The Most Important Thing is the Smoke Filled Room
Wed Feb 06, 2008 at 09:49:49 AM PDT
I don't believe in letting political opponents pick your nominee, but I do believe in trying to see things from the adversary's perspective so you know how to win a contest. (Ironically, in the military, we used to call this "red teaming.") With that in mind, check out this quote from RedState:
"The important thing is that Hillary wins, but in the most smoke-filled-room way possible."
It's true. The best scenario for the GOP is a brokered Democratic convention in which Hillary wins based solely on the strength of superdelegates. (Just as bad would be a brokered convention in which Hillary emerged as the choice of the people, but the superdelegates engineered their way to an Obama victory. Unlikely as this seems now, the convention isn't for nearly six months, a lifetime in politics.)
I back Obama, but I would vote for Hillary in the general election. And I can imagine other circumstances in which I could even have supported her in the primaries. I love the idea of woman winning the presidency, and I can see and respect the genuine passion that many of her supporters have for her. I suspect she'd be a much better president than she is a candidate.
But all of that said, if the pledged delegates are going Obama's way, and yet the superdelegates swoop in to shift the nomination to Hillary at the convention, it would be a disaster for the Democrats, sucking the momentum out of the movement we've seen this year for the party.
The flipside is probably less likely, but it's just as true. If Hillary were to have more legitimate pledged delegates, but the superdelegates were to decide to jump on the Obama bandwagon, it would also reek of the smoke-filled rooms of the past.
Most Obama supporters in the primary would shake hands and vote (maybe even contribute or work) for Hillary in the general. Most Hillary supporters, I believe, would do the same if the shoe winds up on the other foot. But the one thing that would derail all of this, and leave a bitter taste in everyone's mouth, is if the choice of the rank and file of the party were to flip the nomination.
Yes, the following is from the Politico but it's a pretty good summary of who the superdelegates are.
Superdelegates grow in number as the party gets more successful: They include all Democratic members of Congress, members of the Democratic National Committee, Democratic governors.
They also are the party warhorses and include “all former Democratic presidents, all former Democratic vice presidents, all former Democratic leaders of the U.S. Senate, all former Democratic speakers of the U.S. House of Representatives and Democratic minority leaders, as applicable, and all former chairs of the Democratic National Committee.”
This means that not only Bill Clinton, but Terry McAuliffe, Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, are superdelegates.
These are the people who Bill Clinton has been lobbying according to The Washington Post. These are the people who might very well pick the Democratic nominee. Maybe they ought to hear from you as well.
[UPDATE: I changed the title. The focus of this is the smoke-filled room, not Hillary or Obama.]
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