“Have you actually read the Rules?”

Obama’s campaign is spreading misinformation about the disposition of the Florida and Michigan delegation. But before we get to what the actual rules are, let’s be clear about one thing: it is in the interest of the Obama campaign to suppress the votes from MI and FL and by extension NY, NJ, CA, AZ, MA, OH and many other states that voted *decisively* for Hillary Clinton. And hey, if you want to elect a guy who got to the White House by ignoring the votes of more than half of the Democratic electorate, fine! But don’t be surprised if he doesn’t pay much attention to you when he gets there.

Anyway, the misperception is that now that there will be no revote in Florida and now that Obama intends to fight the vote in Michigan, there’s nothing Clinton can do but concede to Obama’s greater numbers (you wish). Game, set, match. But, this is not true. The decision to count the delegates is in the hands of the members of the DNC Rules and Bylaws committee. Oh, sure, they want to elect Obama but who cares what they think? Do voters count or not? Anyway, here are the rules from a post by Jon Winkleman at MyDD:

“Have you actually read the rules?”

DNC Delegate Selection Rules: Florida & Michigan

True or False?

Rules are not necessarily sacred, principles are.

That is from part of a quote by FDR, an infamous rule breaker who gave us Social Security, a way out of the Depression and Victory in Europe in WWII. And it was also in the body of a letter sent out today by Karen Thurman, Chair, Florida Democratic Party. Read it and weep. There will be no do-ever. The best we can hope for now is that the DNC Rules and Bylaws committee that meets in April will either apply the rules consistently or take the advice of one of the greatest Democratic presidents of the 20th century and do the principled thing.

Obama has shown his quality. He could have asked the DNC to waive the rules and seat the delegates, taking a small hit in delegate count going into the final primaries. He chose to disenfranchise the state of Florida and he is holding out on the revote in Michigan to the point that Jennifer Granholm will have to go over his head to hold a primary there. If there is anyone who is willing to destroy the party in order to “win at all costs”, it would have to be Obama.

Hmmm, here’s an interesting theory

Venice1789 at MyDD says that Obama will drop out before June. It doesn’t sound like just wishful thinking either. Here are the money quotes:

Some argue that the Wright debacle has had no impact and that the media has already moved on. But the truth is, these kinds of things work slowly on the consciousness. They linger even after the public discussion has faded; they seep in and they influence opinion sliently over time. And since race is an issue few people discuss openly because of the PC police and self-censorship, it will be especially true in this case. The test will com in PA and the states after. If his support among whites dries up then we know that this made a big difference. And that is what will swing the superdelgates in the end. Slowly this will make him unelectable against McCain even if the math is on his side a tthe moment. And, remember, despite what Pelosi and others say now, in the end this is not about the math. The supers were put there precisely for this purpose: to stop the nomination going to an unelectable insurgent who misled the American people early on in the campaign. The supers are there to correct just this sort of thing, and they will.

I think there is more than a nugget of truth in this. It takes a little bit of time for the thoughts and attitudes to take shape in the mind. The situation has to present itself several times to make an impression and it has to be discussed before the person “owns” it. That’s how Obama’s negative campaigning on DailyKos got to be so successful. You have literally thousands of people hearing a repeating the same lies and innuendos. But I digress. A lot of people in PA who thought that Obama was an African-American who they could feel confidence in and with whom they felt they could move past the politics of racial resentment, will feel hurt and betrayed by his pastor’s remarks. Obama knew about the pastor’s rhetoric last year but kept him onboard the campaign as a spiritual advisor. Pennsylvanians are going to wonder whether his spiritual advice was more like MLK’s or Malcolm X. If PA goes overwhelmingly for Clinton, it will send a signal that the end for Obama approacheth. I suspect that last week Clinton would have won PA comfortably. Now, I think we can expect a painfully lopsided victory for her. I see my fam next week at Easter and I’ll have a better idea then.

Then there’s this:

As this Wright controversary sinks into the American consciousness, the backlash will grow stronger. Presently, the meme coming out of camp Obama is that Hillary is the one trying to “steal” the nomination from him since he has the most pledged delegates etc. But my prediction is that as this Wright debacle sinks in, coupled with Michelle Obama’s anti-American diatribes…

Every day it appears more and more that Obama got as far as he did in this race by lying to the American people about his policy positions (re: his plan to withdraw from Iraq, NAFTA) and by misrepresenting himself as “post-racial” and such.

The best thing he could do at this point is to drop out and to strongly urge his “supporters” to back the true Democrat in this race: Hillary.

Well, that last sentence is certainly a twist, isn’t it? Let’s hope he takes the advice before he is trounced and humiliated.

The Split

Markos was being dense again today. He wrote a ridiculous FrontPage diary about The Clinton Civil war that included this little gem:

Clinton knows this, it’s her only path to victory, and she doesn’t care. She is willing — nay, eager to split the party apart in her mad pursuit of power.

She’s mad I tell you, MAD! See her wild eyed gaze and word salad gibberish as she slobbers on herself and eats beetles in her cell. She’s like Simon Barsinister without the PhD, a megalomaniacal slave to her urges for unlimited omnipotence. Can’t you hear her from here? “I have the POWER!” Pinky and the Brain have nothing on Hillary.

and here was the money quote:

First of all, the only path to victory for Clinton is via coup by super delegate.

