A Tale of Two Videos

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Er, scratch that. It’s been used before. But surely, ladies and gentleman, you will have never seen a bigger miscarriage of justice since Bush vs. Gore than the DNC hearing that stripped Florida of its delegates. You may want to procure a strong drink or a xanax (but not both together) before you sit down for the next 80 minutes to view this classic of having every opportunity to avoid Murphy’s Law but diving headlong into it anyway. Here is the egregious piece of footage: Florida Democratic Primary Election Hearing of the DNC

(Didn’t it occur to anyone in that room that this was being recorded for posterity? I’m betting some of them regret having ever encouraged technology.)

And this piece of footage is of Howard Dean on This Week with George Stephanopolous (thanks to Katiebird) trying to justify excluding Florida because it broke the RULZ and wouldn’t have a caucus with a total of 150,000 ballots for all 4 million Floridian Democrats who were eligible to vote. It just warms the cockles of your spleen.

All that is left now it to re-erect La Guillotine and to escort Donna Brazile and pals to it in a trundle of their own making.

Howard Dean Is Angry

Did anyone besides me catch him this morning on This Week with George Stephanopolous?  He started out congenially alright.  It was all “two extraordinary candidates” and “unity ponies for everyone”.  Then George started to ask him about the popular vote and MI and FL and it became clear pretty quickly that he was one phoneme short of a scream.

What I learned from Howard is that Hillary’s claim to legitimacy through the popular vote pisses him off and that he still plans to sabotage the election this fall by seating FL and MI in a way that will make their delegates not count.  And the main beneficiary of the stifling of MI and FL is Barack Obama because as Howard insists, the only legitimate nominee is the one with the most delegates.  So, everyone else who voted for Clinton should STfU because the superdelegates will find out in June who the delegate leader will be and it will be over.  And Hillary can complain all the way to the convention because that is her right but it won’t make a damn bit of difference because the RULZ were violated, so THERE!

But, by Golly, we sure do have two swell candidates this year don’t we?  And we’re all going to kiss and have make up sex when this is all over and all the ladies in the auxilliary and the stupid Archie Bunker working peoplee will fetch coffee and make phone calls for Senator Obama in the fall.

Howard, you ain’t seen anger yet.

Fortunately for us, Ed Rendell on MTP gets it.  This won’t be over and we are NOT making phone calls unless all fifty states get a voice and have impact.  Deal with it, Howard.

The road to 2214 goes straight through Florida & Michigan

One of the reasons I enjoy the blog, TalkLeft, is their commitment to discussing the Florida and Michigan situation. I’ve participated in several threads on the subject. But, I haven’t been able to get a particular response to one of my comments yesterday out of my mind. Here’s what she said:

Of course it is a partisan issue by Molly Bloom

Please don’t be naive. You can argue as BTD does that it is in the best interest of the party to have a revote.

Don’t fool yourself. HRC would argue against a revote, if that was her path to the nomination. It just so happens it is not. She is a Pol and a very good one. That is one of the reasons she would make a good president. Unlike some I don’t consider being a Pol to be an insult or a disqualifying.

“Once in a while you get shown the light In the strangest of places if you look at it right”

The bit I highlighted, is the bit I’m arguing against.

Lou Dobbs does The Math for Bill Schneider

Following in the footsteps of Hillary is 44, I was astonished to see Lou Dobbs correct Bill Schneider’s math. As the two discussed the campaign, Dobbs expressed disgust at the media preference for Senator Obama. Schneider claimed that it was reasonable because when you examine The Math, it’s pretty difficult to see how Hillary can catch up in either popular vote or pledged delegate count.

Lou Dobbs cleared that up in a hurry asking if it’s true that NEITHER candidate can win without super-delegates. And forcing Schneider to turn his analysis completely around with a more balanced view of the situation.

Then Dobbs got into the Florida and Michigan situation. Schneider displayed his weasel side by saying that Hillary might not be considered a legitimate candidate if her winning votes came from 2 states with questionable elections. So it wouldn’t be fair to let those states influence the nomination. Oh, Boy! Dobbs lit right back at Schneider by questioning the legitimacy of a nomination that didn’t include voters from those states.

For a roaring great time, watch it for yourself.