The opposition is claiming victory, but results are coming out very slowly, so my guess is that there will be significant vote fraud.
Category: Elections
Good Politics, Good Policy on Iraq
42 Democrats are promising to submit legislation for an immediate withdrawal from Iraq if elected.
At least one of the 42, Donna Edwards, is pretty much already in, as she defeated the incumbent in the primary, and it’s one of the safest Dem seats in the country.
What needs to be done is to lean on the Bush Blue Dog Democrats.
If we see a few more “Mini-Tets” in Iraq, which I think is likely, then more people will sign on to something like this.
Kenyan Dispute Still Not Resolved
President Mwai Kibaki and PM Raila Odingaappear to be having significant problems resolving the composition of the cabinet.
I haven’t followed this closely, quite honestly Africa is pretty much off of my radar, but to the degree that I have, it’s painfully clear that Kibaki stole the election, and that he is being given a bit of a pass by outside powers, because he is seen as being “good for business.”
The impetus here should be for an arrangement that respects the will of the people as it was actually expressed at the ballot box, and to the degree that Kibaki is backing away from these agreements, it should be made clear that this is not acceptable.
Al Wynn to Resign
Wynn is retiring, effective June.
Nominally, the reason given is that he wants to give Edwards a leg up on the general, that she does not need, but I don’t buy that.
My guess is that either he wants to get a running start on his lucrative lobbying gig, or he is doing this as a way to shaft either Donna Edwards or his constituents.
My suggestion would for O’Malley to call a special election on the same day as the general. That way Edwards has a seniority edge on the rest of the 2009 Freshman class.
Stupid Arguments
Josh Marshall has it right when he calls out Evan Bayh for being stupid, when he suggests that electoral votes should count in the super delegates decision.
He does not go far enough though.
All the arguments, whether popular votes, delegates, etc. should be irrelevant to the super delegates decision.
They are a 20% swing vote, and their concerns should be as follows (in order of descending importance):
- Who will be the best president of the United States of America
- Who is best for the party.
- Who is most likely to be elected.
Now it’s clear that things like delegates, popular vote, and fund raising, etc. are factors in those concerns, but they are not the concerns themselves.
They are the trees, not the forest.
Because Right Now the Stakes are So Small
Again Josh Marshall has a good insight
But it seems to me that the real reason the Democratic primary race has gone from heated to vicious (at least among the candidates’ supporters, if not the candidates themselves) is precisely because we’re in this awkward seven week hiatus in which there are no actual elections being held.
There is no weekly reality check for the next few weeks.
Michigan Getting Very Ugly Very Fast, Florida Getting Better
As I said a few days ago, the issue of whether folks who voted in the Replithug primary could vote is a legitimate one, but it’s Obama who has everything to lose here. For Clinton, any resolution has an upside.
So, the Michigan re-vote plan has died in the state senate, because the Obama people were objecting to the exclusion of Republican voters.
I understand the principal, but on all other levels, it is mind-bogglingly stupid.
I agree with Jeralyn Merritt’s take onObama’s preferred solution, a 50-50 split of delegates. This is explicitly preventing a legitimate vote with a legitimate count. You are in Bush buddy James Baker territory.
The math is bad for Clinton right. It’s very, very bad. If there were a revote in Florida and Michigan, Hillary would need to win by about 20% to improve her position, which is not going to happen absent an Elliot Spitzer type revelation.
By playing hardball on this, Obama is opening the door for a fight in the credentialing committee and a floor fight at the convention.
It’s worse than a sin, it is a mistake.
In Florida, however, things are looking brighter, with a proposal to give ½ the delegates according to the Jan 29 votes, and the remainder according to the nationwide split of votes received.
Rep. Tom Reynolds (R-NY), To Retire
As you may recall, he almost lost in 2006, because he was hip deep in the Foley congressional page sex scandal.
Lawsuit Threats Stop Independent Audit
Ed Felton’s offer to audit voting machines was rejected after Sequoia threatened a lawsuit.
Which raises the question, what do they have to hide?
In certifying any critical system, it’s supposed to be guilty until proven innocent, so any actions taken to prevent a 3rd party review should be viewed as an admission of guilt.
Chet Edwards (TX-17-D) Looks Safe This Year
It appears that the Republican party cannot find anyone interested in running this year.
OK, Legitimate Issue on the MI Revote, NOT Stonewalling
In discussing a possible revote, I noted that I thought that objections being raised by the Obama campaign were a specious attempt to stone wall.
I’ve finally come across some of the specific issues that they have with a revote, and they are in fact quite valid.
One question is who do you allow to vote. Unlike a lot of other states, Michigan has an open primary, which means that you can choose which ballot you want when you walk into the polling area, regardless of party affiliation.
To quote Chairman Kaga, “As Memory Serves”, there were a lot of Democrats who chose to vote for Mittmentum, because they thought that he would be particularly weak in the general.
So, there is now an issue regarding what to do with the people who voted on the Republican ticket.
This is a completely legitimate issue.
My preferred solution would be to simply allow only people who were registered Democrats as of the date of the first election to participate in any revote, regardless of which ballot they took in January. I think that open primaries create too much mischief, particularly in this instance.
In any case, this issue has a number of possible solutions, and it cuts to the very core of any possible revote, so it is a very valid concern, and needs to be addressed to the satisfaction of both campaigns.
Me bad on calling it stonewalling
Disgraceful.
Representatives Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Kendrick Meek have declined to support Democratic candidates running against Republicans incumbents in Florida.
