I’m reposting my comment response to Falstaff in regard to what happened in 2008 that brought us to this point and how the Democratic activists screwed up by letting the ends justify the means (I’m leaving the typos and style mistakes in because I’m too tired to edit it):
I was absolutely sure that the fix was in the day after supertuesday when the Obots were screaming that the math was not in her favor and she should get out. The whole plan was to deliberately withhold Florida and Michigan. Without those two states, she could never get the critical mass to make her the decisive winner and popular choice. She always looked like she was running hard to catch up. And the Democrats were making sure that Florida and Michigan didn’t count even one more day than they needed to in August 2008. There was never any question that the votes would be counted fully. It was only a matter of timing.
So, let me take you back to supertuesday 2008 and ask you to imagine the scenario where she wins the big Democratic states AND Florida and Michigan had already been added to her plus column. Are you with me yet? NOW tell me who was winning.
In February 2008, they had already written off all of her voters by withholding Florida and Michigan. It’s surprising that she continued to win and win and win in spite of the rigging. But she did. In fact, she was getting stronger. By May 2008, they had to make a decision about Florida and Michigan and that’s when they changed the rules and allowed Obama to take delegates from Michigan where he wasn’t on the ballot and then they reduced the two state delegations to half strength to prevent Hillary’s numbers from rising. By doing that, they not only screwed Florida and Michigan, they screwed NJ, NY, MA, CA, PA, OH, TX, etc, etc, etc. If they hadn’t taken Florida and Michigan out of the picture, Obama might have lost. That’s generally the way it had worked in other primary seasons but this primary season was going to be different. Obama was selected, not elected, to the nomination and the primary results were reorganized to reflect this desired outcome. (go on, Matt Yglesias and Matt Stoller, admit it, that was what “The Math” was all about. You didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure it out but a background in science did help)
But let’s say that everything was conducted without any skullduggery and they still went to the convention separated by the width of a gnat’s wing. How do you explain the fact that two candidates who were so closely tied, (really, the final delegate separation was something like 17, which is statistically insignificant) how do you explain why there wasn’t a legitimate roll call followed by a floor debate? The whole convention’s tone was such that the average viewer could only believe that Obama had won in overwhelming numbers even though that wasn’t even remotely true. But they humiliated her anyway and harassed and intimidated her delegates. Those delegates were in Denver to represent *us*, the 18,000,000 of us who did not vote for Obama. Didn’t we deserve to be counted? Because I wasn’t counted. Jon Corzine gave the entire state of NJ’s delegation to Obama. But Obama lost the NJ primary by 10 points. How do you explain that? How do you excuse it?
You can’t. That’s why what the Democrats did was so unforgivable. They completely disenfranchised us and forced Obama on us when we knew he wasn’t ready and that he was a ruthless bastard who didn’t give a fuck about the outcomes of elections. That right there told me everything I needed to know about how Obama would govern and what I could expect from the Democratic party. And I was right. I don’t like being right about them but once I saw what was going on, I couldn’t unsee it.
And, that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the small evil group who runs everything, and to which no one we know belongs, was able to put a schmoozing, anti New Deal Democrat into the White House at a point in time when we needed a hard working second coming of FDR.
This week, the Democratic activists and Obama apologists (I am loving the 180 that Kevin Drum is doing lately) are starting the get the “oh my god, wtf have we done?!?” feeling we forecasted three years ago. There’s a little story that illustrates why the peak of the Obama supporters power occured in May of 2008 and was all downhill from there on:
George Bernard Shaw was at a dinner party once and turned to the elegant lady who was sitting next to him and said:
“Madam, would you sleep with me for 1,000,000£ ?”
“Why, yes, I suppose I would”, she answered.
“Well, would you sleep with me for 10£ ?”, he asked.
The lady became irate. “Certainly not! What kind of woman do you think I am?!”, she huffed indignantly.
“Madam”, he replied, “We have already established what kind of woman you are. We are now merely negotiating a price,”
This is why the Obama administration feels comfortable punching the hippies and is blowing off the liberals and ready to dismantle the New Deal. When the Obama contingent decided to go for the big one in May 2008 and gave the party permission to blow off half of the voters and all of those voters’ legitimately cast ballots, and didn’t say anything and didn’t stand up for fair reflection, it was giving tacit approval to the party to blow off the rest of the voters in the future. They know what kind of activists you are. They are now merely negotiating a price. And since you threw away your honor and credibility three years ago, they feel no compunction to take your demands seriously now. They know that all they have to do is whip out a ten spot and you’ll do whatever they ask without them having to do a damn thing for you.
When it comes to taking the money or doing the right thing, you’re always better off in the long run if you do the right thing. If you take the money, you’re giving the unscrupulous and dishonorable an opportunity they might not otherwise have and if you give in once, it’s easier to do it the second time.
You can get your mojo back. You can always say no, even if you’ve said yes before. And you do have someplace to go. There are other candidates you could shanghai into running if you really want to change history. All you have to do is take Susie Madrak’s advice and stop believing Obama’s schtick. Once you’re free, you can consider your options.
Consider this a public service announcement.
Update: I just noticed that one of my very first posts on this site after I was kicked off of is moving up the list of posts in the left sidebar. It’s probably just due to the Harry Potter character reference but whatever. So, I pulled the sucker up and reread it. I wrote it in January of 2008 but daaayum, did I nail it or what?! Here’s the link: https://riverdaughter.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/this-weeks-esp-january-27-2008/.
Read it and weep, Obots.
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