For all the talk of "disenfranchisement" and "constitutional rights," this is simple...you have no constitutional right to vote in a primary or have your vote count. These contests are essentially administered by the state, but as evidenced by several things, including:

1. Some states have primaries and some have caucuses

2. Some states award delegates to the winner of the overall popular vote and some by congressional district

3. Even between parties, there are differences, as the GOP were mostly winner-take-all by state popular vote, and the Democrats were usually proportionally allocated

So saying that your constitutional rights were violated is like claiming you have a constitutional right to join your local Thursday night bowling league.

Another point...yes, Obama had commercials running on cable, but he had been assured by the party that the ads did not violate the ban on campaigning there. Clinton was free to run ads.

And no, there was not a "fair" election in Florida, because no campaigning means that the candidate with higher initial name recognition has an enormous advantage. That's hardly a fair election. Same for Michigan.

The other meme floating around in defense of counting the FL delegates is that the Republican governor or legislature did this unilaterally. There were plenty of willing participants from the state party.

Someone up the thread said that it was a stupid and arbitrary rule. I'd disagree that it was arbitrary, but I may agree, in principle that it is stupid. But it doesn't f***ing matter. It's a rule that was agreed to by all the campaigns. The bottom line has to be that you cannot change the rules in the middle of the game, just because you don't like the score. I'm sorry for your trouble, voters of MI and FL, but your beef is with your state party.

Sorry, this is why I shouldn't be allowed at a keyboard this late at night. My point about the Thursday night bowling league is that, like a party nomination process, it is essentially a private event. The state hosts it and counts the results as impartial arbiter, but if the parties wanted to, they could say that only lefthanded people named Sparky could vote, and unless that particular state legislature has passed a law requiring open access to right-handed non-Sparkys, then they'd be out of luck.

I mentioned black people (among others) because there is a bad history of black voter disenfranchisement in Florida. One that black people in Florida have every right to be bitter about. Do you remember the 2000 election?

Not to mention the fact that this is a historic election with a black candidate on the ballot. Imagine that the first year that you could vote for a serious contender for President who is also your race, and you are told not to vote, but then you find out that your neighbors who own their house instead of renting it did vote, and then later on, it turns out that their vote counts after all. Do you think a voter like this is going to LOVE the Democratic party in the future?

Just saying.

The original primary had both candidates' names on the ballot, and neither one campaigned, so you can't argue either had an unfair advantage.

Back in January Obama had very little name recognition in Florida, whereas Clinton bore the last name of the last but one president. Do you not understand this?

I don't know how much you know about Florida, but it has different populations. There is a large retired population for whom it is no great hardship to go out to vote. This population leans toward Clinton who is, of course, closer in age and in ethnicity to most retirees, who tend to be midwesterners.

The black population tends to be working, which makes it much harder to get to the polls, especially if you are going to vote in an election that has been declared meaningless in advance. Can you not see this?

Obama may have run some cable TV ads in Florida contrary to the agreement. I do not know why he would do that, but goodness me, there are hundreds of cable channels and the chances that such ads would have materially affected the result seem remote. Many people in Florida only watch Spanish TV and I doubt he advertised there either.

I have said this before, but I can tell you that only days before the Florida primary, I was talking to some black Floridians who had never heard of Obama and did not know that there was a black candidate running. But they knew who Hillary was.

There are many letters here saying that the Florida votes ought to count anyway, but I suspect that by no means all these posters are impartial re Clinton vs Obama, and do not necessarily have the well being of the whole party in mind.

I tell you again. If the Florida vote is now counted, there will be a black backlash against the Democrats in Florida, because black Floridians will perceive that when a man of color was close to winning the Democratic nomination, the rules were suddenly changed again.

It is like Animal Farm all over again, but the sheep are not so easily led now.

You may think this is all irrational and illogical and maybe it is, but it will still affect the way people FEEL and that is very important in politics. People will not come out and vote for you or organize for you if they FEEL that you stole the nomination.

Although Ohio may now be the key state, Florida also could make the difference between winning and losing the Presidency, so it is still very important.

Thanks for the more definitive term of "swiftboating." Makes sense and I sure never thought that way.

I remember consoling myself after George II was reelected. I kept saying to myself that the quickest road to socialism was a heavy dose of fascism, which we got in great measure from George and Dick.

Yes. A leftie can win in this environment. Bush has paved the way for that. Neither Obama nor hillary represent the progressive wing of the Democratic, but Obama is most certainly populist in his appeal and is bouyed by the groundswell of discontent by ordinary men and women who have felt so left out of the democratic process. This is really not about Obama. He just happens to be at the right time and the right place and has benefitted greatly from an outpouring of bringing the country back to its promise.