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Florida
There's been some talk recently about whether to seat Florida as is (typically from Hillary supporters), whether to not seat Florida (typically from Obama supporters), or whether to have a re-vote (more often than not from Obama supporters, it seems to me).
Here's why I think there should be a revote.
1) Using the votes as is doesn't make sense. Forget about who did or did not campaign in Florida. What is undeniable, is that prior to the Florida vote (but after the IA and NH vote, but I digress), Clinton was advocating for their votes to count. So, if you agreed with Clinton, it made sense to show that support by voting. However, if you were an Obama supporter, then why would you vote since your vote wasn't going to count anyway? So, the simple fact that Clinton was the only one arguing for seating Florida prior to the vote, and Florida Democratic voters being told by the party their votes wouldn't count would bias the vote <em>strongly</em> towards Clinton.
2) If there is a re-vote, then they've no longer broken the rules since the re-vote would be after the earliest allowed date. Problem solved.
I'm sure #2 has been mentioned before, but I haven't really seen anyone bring up point #1 yet. Mainly, I've seen Obama supporters talk about how she was campaigning, and Clinton supporters responding about his campaigning, while both sides deny that their candidate campaigned. To me, what clearly biases the Florida vote is that only one candidate was saying that (against the DNC rules), the Florida vote from that day should count, so naturally she's going to get more votes on that day. (Why go out to vote if the person you support doesn't think your vote will count?)
Comments (10)
Sigh, Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina also moved up their contests and didn't get punished. By the way, did you know Obama sued to get back on the Florida ballot in November?
If they can do another primary with campaigning, fine. Caucus? Thanks, no thanks. Look at Texas - 2.7 million people vote for 127 delegates while 110,000 vote for the caucus' 67 delegates. That's some strange sign of turnout - just who is the elite that the caucus favors? I understand Superdelegates - Senators, Congressmen/women, party regulars. But caucus' are just some random sampling of people that somehow are more important than caucus voters.
March 6, 2008 11:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, yes, that's a fine point, but it has nothing to do with what I wrote. The voters of Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina were 100% sure that their votes would count when they went out to vote on election day.
Do you understand my point about how whether your candidate was fighting to have your votes count or whether they agreed with the DNC that your votes won't count would greatly influence whether you chose to go out to vote?
March 6, 2008 11:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, yes, very fine points, but they have almost nothing to do with what I wrote.
Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina voters were 100% sure that their votes would count, so it's not at all the same thing.
Do you understand my point that whether the candidate you support was fighting to make your votes count or whether that candidate agreed with the DNC that your votes wouldn't count would drastically impact your decision to vote at all?
March 6, 2008 11:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Obviously, I didn't intend to post the same thing twice. I refreshed after waiting a few minutes, and when I saw nothing but the one post, I assumed it had gotten lost in cyberspace. *sigh*
March 6, 2008 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sigh. For the umpteenth time, here is what actually happened with Florida and Michigan and why those two states were disqualified and Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina were not.
The dates chosen by Florida and Michigan violated DNC rules because they fell before Feb. 5. DNC rules stipulate that all but a select handful of states (Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina) were permitted to hold nominating contests earlier than Feb. 5, 2008. Florida and Michigan were well aware of these rules and chose to move their primaries up anyway, in clear violation of the DNC rules (which have been upheld in the Florida supreme court).
Please, you need to have the facts before you make statements like this. Whether or not the rules are "fair", they were in place and were known by both governors prior to the primary dates being set, and they chose to go ahead anyway. If they want a "re-do" later this summer, then fine. However, seating the delegates as they are now when agreements by the candidates were broken (i.e., Hillary keeping her name on the ballot in Michigan and expressing support for the Florida primary) would be wrong and would lead to revolt by Obama supporters.
March 6, 2008 11:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Desidero is referring to the fact that these states moved their primaries ahead of the dates allowed them by that same clause. They were given permission to have their primaries earlier than everyone else, but not as early as they actually had them. Of course, these actions were a response to FL and MI's actions, but they still disobeyed the rules.
Nevertheless, my primary point is that the voters in those states had every reason to think that their vote would be counted. That's not true about FL so that election was biased towards Clinton who was arguing that their votes should count. If you were the kind of person to believe in Clinton, you would be more likely to vote. Hence, this is clearly a form of selection bias that is incredibly skewed towards Clinton.
March 6, 2008 12:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
I really don't see why revoting both Florida and Michigan is something we have to debate. Seems like a no brainer to me. The only question would be when and how.
I'm with Desidero that they should be primary elections.
March 6, 2008 11:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree 100%. I'd like them to be as close as possible to the usual elections.
March 6, 2008 11:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
The only question is the $20-30 million dollar price tage that we could be using to turn McCain into Bush III. Is it worth it?
Democrats: Learn to make a tough choice and deal with the consequences without waffling. [Actually, Barack get get mileage here maybe. Claim that his party is full of toomany wafflers and stand up against a "revote."]
March 6, 2008 11:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
The $20-30 million question is a valid one. However, there's no waffling involved in a re-vote. AFAIK, the party has said from day one that they'd be seated if they had a vote on or after February 5th.
March 6, 2008 11:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
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