Hillary just sent out the following message to her supporters:
Dear Friend,
I wanted you to be one of the first to know: on Saturday, I will hold an event in Washington D.C. to thank everyone who has supported my campaign. Over the course of the last 16 months, I have been privileged and touched to witness the incredible dedication and sacrifice of so many people working for our campaign. Every minute you put into helping us win, every dollar you gave to keep up the fight meant more to me than I can ever possibly tell you.
On Saturday, I will extend my congratulations to Senator Obama and my support for his candidacy. This has been a long and hard-fought campaign, but as I have always said, my differences with Senator Obama are small compared to the differences we have with Senator McCain and the Republicans.
I have said throughout the campaign that I would strongly support Senator Obama if he were the Democratic Party's nominee, and I intend to deliver on that promise.
When I decided to run for president, I knew exactly why I was getting into this race: to work hard every day for the millions of Americans who need a voice in the White House.
I made you -- and everyone who supported me -- a promise: to stand up for our shared values and to never back down. I'm going to keep that promise today, tomorrow, and for the rest of my life.
I will be speaking on Saturday about how together we can rally the party behind Senator Obama. The stakes are too high and the task before us too important to do otherwise.
I know as I continue my lifelong work for a stronger America and a better world, I will turn to you for the support, the strength, and the commitment that you have shown me in the past 16 months. And I will always keep faith with the issues and causes that are important to you.
In the past few days, you have shown that support once again with hundreds of thousands of messages to the campaign, and again, I am touched by your thoughtfulness and kindness.
I can never possibly express my gratitude, so let me say simply, thank you.
Today was probably the biggest day in the 2008 Democratic Presidential Race. The Delegates from the State of Michigan and Florida will be seated in full, with each delegate having a half vote. I believe that this was the best possible to way bring Michigan and Florida to Denver. This decision was hard for everyone on both sides, but this is now in the past, and together we must unify for the good of the Democratic Party and for the good of America. As a son of a Rural Blue Collar Middle Class Family, we cannot afford to have another Republican in the White House. No matter if Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama takes it home, I will stand behind the winner 100%! I encourage all people no matter who wins this to support the Democratic Nominee. America and Michigan cannot afford to have four more years of the Republican Agenda running this nation. With the rising costs of gas prices, college, and healthcare, a missed manage war, the threat of our natural resources disappearing, and equal rights for all people, it is time for a Democratic to move into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, no matter if that person is younger or older, male or female, black or white, an old timer or a new comer. A DEMOCRAT MUST WIN THE PRESIDENCY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, IF WE WANT TO MOVE AMERICA IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION. Our Time Is Now My Friends, and with another four years of the Republican Machine, we mind as well go to hell in a hand basket. SUPPORT THE DEMOCRATIC NOMINEE, WHOM EVER IT SHALL BE!!
I have to admit, I thought Mark Brewer was going to have a tough job today. Whereas the FL delegation came in united in their belief that the primary should be used to select delegates (though they disagreed on the strength at which it would be seated). MI proposed something that--as one RBC member just called it--might seem willy nilly, completely arbitrary.
Mark just got asked whether he's relying on the rule that requires that the delegation be based on a "fair reflection" of the voters partiicpating in the presidential selection. He said no. He said there is no primary or caucus to measure the fair reflection of the voters.
Brewer--in all his glory as a numbers geek--did a very good job of presenting the 69-59 compromise seem very logical and fact-based.
He still has a hard challenge in front of him--the RBC members are obviously uncomfortable with the idea of awarding delegates without a vote on which to base them. But to his credit, he very quickly got to the point where RBC members are discussing how to figure out how to measure the voters.
There's something disturbing in the Rules and By-Law Committee Meeting Materials handed out for Saturday's meeting: the distinct possibility that the RBC will overturn the results of MI's April 19 Convention, the only thing approaching a real exercise in democracy this year. It's the problem of how to assign uncommitted delegates as supporting Obama.
First, the document pretty much throws out the possibility of doing a 69-59 split, which is what MI recommended.
It;s over. Hillary just crossed a line--intentionally or not--that goes way, way beyond anything resembling acceptable behavior.
She just invoked Robert Kennedy's assassination in 1968 as one of the main justifications for her not dropping out.
