Now there’s a contest between the old Obama and the new Clinton. Updated.
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As the Democratic convention draws closer, the candidates are making their cases more and more directly to the superdelegates. On the Sunday before the Indiana and North Carolina primaries, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton each made hour-long appearances on morning talk shows that few voters actually watch. It’s the party insiders who never miss a “Meet the Press” who probably will decide the nomination, and the candidates know it.
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The man who made his mark on the last presidential election cycle with his campaign-sinking scream, DNC Chairman Howard Dean, was the bearer of good predictions for Democrats on Thursday’s “Daily Show.” He explained the super-cryptic superdelegate system, the controversial notion of “electability” and what it’s like to be the candidate who missed out in ‘04 for “saying boo-ya at the wrong time.”
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www.flickr.com/photos/emilymills
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By Bill Boyarsky — When looking at Sen. Barack Obama’s primary election results, I always check the white vote first. I imagine many Democratic National Convention superdelegates do, too. The reason is obvious: Obama is the first African-American with a strong chance of winning the presidency, and his prospects depend on whether whites will give him a vote.
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By Marie Cocco — The Pennsylvania Turnpike was a highway to nowhere for Barack Obama.
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Here’s the conventional wisdom as of the morning of the Pennsylvania primary: Hillary Clinton is leading in nearly every recent poll and has gained ground in the last few days. The good weather will probably benefit her more than Barack Obama. Unprecedented voter registration is a good sign for Obama, but it probably won’t be enough. Of course, this campaign has been anything but conventional.
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Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean is putting pressure on superdelegates to let their presidential preferences be known well before this summer’s convention—partly for logistical reasons, and also to let the healing begin.
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Barack Obama raised more than $40 million in March to Hillary Clinton’s $20 million. Between them, the Democrats took in about three times in March what John McCain raised in January and February combined. That’s good news for Democrats, but only, as Donna Brazile points out, if the money isn’t “used to tear the party apart.”
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Flickr / moose.boy
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The Political Wire’s Taegan Goddard argues that Howard Dean and Harry Reid’s big idea for settling the Democratic nomination should have Democrats worried about a lack of leadership in their party. Reid and Dean both have called for superdelegates to make a decision by early July—a little under two months before the convention in Denver.
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By Marie Cocco — Because superdelegates—not to mention Democrats in general—want a candidate who can beat McCain, they want answers to some very uncomfortable questions.
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Tim Russert and his merry band of super pundits debate whether superdelegates will decide the Democratic nomination and where Hillary Clinton went wrong. (Hint: Bill’s name comes up.)
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AP photo / Susan Walsh
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Nancy Pelosi, who is not only one of the highest-ranking members of the Democratic Party but the chair of its approaching national convention, has weighed in on two of the most controversial issues looming over the presidential nomination. Superdelegates, Pelosi said, should not overrule the will of the voters, and the disputed delegations from Michigan and Florida “can’t make the difference because then we would have no rules.”
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According to The New York Times and others, what was once an alarming possibility now appears likely: The Democratic nomination will probably be decided by superdelegates—those party bigwigs who exist to keep the will of the people in check. If that happens, expect to see the ugly side of politics out in the open. It’s already begun to surface.
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