It's time Obama brought out the heavy artillery and started talking
Vince Foster and Travelgate and all the other scurrilous crimes she
was involved in during her husband's artrocious presidencies.
It's now clear she's NOT willing to admit defeat, not willing to
compromise, not willing to play by the rules -- much less QUIT! Which
a moral, honest, fair, realistic, and dedicated member of the party
would do. But again, she shows anyone willing to objectively observe
that she's NOT a team player, never was.
If there ever was any slim doubt about her being DEVISIVE, that's now
conclusively confirmed.
It's now also clear that the Clintons have NO INTENTION of allowing
the Democrats and Obama to move forward, short of revelations of some
other crime or crimes the couple have committed during their self-
centered, craven and nasty campaign. With each day now, her public
petulance and selfishness are shoveling Dems' votes McCain's way.
And It's also becoming clearer now that Obama sup****ters will neither
back Clinton for veep or, much less, for president, should this
internecine and destructive race be stolen from Barack. Which has
been the Clinton's intention from the start.
-------------------------------------
"Fla., Mich. Delegates Each Get Half a Vote"
"Compromise Prompts Anger From Clinton Campaign"
By Dan Balz
Wa****ngton Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 1, 2008; A01
After hours of emotional testimony and sometimes contentious debate,
Democratic Party officials agreed yesterday on a pair of compromises
to seat Florida's and Michigan's delegations to their national
convention. But a part of the deal drew an angry reaction and the
threat of a subsequent challenge from the campaign of Sen. Hillary
Rodham Clinton.
The compromises by the Democratic National Committee's Rules and
Bylaws Committee called for both delegations, originally barred from
the convention for violating party rules, to be seated in full in
Denver but with each delegate casting only half a vote.
The actions by the committee were aimed at bringing the long and
sometimes-bitter Democratic nomination battle between Sen. Barack
Obama (Ill.) and Clinton (N.Y.) to a close and to ensure party unity
as the Democrats head into the general election. But the decisions
prompted bitter and sometimes-tearful reactions from some members of
the audience, who repeatedly shouted over the committee members as
they voted.
Obama remains the heavy favorite to win the nomination, with his
campaign hoping that he can secure enough delegates over the next week
to do so. Puerto Rico's primary will be held today, and the last two
states, Montana and South Dakota, will vote Tuesday. The committee's
decisions represented a significant setback to Clinton, who had
passionately called for seating both delegations with full votes.
The net result was a gain of 87 delegate votes for Clinton and 63 for
Obama. Until yesterday's action, the magic number for winning the
nomination was 2,026 delegates. Now the winner will need 2,118.
According to a count by the Associated Press, as of last night, Obama
controlled 2,052 delegates to Clinton's 1,877.
Obama campaign officials said they will redouble efforts to win over
enough superdelegates to put their candidate over the top as quickly
as possible, but Clinton hopes to emerge with more popular votes and
continues to press the case that she would be a stronger general-
election candidate than Obama.
"We're extremely gratified that the commission agreed on a fair
solution that will allow Michigan and Florida to participate in the
Convention. We appreciate their efforts, and those of the party
leader****p of both states, to bring this resolution about," said Obama
campaign manager David Plouffe.
The Florida agreement included a provision calling for the delegates
to be allocated on the basis of the state's Jan. 29 primary, a
decision that would net Clinton 19 more delegates than Obama.
Clinton's campaign had pushed for a proposal to seat the full
delegation with full voting power, but when that failed, her
sup****ters on the committee relented, and the compromise was approved
without a dissenting vote, 27 to 0.
But it was the Michigan plan, approved by a 19 to 8 vote, that drew
sharper opposition because of the way that state's delegates will be
awarded. Under the plan, Clinton will be given 34.5 delegate votes in
Denver to Obama's 29.5 delegate votes, a percentage distribution
recommended by leaders of the Michigan Democratic Party but opposed by
the Clinton campaign officials, who said it violates the results of
Michigan's Jan. 15 primary.
"This motion will hijack -- hijack -- remove four delegates won by
Hillary Clinton," said Harold Ickes, who oversees delegate operations
for the Clinton campaign and is also a member of the Rules and Bylaws
Committee. "This body of 30 individuals has decided that they're going
to substitute their judgment for 600,000 voters."
Arguing that the Michigan compromise "is not a good way to start down
the path of party unity," Ickes warned that Clinton had authorized him
to note that she will "reserve her rights to take it to the
credentials committee" later. Campaign spokesman Howard Wolfson later
affirmed that Clinton will reserve her right to challenge the outcome.