If she chose her words deliberately, it was unforgivable.
If she chose her words in error, it was a gaffe of gargantuan proportions.
Either way, I don't think we need to worry about what's gonna happen on the 31st, because I think Hillary Clinton just ended her Presidential--*or* VICE-Presidential--ambitions forever today.
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Democrat John Edwards endorsed former rival Barack Obama on Wednesday, a move designed to help solidify support for the party's likely presidential nominee even as Hillary Rodham Clinton refuses to give up her long-shot candidacy.
The surprise endorsement came a day after Clinton defeated Obama by more than 2-to-1 in the West Virginia primary, and it helped the Obama campaign steer much of the evening news coverage away from a painful subject. The West Virginia outcome highlighted Obama's challenge in winning over "Hillary Democrats" _ white, working-class voters who also supported Edwards in significant numbers before he exited the race in late January.
Edwards made the carefully timed announcement at an Obama rally here, as the Illinois senator campaigned in a critical general election battleground state.
In a letter addressed to Sen. Barack Obama, Sen. Hillary Clinton asks the Illinois Senator to join her in working towards a "fair and quick resolution" to the Michigan and Florida questions. Sen. Clinton writes that simply seating the delegaitons is enough enough, and that "[t]he people of these great states, like the people who have voted and are to vote in other states, must have a voice in selecting our party's nominee."
One of the foremost principles of our party is that citizens be allowed to vote and that those votes be counted. That principle is not currently being applied to the nearly 2.5 million people who voted in primaries in Florida and Michigan. Whoever emerges as the Democratic nominee will be hamstrung in the general election if a fair and quick resolution is not reached that ensures that the voices of these voters are heard. Our commitment now to this goal could be the difference between winning and losing in November.
The Obama campaign has not immediately responded to Sen. Clinton's letter.
(This is a partial response to the "challenges" posted by William Allen Simpson, as well as various comments left on this and other blogs.)
The discussion of the rules and the December 2007 decision by the DNC's Rules & Bylaws Committee to strip Michigan and Florida of 100% of their convention delegates does not do justice to the complicated and nuanced nature of "the rules" and eschews any discussion of a decision improperly rendered or an innacurate interpretation.
Reading the various challenges that have been posted on MichLib during finals week forced my hand and I felt compelled to review the primary documents--the DNC Charter and Bylaws.
The Charter of the Democratic Party
Article 10, Section 4
The National Convention shall be composed of delegates equally divided between men and women. The delegates shall be chosen through processes which: [snip]
(h) notwithstanding any provision to the contrary in this Section:
(iii) permit unpledged delegates consisting of:
1) the President and Vice President of the United States, if Democrats,
2) the Democratic members of the United States Senate and the Democratic
members of the House of Representatives,
3) the Democratic Governors,
4) former Democratic Presidents and Vice Presidents of the United States,
5) former Democratic Majority and Minority Leaders of the United States Senate,
6) former Democratic Speakers and Minority Leaders of the United States House of
Representatives,
7) former Chairs of the Democratic National Committee,
8) such delegates shall not be permitted to have alternates and such delegates shall
constitute an exception to Subsection (b) of this Section 4.
Now, unless I'm mistaken this provision stipulates that the Democratic Governor, Democratic Members of Congress, and Democratic National Committee Members "shall" be delegates.
I studied Computer Science in high school, and the definition of "shall" in programming is:
Describes a feature or behavior that is mandatory for an implementation that conforms to this document. An application can rely on the existence of the feature or behavior.
Davis, California -- where my mother attended college -- makes the distinction between "shall" and "may" quite clear:
"Shall" is mandatory and "may" is permissive.
The United Nations Environmental Programme defines it as:
As negotiating language, shall creates an obligation for action for the addressee. It is binding.
But enough on the word "shall." These examples only serve to explain that the original decision by the Rules & Bylaw Committee decision to disqualify unpledged delegates violates the Charter, which makes their attendance as delegates a mandatory "feature" of the convention.
What if I was to tell you that deep within the bowels of the Arlington headquarters of Sen. Hillary Clinton's Presidential Campaign there is a room.
In that room, there is a folder.
In that folder, there is a top-secret plan...a plan to have the Michigan and Florida delegations seated at the Democratic National Convention in Denver this August by going to the Rules & Bylaws Committee and asking for just that.
