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A Michigan (Non) Voter Speaks Out
As a Michigan Democrat, I find the whole delegate situation preposterous.
Levin was at the heart of this enitre fiasco. He should be punished for indirectly disenfranchising the votes of millions of people. Egos and money got in the way.
At this point, however, it makes no difference, because even with the Michigan 69-59 split in delegates, Hillary still can't win against Obama. In the words of George Stpehanopolous in 1992, "it's mathematically impossible".
Furher as some people have suggested, it's completely even absurdly why-are-we-even-arguing-about-this unfair to give Hillbag 69 delegates according to 55% of the vote, when
a) SHE broke the rules by having her name on the ballot,
b) Obama didn't break the rules and
c) he didn't have his name on the ballot, so how could people have voted for him?!
I am an Obama supporter, but his name was not on the ballot, so I couldn't vote for him. I STAYED HOME, AND SO DID HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS.
To count "uncommitted" for Obama is also wrong, because how many of those uncommitted voted for someone else, like John Edwards? In MI, you had Dodd, Gravel, Kucinich, Clinton and Uncommitted. The fact that 238,168 people were moitvated enough to get out there and vote for "Uncommitted" tells me that HRC would have LOST this state handily.
I think BHO made a big mistake by not allowing a re-vote here. Give her Florida, fine -- full of paranoid old people and GOP'ers anyway. The recent mob scene in Grand Rapids and upcoming one in Troy proves that BHO has HUGE appeal here in Michigan. And Detroit is Chocolate City -- 80% black.
What should have been done in FEBRUARY is that there should have been re-elections. But Howard dumbass Dean forgot that this was politics, where all rules are neogtiable, and decided not to. Pretty incredible.
At this point, HRC doesn't deserve jack. BELIEVE ME, if it were the OTHER WAY AROUND, she would be doing everything she could to stop BHO from getting the nomination. EVERYTHING. It's about no one but HER, as her flawed, psycho campaign has more than made evident. It has nothing to do with "the people's voice being heard". Give me a break -- Who's Zoomin Who? She cares ONLY about herself.
Side note: I'm not saying BHO isn't a narcissist either, but by my lights, and the majority of the public's lights, far less so than the Billary. And people get this on a gut level. For some reason, we don't expect women to be narcissistic -- we expect them to be nurturing and other-centered. And I think women are generally worse at faking being caring. But I digress.
Comments (6)
I am an Obama supporter, but I wanted my vote to count, so it went to Paul.
BHO and HRC both rejected each others rules for a revote. I'd like to vote, but not Rush have too much influence. There was no good way to revote, the blame goes to MI pols and the DNC. If they now end up seating 1/2, how much better would it have been if they would have said so up front?
they need to come up with a fraction that states get if they jump in line, and stick to it. Setting it up for lawyers instead of voters is stupid.
May 31, 2008 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
I hear you. I do think that IF Michigan is counted (which it shouldn't be), then you have to give the uncommitted votes to Obama. It is clear that the vast majority of those votes were intended for Obama (my own included). Also, Edwards and Richardson have since endorsed Obama and almost all of the Edwards delegates have switched to Obama.
There really is no good way to count them, but any of those "uncommitted" delegates going to Hillary (as her campaign is suggesting) is completely insane.
May 31, 2008 11:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
I only quibble with one thing: the thing that matters is that the voters were disenfranchised--the ones who voted for Clinton, 40% who voted against her, the 30,000 who wrote in Obama's name (write-ins don't count in vote-loving Michigan), the ones who stayed home because they couldn't vote for the candidates they wanted, and the ones who, because they couldn't vote for their Democratic candidate, voted for the weakest Republican in MI's open primary.
There was no rule requiring Democratic candidates to take their names off the ballot. It was an agreement made by all of the Democratic candidates except Hillary and Kucinich. Following the lead of Obama et al. would have been the respectable thing for Hillary to do. Instead she set them up.
May 31, 2008 3:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Joe Ann Arbor:
Josh has a good post up today about how non-voters in MI and FL are as "disenfranchised" as voters in this situation. But it prompted a question for me.
I don't live in either state, so can you explain why people *did* vote in MI on primary day? Do you believe (a) they weren't aware of the DNC ruling, (b) knew but were angry about it, or (c) knew, were angry, and believed that the primary would somehow be made to count later on?
An amazing number of people turned out, and I can't understand why. If the primary had been held in my state, I never would have voted in it knowing the DNC ruling, just because I would have considered it a waste of time.
May 31, 2008 5:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm from MI too, but I'd disagree on Levin. It sounds to me like he was just fighting for the state to be moved up and that he (along with many others) were betting on the idea that they could take advantage of their influence as a swing state to make the shift happen. I can't blame them for wanting to move the primary up to get more influence especially with how terrible our economy is doing right now.
Also, HRC didn't break the rules by leaving her name on the ballot, no one was required to take their name off by the DNC, they were just asked to but not required. And Barack Obama didn't stop a revote, there were just way too many ways that weren't acceptable because of legal/money issues.
Anyway, I'm for Obama too, but I voted for Kucinich because I was afraid that if I voted uncommitted that some of those votes could go to HRC. And I know at least 2 people that I can think of right off the bat that didn't vote because they were told their vote basically wouldn't count.
Every time I think about Clintonites using this as an opportunity to put themselves up as crusaders for the poor 'disenfranchised' voters whose vote won't count, I think about those 2 that I know and how many others there are that are having their silence in a flawed election counted as 'legitimate' by the trash that is the Clinton campaign.
May 31, 2008 5:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey, good replies all - all I knew about the MI primary was that BHO wouldn't be on the ballot b/c it was null and void. Some of my friends mentioned voting u/c but I thought that wouldn't prove anything. By voting I thought I would be participating in an illegitimate meaningless process.
I wrote to Dingle and talked with members of Levin's staff. I'm pissed with them b/c they rendered the primary illegitimate b/c of fairly petty BS about timing of primaries. That was not worth disenfranchising millions of voters -- like me.
I hear you that BHO didn't have to take his name off. And that it wasn't his decision whether to have a revote.
The half delegate solution seems fair and sends a clear message to those states who want to mess w/ the rules. HRC and her supporters generally have lost clear perspective. Though if BHO were in this mess, I'd be unhappy too.
Just a final general point about character. I think a message to take away from this is that BHO, like any other black person, has had to play by the rules to the nth degree. He didn't have to take his name off MI but he did, he's released taxes and medical records, been above board re Rezko, denounced extremist supporters readily. But HRC has made many mistakes and has run her campaign badly and has whined all the way. And her entitlement makes me unsympathetic toward her situation.
June 1, 2008 10:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
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