By Jim Tankersley
The 2008 calendar, for Democrats, is nothing if not ironic.
It's ironic that the most front-loaded primary schedule in party history has stretched into June without a clear winner. It's ironic that states that scrambled to vote on Feb. 5 missed out on the attention now being showered on their more-patient neighbors. (Who would have thought Barack Obama would spend nearly as much time campaigning in South Dakota as in California?)
It's ironic that the only two states to defy the national party's calendar restrictions now appear to get only half a voice each at the Democratic National Convention.
But the biggest irony could come in August, at the party convention in Denver.
It's tough to say, from her campaign's statements this weekend, whether Hillary Clinton plans to press her case for the Democratic presidential nomination all the way to the party convention in Denver at the end of August. But it's clear that if she does, Democrats risk spending the summer with a cloud of doubt hanging over their prospective nominee.
That's because even if Obama reaches the "magic number" of pledged delegates and superdelegates needed to clinch the nomination, he still isn't guaranteed to be the nominee if Clinton is continuing to fight. Any of those delegates could switch allegiances any time before the floor vote in Denver, and presumably, Clinton would pressure them to if she presses her challenge on the seating of disputed Michigan delegates.
Democrats would have avoided that potential summer of discontent by scheduling their convention in July, as they did in 2004, guaranteeing more than three months of general-election campaigning for their nominee. Instead, they moved the convention back to the end of August.
The late date allows them to avoid competing with the Beijing Olympics for television time. It also was supposed to avoid a pitfall of 2004: locking the party nominee into general-election public financing earlier than the Republican nominee. Essentially, it was supposed to allow the Democratic candidate to spend more money closer to November.
Here's the irony: Obama and Clinton have shattered fundraising records. Neither of them figures to opt into the public financing system for the general election.
So the party is risking a long, uncertain summer for a financial boost that means absolutely nothing to its eventual nominee.
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Comments
One more irony - from the party in 2000 that was screaming to do away with electoral college and use the popular vote, it will be the canidate that finishes 2nd in the popular vote that will be the nominee.
Posted by: Terry | June 1, 2008 3:07 PM
I’m not prescient or plugged-in enough to have any special window on how many of you Clinton supporters who are saying you will vote for John McCain in November will come to your senses by then. Many people I respect think that most of you will. I suspect they’re right. I hope they are. But it’s obvious that more than a handful of you are serious in your vindicativeness and will join Joe Lieberman to support the Senator from Arizona over Obama. That would be the anti-choice, hundred-year-war, two-faced, Republican Senator from Arizona.
Thus is born a new subspecies, McCain Democrats, McCainocrats.
If your shrieking can be believed, you McCainocrats are premeditating ballot support for an exclusive club of racist, union-busting, woman-suppressing, bedroom-peering, rights-scoffing, warmongering, torture-backing, buccaneering, global warming-denying, privatizing, public land-grabbing, Supreme Court stuffing, empire-building, Constitution-shredding raptors. All for self-indulgent revenge. You’re unhappy that your candidate has not won the nomination. I understand that. Mine didn’t win either. But you’re not just unhappy, you're also willing to contribute to the election of someone who stands against most of what your candidate has been promoted as standing for. That, I don’t comprehend at all. Emotionally, intellectually or morally. I get the feeling you would vote for George W. Bush in 2008 if the 22nd Amendment weren’t in the way.
John McCain can’t possibly give you what you want if what you really want is what you say Senator Clinton has been in the running for this year. Only on the margins does he contravene the rightwing cabal that over time seized the party and has now left it in disarray. His discernible stances on almost everything of note are, or should be, anathema to any Democrat who is a Democrat. Much of the rest of his views are just contradictory meandering. When he opens his mouth, you never know which side he will speak from.
I’m no fan of third parties because history shows only one making the leap to even the lower rungs of national power. But I can at least understand voters who jump ship to a third party based on principle and symbolism and hope for a breakthrough in a direction amicable to their beliefs. You McCainocrats, on the other hand, are incomprehensible. Is the idea that voting for another four years of rightwing Republican rule would be worth it as long as you could say: "See? We told you Obama couldn’t win." Does the McCainocrat lunacy embrace the idea that four more years of a Republican in the White House would make Clinton a shoo-in for 2012?
If that’s what your telling me, if you’re willing to force the American people to suffer for your chance to say nah-nah-nah, I’ll have two words for you when you come around looking for my support for any candidate or any cause in 2012 or any other time in the future: Bite me.
Posted by: MBlades | June 1, 2008 3:55 PM
Hillary is really pulling ahead in the popular vote, now that the truth is finally comming through.
Looks as if Obama favorite word now is "resign" replacing his "i apologize"
Posted by: George | June 1, 2008 4:00 PM
The magic number is just that---magic. IT'S NOT REAL!