But this isn't like any other top secret plan. Because this plan is not a secret at all.
In fact, as far back as September 2007, those instrumental in the challenge to the oversized influence of early-voting states have been making very public statements to that effect.
What if I were to point you to the following information all of which proves conclusively that challenging the RBC decision is nothing new?
Sen. Hillary Clinton, February 2008:
...I think it's important for the DNC to ask itself, Is this really in the best interest of our eventual nominee? We do not want to be disenfranchising Michigan and Florida. We have to try to carry both of those states. I'd love to carry Texas, but it's usually not in the electoral calculation for the Democratic nominee. Florida and Michigan are. Therefore, the people of those two states disregarded adamantly the DNC's decision that they would not seat the delegates. They came out and voted. If they had been influenced by the DNC, despite the fact that there was very little campaigning, if any, they would have stayed home. But they wanted their voices heard. More than 2 million people came out. I mean, it was record turnout for a primary. Florida, in particular, is sensitive to being disenfranchised because of what happened to them in the last elections. I have said that I would ask my delegates to vote to seat.
Sen. Hillary Clinton, January 2008:
I believe our nominee will need the enthusiastic support of Democrats in these states to win the general election, and so I will ask my Democratic convention delegates to support seating the delegations from Florida and Michigan.
Former DNC Chairman Don Fowler, December 2007:
"No one at this table believes that the delegates from Florida and Michigan will be absent from the convention," Fowler told the rules panel.
Sen. Carl Levin, December 2007:
The threat not to seat the delegates of Michigan and Florida at the Democratic convention is a hollow threat. They will be seated, and when they are, it will be plain for all to see that the privileged position that New Hampshire and Iowa have extracted through threats and pledges from candidates is on its last legs.
Debbie Dingell & Sen. Carl Levin, September 2007:
In the face of New Hampshire's decision to violate the DNC rules and your silence concerning that decision, and given our strong feelings about the need to reform our nominating process to make it fairer, Michigan's Democratic leadership decided to elect our delegates on January 15, 2008, the date the Michigan legislature set for the Michigan primary...
New Hampshire's gun remains at our candidates' heads and they fear the repercussions to their campaigns in New Hampshire if they don't sign the New Hampshire pledge -- dramatic proof, if any more were needed, of the disproportionate impact of the New Hampshire primary.
Maybe Florida will join us if we have to take our case for the seating of our delegates to the Democratic convention in Denver. And maybe Nevada will insist on maintaining the number two position assigned to it. Maybe one or more of our Democratic candidates will join us. In any event, there cannot be one set of rules for New Hampshire and one set for every other state. We are determined that Michigan not be bound by rules that are not effectively enforced against other states.
Karen Thurman, chairwoman of the Florida Democratic Party, August 2007:
"We're going to fight for all of our delegates," Ms. Thurman said. "The disenfranchisement is on their hands."
Now, if I had told you about this top-secret "nuclear option" the Clinton campaign didn't want you to know about, I wouldn't be a good Clinton supporter--it is a secret, after all.
....But of course if I told you about this secret plan, you'd probably just think I was lying.
The ouster of Mary Gade as Region V administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency reminds us of what should be a critical presidential campaign issue, but which never gets a second's worth of attention -- who a prospective candidate is likely to appoint to key posts.
Here is what EPA administrator Stephen Johnson said about Gade when she was first appointed to the job a year and a half ago.
“We are excited to welcome Mary Gade back to EPA Region 5 where she began her impressive environmental career,” said Administrator Stephen L. Johnson in announcing her appointment today. “With over twenty years of experience in environmental regulation and enforcement, Mary is well-prepared to lead the Agency’s largest regional office.”
I was in East Los Angeles on Super Tuesday when the non-partisan election reform organization Why Tuesday? interviewed Dolores Huerta, one of my personal heroes. Huerta, a human rights activist, community organizer, and co-founder (with Cesar E. Chavez) of the United Farm Workers, talked about the need for serious voter reform to ensure that every voice is heard in our democracy.
Dolores Huerta has spent her life fighting the good fight, empowering people of color and other marginalized groups to organize and push for change.
