Head's Up
Obama has by no means won; the Clintons have many advantages in Ohio and Texas, and if they win both of those states, then she is in front again.
The supertruth about superdelegates is that they should all vote for the person who has the most non-super delegates. That's the purpose of superdelegates: to turn a plurality into a majority so as to avoid a floor fight about Fla or Mich or anything else.
And Obama's infrastructure spending plan is exactly what is needed to create new jobs and a new footing for the economy; it is exactly what should have been done in the 90s instead of cooperating with the Republicans to stint on public good creation.
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Maybe Obama hasn't officially won yet, but I have stopped worrying about the super delegates and the Florida and Michigan mess. Hillary received such a crushing defeat this week that her ability to recover is quite slim.
February 13, 2008 7:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Reed, I'm not sure about your primary prognostications, but I'm with you on the infrastructure comment.
BHO or HRC can be the new FDR.
That will send chills up the GOPs spine, but it's time for a new New Deal. It will not only bump the economy, from the bottom up for once, but we desperately need to fix the infrastructure.
In Pennsylvania they are deciding whether to sell or lease the turnpike, or toll Interstate 80 to pay for billions of dollars in needed road and bridge fixes.
They are also need about $20 billion to fix the water system.
I'm tired of the sweet speeches. Let's hear some policy.
February 13, 2008 8:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Gee whiz.
Sounds like Edwards infrastructure program.
Think OH! Bama got John' blessing on using it?
February 13, 2008 8:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is a PDF of a speech that Obama gave in NOLA on 08/27/2007 talking about rebuilding the infrastructure of the Gulf Coast. Is that a rip-off of John Edwards as well? Is it possible that Obama could have an original, independent thought?
http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/KatrinaFactSheetFinal.pdf
February 13, 2008 11:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
The point of the Superdelegates was never to simply weigh in on the side of whoever had the most votes but not enough to get the nomination. Quite the contrary in fact.
The Superdelegates came about as a means of counterbalancing a popular error in judgement (for lack of a better phrase). The Superdelegate concept arose after the party's burst of openess in the 70's was perceived as having gone too far in stripping elected and appointed officials of any say in the nominating process.
Those who now claim that the "only" proper thing for Superdelegates to do is support whoever can't win the nomination outright without them but who receives a plurality sounds suspiciously like the argument of people who don't feel confident in getting the number of Superdelegate votes they need. Personally, I think that at the end of the primary season if neither Obama nor Clinton has enough delegates to secure the nomination, the Superdelegates have an obligation to try and figure out what is best under the circumstances they find themselves in and act accordingly. That may or may not be to support the candidate with a plurality of popular votes and/or popularly elected delegates. I don't have a predetermined preference on that because we don't know what the situation will be and I'm not completely invested in one candidate or the other though I personally think Obama the better choice of the two if we have to swallow yet another centrist, corporate Democrat (which they both unfortunately are).
But really folks, all this nonsense about Superdelegates "have" to support the person with the most votes but not enough to win is specious. If that were the case, the rules would restrict the choice of the Superdelegates to that purpose. But the rules do not restrict or dictate in any way how the Superdelegates vote for the reasons I noted above.
February 14, 2008 1:23 PM | Reply | Permalink