Posted by: Done in Denver | June 1, 2008 4:39 PM
Here's more irony for you: despite a tanking economy, a new energy crisis, and unpopular war and a public thoroughly tired of the Republicans, the probable nominee (Obama) is still polling about even with McCain -- even behind him in some critical states. It has been that way for months. He should be light years ahead given all these factors.
That means that there's an excellent chance that Obama will get his butt handed to him in November.
Posted by: MJ | June 1, 2008 10:24 PM
I think the biggest irony is that the party that told us that every vote counts is now telling us that they only count as half. The party that complained about Bush not being the real president because he lost the popular vote now has the nominee who lost the popular vote. How could someone write an article about Irony and the Dems contest and not even mention these 2 events. While I am not a big fan of the Republican party no one can deny that if it were the GOP that was telling people their votes dont count the media would be all over it.
Posted by: VInny | June 2, 2008 9:36 AM
Add to your irony list:
The date of the Democratic nominee's acceptance speech is the 40th Anniversary of MLK's "I had a dream"...
Posted by: jaycbird | June 2, 2008 10:50 AM
Hillary will be out of the race and endorsing Obama by the end of the week. It's fun to think of all the possibilities, but everything points to this being done by Friday. Then the national campaign begins.
Posted by: Jonathan | June 2, 2008 10:54 AM
@Terry, Vinny -
Clinton has NOT won the "popular" vote. You do realize that, right? I've been consistently amazed at the ways people uncritically ingest a campaign's talking points. Simply because Hillary says she's won the popular vote doesn't mean that she has (remember Tuzla!). In order to get to a number where Hillary actually wins it, you have to exclude caucus states and include Michigan. In my book that doesn't quite add up to "popular." It also totally undermines her trumped up concerns about "disenfranchisement," since her total disenfranchises a whole bunch of states.
Posted by: nepat | June 2, 2008 10:57 AM
Clinton is not leading in the popular vote unless you use a bizarre set of rules about which votes count and which don't. If you count all of the votes cast, including the caucuses, Obama is roughly 180,000 votes up. And popular vote is completely meaningless in a delegate battle. Stop trying to change the rules at the last second because you're not winning. That's how Republicans act, not Democrats. Clinton herself said that Florida and Michigan wouldn't count for anything. Be honest with yourself.
Posted by: AS | June 2, 2008 11:03 AM
MJ,
Obama is polling even with McCain despite being hit by both McCain and Clinton for months.
Once Hillary's pathetic campaign is finally put out of its misery, and she is forced to at least pretend that she cares about her party and her country, Obama's numbers will go up.
Posted by: Kat | June 2, 2008 11:17 AM
Hillary is winning the popular vote in the States That Matterâ„¢!
Posted by: Howard | June 2, 2008 11:27 AM
Terry Vinnie and other members of the "get out the talking points" squads, please remember that the "popular vote" meme is wrong. Clinton has lost with delagates and has lost in the popular vote.
If you are just repeating the popular vote thing to take advantage of people who don't take time to know the facts, I am sure you will not care. However just a reminder that you are being intellectually dishonest.
Posted by: Derek | June 2, 2008 11:32 AM
Not only is it a lie to claim that Clinton has the popular vote but you McCainocrats keep whining about the Democrats halving the Michigan and Florida delegations. Inconveniently for that talking point, the Republicans did the same friggin' thing this year. Please all of you, just take a pill.
Posted by: Raka | June 2, 2008 11:45 AM
By the same token, there's a cloud of doubt hanging over the Republican nominee. Maybe Ron Paul will actually get the nomination at the convention. After all, it's clear that John McCain can't win in crucial states like Utah, Michigan, Kansas, Iowa, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, Louisiana, Arkansas, Minnesota, and Colorado.
Posted by: Galois | June 2, 2008 12:50 PM
I don't give the Clintons too much credit for honesty, but you've gotta admit that it's been awhile since even a Republican has openly bragged about his voters being white.
Posted by: aleks | June 2, 2008 1:03 PM
There is no fuzzy math. If you include both Michigan and Florida more people have cast a vote for Hillary than Obama. That is a fact. Now whether or not those votes in Michigan and Florida should count is a diff story. But no one can deny that more people have voted for Hillary than Obama including Puerto Rico.
Posted by: Vinny | June 2, 2008 2:27 PM
Puerto Rico with its treasure trove of electoral votes!
Posted by: Grinderman | June 2, 2008 6:18 PM
Vinnie, that's just simply not true. You also have to drop out votes from a number of caucus states in order to say that Hillary has more. Give it up, man. Your candidate lost by every measure -- including the popular vote.
Posted by: Raka | June 2, 2008 7:49 PM
Until the four caucus states release their vote totals, look at the 5th line down. Clinton leads:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/democratic_vote_count.html
Posted by: Terry | June 2, 2008 8:50 PM