It was in that spirit that today hundreds of Latinos--organized by the United Latin American Citizens—protested outside of the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in Washington, DC.
Latinos came from Orlando, Tampa, Miami, Jacksonville, and beyond to express their outrage at their disenfranchisement
“This is a civil liberties issue – not a campaign or candidate issue,” said Jose Fernandez, president of the Democratic Hispanic Caucus of Florida, speaking to the crowd… Another speaker was Anita de Palma, 66, of Clearwater, Fla. She is a past Florida director of the League of United Latin American Citizens… “This is our heritage!” said de Palma, referring to the right to vote and have that vote count. “Our forefathers fought for it, our father’s fought for it, and I’ll be damned if we are going to let it get away from us now!”
And she’s right.
Julian Bond, the chairman of the NAACP, has said that this selective disenfranchisement could remind voters of America’s “sordid history of racially discriminatory primaries."
And it does.
The overriding consensus on MichiganLiberal is to tell the 2 million voters who voted in Michigan and Florida "tough luck," and to blame the MI and FL party leadership.
"Tough luck" is what African-Americans were told when they failed literacy tests.
"Tough luck" is what African-Americans were told when they weren't able to pass the "grandfather tests" in the days before the Voting Rights Act.
"Tough luck" is what my grandparents were told when they tried to buy a house, only to discover there was a "whites only" clause in the deed.
"Tough luck" is what my mother and her black neighbors were told when they wanted to swim in the Los Angeles city pool on "whites only" days.
And "tough luck" is what people of color hear time and time again when whites overlook us for the job, promition, or recognition we've earned.
So excuse me if I think we've had enough of "tough luck."
A few weeks back, I posted about a rally a grasroots "activist" organized in Lansing to raise awareness about the disenfranchisement of Michigan's voters. I also posted about some Michigan and Florida union workers who protested at DNC headquarters.
And although proud of both efforts, the question that lingers in the back of my mind (and in the minds of many of the other people of color I talk to) is why are the rest of our brothers and sisters in the Michigan Democratic Party remaining silent when the votes of hundreds of thousands of are hanging in the balance? We ask ourselves, "Where is their outrage?"
Jane has me fairly persuaded that some good will come out of seeing the Democratic primary process extend for two more months. Except for one thing. As a Michigander, I see how the posturing about MI's DNC delegation is exacerbating the wounds of having had our January 15 presidential primary turn into a Clusterfuck of grand scale. More and more, I see volunteers who have been critical to our GOTV success in recent years tuning out of the party, utterly disgusted by the state and national politicians posturing about our vote.
There have been a number of solutions proposed--but they're really just more cynical attempts to game the Clusterfuck primary which, like the posturing, is only exacerbating the wounds. So yesterday, I proposed my own solution, one that accomplishes what everyone says they want, and one that has been pretty well received in the blogosphere. Today, I'm started a petition to collect the names of people who would like the MDP and the DNC to adopt this fair solution for the seemingly intractable problem of how to seat MI's delegation.
It's bad enough to watch MSNBC and listen to the likes of James Carville and Terry McAuliffe use Michigan as a pawn against Barack Obama, but now we've got our own governor.
Speaking on the Clinton conference call Wednesday, Michigan Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm called for the DNC to recognize the votes of the 600,000 Democrats who participated in that state’s primary.
Granholm said that Clinton would lead the popular vote if Michigan’s votes were included. “That to me — that to all of us — should be a sign to superdelegates that she in fact is the strongest candidate to win the general election in November,” she said.
Governor ... please stop.
Represent the interests of the people whose state you were elected to lead, not the presidential candidate who you endorsed. This is the kind of thing that makes me wonder if your loyalties are more towards getting a job in D.C. than it is in being governor, and also lends support to the widespread belief that Hillary Clinton -- Bill and Hillary, actually -- wouldn't bat an eyelash at destroying the fortunes of the Democratic party to win the nomination. It also makes it more difficult for those of us who'd like to see a solution to demand that it come without turning this state into a pawn.
What I'm about to write will probably get me bounced from local politics. But here goes--my suggestion for how you resolve the impasse over the MI delegates.
I couldn't believe Hillary Clinton utterered these words. She comes right out and says if she were president and Iran attacked Israel, she would annihilate them with a nuclear bomb.