Here’s the kicker. If you want a house leadership position, and Meek is a member of the 30-Something Working Group, and has been a vice chairman of the DCCC, and Wasserman Schultz is co-chair of the Red to Blue committee.
These are leadership positions. If you take those positions, you have an obligation to do your damn job.
I don’t care if your daughter is running as a Republican, and her alleged rapist is running as a Democrat, you work for the Democrat. If you can’t hack it, then go and be a back bencher.
We need to go after both of these folks in the 2010 primaries, hard.
Money quote on the real reason:
However, Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the Rothenberg Political Report, which tracks political campaigns, said the lack of support from top Democrats could make donors leery.
”Debbie Wasserman Schultz is a favorite of leadership, somebody on the move,” Rothenberg said. “When somebody like that doesn’t want to be a major player in taking on a Republican, that’s a signal.”
Yet Rothenberg says the situation is not without precedent: He noted several Republican and Democratic senators from the same states honor nonaggression pacts.
Both Meek and Wasserman Schultz have benefited from a close affiliation with the U.S.-Cuba Democracy PAC, which since its founding in 2003 has contributed $22,000 to Wasserman Schultz’s campaign committee and $10,500 to Meek’s.
Wasserman Schultz said the PAC support played no role in her decision, but she acknowledges she’s closer to the Republican incumbents on Cuba issues than she is to the Democratic challengers, who favor easing restrictions on family travel to the island.
When Castro dies, can we send tham all back to Cuba? Let them f$%# up that country.
Obama Campaign in Full Stonewall Mode in Michigan, and Florida Says No Vote
That’s the only explain the various chicken egg objections of Obama supporters, who won’t say if they support a concept of a revote unless they have finished legislation, but also say it’s not worth coming up with finished legislation unless they have sign on by both campaigns.
There is only one real issue here, making sure that the already broke state of Michigan is not left holding the bag on the cost.
In related news, the Florida Democratic party has said there will be no revote.
Truth be told, what happened in Florida was much more a Republican effort, the Dems tried to change the date, but rules are rules.
No delegates may be a good thing, because it will lead more people to question the role of Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. It’s an accident of history that does not need to be repeated, particularly in South Carolina.
The worst solution is Chris Dodd’s where the delegates are split 50/50. That says, “the voters be damned, but the political big wigs should get their junket to Denver.”
Also, the super delegates, who were largely the folks who voted to set those dates at that time, should be excluded too.
Mulligans in Michigan and Florida
Michigan seems to be further along, with the Republicans in the state legislature being rather helpful.
The deal seems to be as follows: The state holds a new primary, and the Dems pay for it.
It’s the right thing to do, both politically and morally, but I’ve learned never to trust a smiling Republican, and the Republicans seem awfully helpful right now, which implies that they have found a way to put a proverbial turd in the punch bowl.
Hopefully, this is just my cynicism.
Florida is far more unsettledwith the state Democratic party and Senator Nelson on one side, and the congressional delegation on the other.
My guess is that if MI gets its act together, so will Florida.
From a purely tactical perspective, the Obama campaign has to see any sort of “re-vote”, even a caucus, as a losing proposition, since it adds about 300 delegates to the mix, and a large number of votes, probably a larger number than who voted in January.
Furthermore, the majority of those people will have already pulled the lever.
Clinton and Obama Split Over Florida and Michigan – New York Times
There seems to be a divergence of opinion on what to do do with Florida and Michigan between the campaigns.
Basically, the preferred solution for the Clinton Campaign is to seat them as is, with a revote being second, while the Obama Campaign, favors (in no particular order), not seating the delegates, splitting the delegates 50/50, or holding a caucus.
Not surprising, they both chose alternatives which they believe benefit them most.
A mail revote is eminently doable, and has the advantage of keeping the troublemaker Republicans in Michigan who vote for the weakest candidate, because mail only goes to registered Democrats.
The time frame is doable too. 3 weeks to get the money, 3 weeks to do the printing and mailing.
Total costs would likely be in the high single digit million dollar range.
There is only one that I find truly offensive, and it’s not refusing the delegates seating. After all, rules are rules, and the legislators in FL and MI knew what they were getting into when they voted for this.*
It’s the 50/50 split. The idea behind this, and the person putting this forward is Chris Dodd, not the Obama campaign, is that the will of the voter does not matter (that is that the 50/50 vote split means), but that the political movers and shakers get to hobnob as delegates at the convention.
It means no democracy, but lots of corrupt patronage.
*Truth be told, I have a little sympathy for the Florida Legislators. They had the date move attached to paper trails on ballots, which needs to be done in a state like Florida.
It Appears That the Texas School System Really Sucks
Because no one in that entire state can count.
They still haven’t finished the tally of the caucuses there. In fact, they don’t expect to be done before the 29th.
Andre Carlson (D) Wins IN Congressional Special Election
54-43 against the Republican, though there is still a May primary and the November general.
Obama Wins in Mississippi
About 60:40, as the polls predicted.
Now we are doomed to 6 weeks of pundits without any elections to prove them wrong.
Help me Stephen Colbert, you’re my only hope.
Mark Prior to Run Unopposed for US Senate
This is stunning, even more so because it is in reliably red Arkansas.
The Republicans have no bench, and their first stringers are retiring, or not running at all.
This may look like 1932 or 1964.
The Minnesota Election Is About Him, Al Franken
Mike Ciresi has dropped out of the Democratic nomination race for Senate, which leaves Al Franken in the driver’s seat, as the only other opponent is an obscure college professor (note to Al, so was Wellstone, IIRC).
It looks like Al can focus on the general against, Norm “Capped Teeth” Coleman.