Letters to the Editor
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various
"If Obama supporters seem to not care about the difference between caucuses and primaries it is because caucuses are a tradition that hasn't really been questioned"
actuallly, they have been questioned in the past. Just as nearly any aspect of the nomination process--starting with Iowa, New Hampshire being early, having a regional primary, having a national primary, having more diverse states go first. If you think none of these have been questioned in the past you haven't been paying all that much attention
"it seems extremely petty for Clinton to try to minimize his success. "
So one should never point out a fact if it somehow minimizes someone's achievement? It seems extremely petty for Obama supporters to simply claim a certain size achievement when the facts would argue otherwise. If he wanted to "maximize his success" perhaps he should win more states where more people vote by the same margins he wins those states where few people vote
"Obama's pledged delegate lead is equivelent to more than four times what Hillary got out of California. That is not insignificant. To say it is insignificant is like trying to judge soccer scores as if it were an NFL game- "Manchester wins 7 to 3? so close, just a touchdown away"."
Well, yes. I can play with numbers too and come up with some comparison out of my butt that makes it more or less significant. Why look, his lead is 48 times the price of a gallon of milk--it must be significant.
"Her line is that she should get the votes because her states matter and Obama's don't"
Way to oversimplify. Yes, that is exactly her line. Nothing more, nothing less.
"Obama has a good chance to win the popular vote."
so after you say he is inevitably the nominee, that he must be the nominee, you now say he has a "good chance to win the popular vote". So a supporter of a campaign that is allegedly all about the voter, all about grass roots and the power of the people, has no problem arguing that the nominee should be someone who doesn't win the popular vote? Seems a bit odd to me.
I also find it odd that Obama supporters have no problem, zero problem, with the discrepancy in caucus versus primary and the way it has skewed his lead. Do you deny caucuses involve fewer people in the process? If so, how based on the numbers? do you deny that in the two places where both have been won, there was a significant difference in Obama's alleged popularity among voters? Do you deny that Obama got more delegates out of Texas in a caucus despite losing the popular vote when many, many more people participated in the vote? No, Obama people trumpeted the victory of caucus over primary in Texas, which means they trumpet that one less democratic process "triumphed" over another more democratic process, thus overturning the will of more people. Hmm, sounds like "win at all cost" to me. You can be an Obama supporter and still find that troubling. Or maybe you can't--I have yet to see it here.
"From everything I've read about caucuses, it seems like they reward two things: 1) superior grass-roots organization and 2) passionate and dedicated supporters."
so somehow you haven't read, from everything you've read, that they result in far less turnout than primaries? Far, far less?
"Obama has done something that no other Democratic presidential candidate has done in my lifetime, and that's to make every Democratic voter feel importan"
Well yes, if of course you ignore the fact that slightly more of the Democratic voters have voted against him. Outside of, you know, half the party, you're right--"every" voter now feels important because of Obama. and you wonder why some people think some Obama supporters are naive? It's because of how blithely they seem to consistently ignore the fact that he is supported not by screaming hordes but by about as many people as Hillary and by slightly fewer actual Democrats.
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Jack
"No matter what criteria the Clintons specify to avoid talking about race--age, size of states won, astrological sign--they are the ones that made this a contest about race"
no, actually, they didn't. Obama's supporters, by lambasting Hillary's MLK comment, an historically accurate statement making no racial point whatsoever. And then by claiming the Clinton's, despite decades of personal statements and more importantly actions that showed the opposite, were racists. So yes, you are an ass.
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The floater sinks? And caucuses
Apparently the Clintons are flushing the condescending Obama-as-veep thing, at least in Mississippi. I guess we'll watch and see.
Caucuses--how many of you have actually participated in one? I think you may have a distorted idea of how they work from the (hostile) media coverage. Most of you would love them, particularly in off years when they can become more issue-oriented. Several issue movements were grounded in caucus participation. (A press misconception that people only caucus around candidates, actually you can usually form groups under any banner.) And despite the media reports, most people at caucuses tend to be older, not younger-- reporters like to hang out in college districts. (Salon reported from around Drake University in Des Moines for example.) Old people often like caucuses because they are much more grounded in community, you see and talk to your neighbors.
Caucuses also lower the threshold for substantive political give and take. Rather than leaving the wheeling and dealing up to party elites, who speak to you through the tube, you wheel and deal yourself.
I'm not saying that primaries don't also have advantages, and perhaps primaries are even better, but most complaints about caucuses come from those who have never participated in one, or from reporters who find them frustrating to cover. It's much easier for reporters to just watch TV and to talk to a few party officials in a primary and nearly impossible to write a story when the action is happening in a thousand tiny precincts.
I think it's fair to say that primary and caucuses may measure different kinds of appeal, and that both types of appeal may be relevant to winning the general election.
That said, primaries make more sense in Michigan and Florida for the do-overs. Mail-in sounds like a good idea to me, if they can pull it off. $18 million is chump change in a country where execs get paid $100 million salaries. Next time the party should either accept the move toward a national primary or penalize states that jump ahead with a decrease in delegates seated, not total disenfranchisement.