Oh? And that wouldn’t work for Obama? Like, hasn’t he been throwing money at them to get them to defect and threatening their congressional districts? Did he make John Lewis an offer he couldn’t refuse? “Nice congressional district you got there, John. You wouldn’t want anything to *happen* to it, would you?” But never mind, he’s got all the bases covered. He’s trying to steal unearned delegates from Florida as well. Like all of the negative campaigning and faux race-baiting accusations towards Clinton wasn’t enough? Flooding caucuses with people who probably shouldn’t be there isn’t enough? Telling the world that your opponent is planting stories about your pastor and that implying that your opponent has an ethics problem that you plan to expose in a mother of all negative campaigns isn’t enough? Jeex, whatever happened to the new politics and Change! Instead, Obama heads to the fainting couch every time he feels he’s a little behind, blaming it all on that woman who’s unleashed her minions on him. I hope his acting skills are up to the $250M GOP assault machine.

And as for that 50 state strategy, well, let’s just say that a Democratic victory that doesn’t include NY, NJ, CA, MA, AZ, OH, MI and FL, isn’t a Democratic victory. And at this point, Howard Dean’s brilliant strategy to shove Obama deep down into our throats is making the rest of us gag. I got news for you, Kos. You can’t count on us in November if you insist on writing off those states I just mentioned. Oh, and throw PA, KY and WV in there just for make weight. Dream on, buddy.

Most Americans didn’t read the Sayings of Chairman Kos. They don’t care about your theories. But the split that Senator Obama has generated within the party by a.) manufacturing a race-baiting campaign b.) acting like Florida and Michigan don’t matter and c.) acting like the rest of the *base* doesn’t matter, will not be healed by Obama after the primaries are over. We are not going to all join hands and sing Kumbaya and kiss and hug and have makeup sex. Ain’t going to happen, Kos. We of the faithful Democratic base still have some dignity and will teach you and Howard a lesson you will never forget. And you know what? We don’t care *just* about whether the twenty somethings don’t have access to safe legal abortion. Because THAT would be single issue politics. And we don’t care about those Yuppies who think Obama is cool because he didn’t vote for the war because THAT would be single issue politics. And we don’t care that you are wringing your hands over the incursion of the consultant class into politics because THAT would be single issue politics.

In fact, your whole site belies the tenets of your Crashing the Gates philosophy. Each one of your remaining Kossacks has a litmus test for why he/she won’t vote for Hillary but there’s no really good reason for voting for Obama. He’s just the negative afterimage of what Clinton is, in the narrow, cramped quarters of their minds. He has no core Democratic principles. He is appealing to Liberatians, like you. And guess what, Kos? The “West” doesn’t have many people in it. yeah, amazing fact. Most of the DEMOCRATS are located on the coasts and rust belt states. You know, the states full of the Edith Bunkers that Obama doesn’t think he needs that voted against Obama by decisive margins in the primaries?. Go figure.

He is the ultimate tofu candidate with a campaign machine that adopts negative GOP campaign strategies to divide and conquer. Mission accomplished. Enjoy your little fantasy while it lasts. The rest of us will vote for the *real* Democrat or write her name in on the ballot. Obama can’t win by hostile and negative campaigning that alienates half of his base, and he won’t.

We’re Splitsville.

Here are some other fine bloggers who have had it up to here with Kos and the Gang of Four (Dean, Brazile, Pelosi and Kennedy) Yeah, we’ve got your number alright.

DailyKos Writer’s Strike Shows Increasingly Bitter Obama/Clinton Democratic Rift

My Turn to be Petty and Selfish

Clinton Supporters Hardening Against Obama

We already practice socialism

Scarecrow at FireDogLake has a sobering post this morning. The Republicans are well on their way to making over the US economy in the Iraq model. We are headed into a recession, boys and girls, and it will be a hard landing, complete with rampant inflation, tight credit and a falling dollar. Congratulations, George! You have managed to compare favorably to Hoover. Nice!

Both NPR and Marketplace: Morning Report had extensive coverage of the takeover of Bear Stears by J.P. Morgan this morning. Over the past week, Bears Stearns, “not the nicest bank in town”, went from trading at $30/share to $2/share. And the scary thing is that Bear Stearns investors might have gotten more than the bank is worth at $2. Now, Morgan turns around and borrows the money from *us*, the taxpayers, to buy Bear Stearns. So, essentially, we now own a worthless company, but the people who drove Bear Stearns into the ground are not going to go bankrupt. Hallelujah for them! Not so much for the poor home owners who were suckered into paying extravagant prices for modest housing by getting an adjustable rate mortgage with a teaser rate. Their investments are worth less than the mortgage and they can’t unload it on the government like J.P. Morgan can. So, what we have here is socialism for the rich where we redistribute tax payer wealth from the people who work to the people who invest. What a sweet deal for the well-heeled.

At least one of the interviewees this morning makes this point and goes one further. He says we ought to let the market take care of itself. The impact will be deep if the investment community starts to go bankrupt but it will be soooo much worse if we keep bailing them out. When will they ever learn? What’s the worst that can happen other than some very rich people become suddenly not so rich? If we keep them above water, we just cover up the rot at the hollow core of the finance industry. Cut them loose, let us take the hit and get on with rebuilding.

And it goes without saying that when the $#@% hits the fan, you aren’t going to want a neophyte or a economic lunkhead (by his own admission) be in charge of the fallout. I suspect you want someone who’s actually seen a crisis up close and personal to be in charge.