i see la vie en rose

How the United States chooses which candidate from the Democratic and Republican parties will be their nominee for President is based on a delegate system. It is not strictly who gets the most votes, but who gets the most delegates. (Our general election for President is run the same way, through the Electoral College, but that’s a topic for another day.) Each state has a certain number of delegates (generally based on population) and depending on the results of the popular vote, the delegates are split between the candidates proportionately. Seems fair enough, even if it’s not as straightforward as relying strictly on the actual number of votes.

In the Democratic party, there are 4,763 delegates among the 50 states, Washington DC, and the several US territories. The primary elections take place from February to June, ending in the party’s National Convention, this year from July 25-28th. At the convention, the delegates for each candidate are counted and whoever has the majority (at least 2,382) becomes the nominee for President.

The problem comes in when you factor in the votes of the superdelegates. These are 712 delegate votes (15% of the total) that are not bound to follow primary election results. They can vote for whichever candidate they choose, even if that candidate would otherwise lose the nomination because the other candidate earned more delegates based on primary and caucus votes. This is not democracy.

We have relied on the primary/caucus system of selecting party nominees since the late 1960s. Before then, candidates were chosen by party insiders. The strong civic activism of the 60s pushed for the change, recognizing how clearly undemocratic it was to leave such an important decision up to a privileged few. By 1982, Democratic party insiders had had enough and wanted to take back some control. So they created superdelegates.

Who are these superdelegates? Democratic party insiders. They include every Democratic member of the Senate and House, every Democratic governor, and hundreds of Democratic Mayors, State party Chairs and Vice Chairs, and other current and former party leaders. Basically, members of the party establishment who are inclined to support the establishment candidate; in this case, Hillary Clinton. Currently, over half of the superdelegates have already announced their support for Clinton.

It’s important to say that the superdelegates are able to change their minds at any point leading up to the National Convention. In early 2008, the superdelegates were also leaning toward Clinton, though not in numbers quite as high as this year. Eventually, though, many of them moved over to supporting Senator Obama. It is misleading, therefore, for media outlets to report that Hillary is leading the delegate count by hundreds when, according to the results of our two actual elections so far, Bernie is leading 36-32. The only reason corporate media, as a tool of the political establishment, would report these misleading, indefinite numbers, is to make Clinton, the establishment candidate, appear more electable.

TIME TO THINK!

Please read it!

by Russ Belville:

I try to imagine what life must look like to a Millennial voter. If you were are between the ages of 18-29, in your reality:

Marijuana has always been medical;

Gay people have always been positively portrayed on TV;

We’ve always been at war in the Middle East;

The economy collapsed somewhere between fifth grade and college; and

No one you know can afford college or you’re in mountains of debt from having attended.

So it’s no surprise that Bernie Sanders is crushing Hillary Clinton among the Millennial voters. She still thinks medical marijuana needs more research; only supported gay marriage three years ago; supported all the Mid-East wars and would engage more; takes $675,000 from the criminal banksters because “that’s what they offered”; and thinks a reasonable college affordability plan is one where students work 10 hours a week and parents pay “what they can”.

But I wonder what kind of surprise awaits the Millennial voter the more he or she sees the results of their hard work canvassing for voters to Feel the Bern.

First, in Iowa, they battle for a statistical tie, with just a quarter-percent of the vote between Hillary and Bernie. So, naturally, the delegates from Iowa are divided fairly. Bernie gets 21 delegates and Hillary gets… 29?

Next, in New Hampshire, Bernie demolishes Hillary in a 22-point landslide victory. So, naturally, the delegates from New Hampshire are divided fairly. Bernie gets 15 delegates and Hillary gets… 15?

What is this strange world where a Bernie tie is an 8-delegate loss and a Bernie landslide is a tie? That’s when our intrepid Millennials start Googling and learn all about Marvel’s Democratic Superdelegates! (Just kidding; Marvel’s heroes are better-looking.)

What they learn is that there are 4,763 delegates who pick the Democratic nominee for president. But roughly 15 percent of them are Superdelegates (712 to be exact) who are the Democratic elected officials and party bigwigs. Regular delegates are split according to popular vote, but Superdelegates can vote for anybody they wish (that’s their super power).

Hillary, being the Queen Democratic Bigwig, has amassed quite a collection of these other bigwigs pledging to vote for her (355 to be exact). With some quick Excel work, Millennials figure out that Hillary already had 14.9 percent of the votes she needed to get the nomination before the first caucus was ever tallied in Iowa.

Then they plug in a few more formulas and learn that in New Hampshire, it took convincing 60,631 voters to choose Bernie to match the choice of Gov. Maggie Hassan, Rep. Ann Kuster, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, and three Democratic National Committee cronies for Hillary.

In other words, one vote from these one-percenters for the Wall Street candidate is worth 10,105 votes from the 99-percenters for the Democratic Socialist candidate. Unfortunately, one-man-one-vote only applies to actual federal elections, not party primary processes.

The more the Millennials (and my people, Gen-X) learn about this, the more convinced they will be that the system is rigged and the current crop of establishment Democrats want to keep it that way. That leads to more popular votes and mortal delegates for Bernie and forces Superdelegates to re-evaluate whether they want to go against the people or go against the Clinton Dynasty.

So while Hillary Clinton leads right now 394-42 over Bernie Sanders in total delegates, Bernie leads Hillary 36-32 in those delegates chosen by the people. Even in that total, Hillary got 2 more delegates in the Iowa tie somehow.

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