Don Fowler, another Clinton sup****ter on the panel but not formally
tied to the Clinton campaign, voted for the Michigan plan. "It does
not represent the first choice of my candidate, Senator Hillary
Clinton," he told the panel. "But I think [it is] in the best interest
of the party."
Anita Dunn, an Obama spokesman, said after the votes that the
committee had taken an im****tant step to unify the party and said she
doubts Clinton would have approved of the angry reactions by some of
her sup****ters in the audience.
Dunn said she believes Clinton will seek to unify the party rather
than appeal yesterday's decision. Clinton campaign officials said that
decision now rests with the candidate after she has had the
op****tunity to review what happened.
The DNC last year sanctioned both Michigan and Florida for moving up
the dates of their primaries in violation of party rules. Determined
to send a signal to other states contemplating similar actions, the
rules committee voted to bar both from sending delegations to the
national convention.
The controversial decisions threatened to diminish the Democrats'
chances of carrying Michigan or Florida in November, and as the
nomination process has continued, both Clinton and Obama called for
finding a resolution that would allow both delegations to go to
Denver. But the contenders were sharply at odds over the distribution
of delegates.
The committee spent more than five hours hearing challenges yesterday,
breaking for lunch about 3 p.m. After the lunch break stretched to
three hours, the committee returned with their compromises ready for
votes.
The committee began its deliberations by taking up the Florida
challenge. Florida Sen. Bill Nelson delivered an emotional appeal to
the committee, urging the members to reflect the will of the 1.7
million voters who turned out for the state's Jan. 29 primary.
"These voters violated no rule," he said. "They committed no crime.
They did not move the election date forward. The Republican
legislature did. Yet they are the ones who would be unfairly punished,
and in my humble opinion they do not deserve punishment. They deserve
to be heard."
Florida State Sen. Arthenia Joyner, representing the Clinton campaign,
traced her own history as a civil rights protester before delivering a
powerful appeal to restore Florida's delegation in full with full
voting rights.
"You have a unique op****tunity right here and right now to write the
people of Florida back into this historic election story," she said.
"You have the power to say yes, their votes count; yes, their
delegates should be seated; yes, their Democratic Party believes that
their voices should be heard."
Rep. Robert Wexler, representing the Obama campaign, agreed with
others that Florida's delegation should be represented in Denver but
conceded that the committee was within its rights to allow half votes
for each -- associating the campaign with the proposal of Jon Ausman
of the Florida Democratic Party.
Wexler also ducked a question from Clinton sup****ter and rules
committee member Tina Flournoy, who asked whether Obama backs giving
Florida delegates full votes in Denver. From the audience, there were
cries of "Answer the question!" and "Yes or no!"
Michigan proved a more controversial challenge for the committee,
largely because Obama and three other Democratic candidates took their
names off the Jan. 15 primary ballot, while Clinton and three others
did not, and because the ballot specifically allowed people to cast a
vote for "uncommitted."
The particulars of the Michigan experience and the legal fine points
of DNC rules created a situation in which the two campaigns and the
Michigan Democrats were proposing competing outcomes, all of which
drew resistance from some committee members as unallowable under the
rules.
Michigan Democratic chairman Mark Brewer and Sen. Carl M. Levin,
representing the state, asked for their full delegation to be
reinstated with full voting powers. But, calling their primary flawed,
they recommended an allocation of the delegates based not only on the
results but also on exit polls and an estimate of uncounted write-in
ballots.
On the basis of those calculations, they said Clinton should receive
69 delegates and Obama 59. Clinton's campaign called for allocation
based on the primary, giving her 73 delegates to Obama's 55. Obama's
campaign said the delegation should be split 50-50 between the two
candidates but did not take a position on whether the Michigan
delegates should receive a full vote or half vote.
The Michigan Democratic Party proposal drew skepticism from members of
the rules committee. "It seems to me that this way lies chaos," Elaine
Kamarck said. "That if we start setting precedents that state parties
can take a little bit of data from a primary and some data from exit
polls and some data from assumptions they made, that we're really in
trouble."
But in the end, the committee decided to set aside those qualms.
During the first session, Ickes pointedly challenged Levin over the
Michigan plan, saying it would strip Clinton of delegates she had
rightly earned through the primary. "Why not take 10?" he asked
indignantly. "Take 20. Just keep on going."
"You're calling for a fair reflection of a flawed election," Levin
shot back. "And what we're trying to do is keep a party together so we
can win a critical state in November."
http://www.wa****ngtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/31/AR2008053102355.html
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