Progressive Obama delegates reportedly purged. Anyone hear anything about this?
Well, interesting things indeed went on in the dead of night as delegate candidates are being evaluated by the Obama campaign in California to see if they’re worthy of inclusion as prospective delegates to Denver. Marcy Winograd over at the blog we do not name or link to said…
By dusk on Wednesday, the California Obama campaign had purged almost all progressive anti-war activists from its delegate candidate lists. Names of candidates, people who had filed to run to represent Obama at the August Democratic Party National Convention, disappeared, not one by one, but hundreds at a time, from the Party web site listing the eligibles. The list of Obama delegate hopefuls in one northern California congressional district went from a robust 100 to an anemic 23, while in southern California, the list in Congressman Waxman’s district almost slipped out of sight, plunging from a high of 91 candidates to 17. Gone were strong women with independent political bases.
Marcy went on to state that the remaining candidates appeared to be mostly “bundlers and their girlfriends”.
Marcy has paid her dues- she ran against Jane Harman in CA-36 in 2006, and got a good percentage of votes with a lot of progressive support. The wisdom of the Obama campaign pissing off this kind of person remains to be determined.
Another report on HuffPo:
The ostensible rationale for the cutting of delegate candidates is to prevent “Trojan horse” delegates from making their way to the Convention floor and then switching allegiances. The vetting and removal of delegate candidates is expressly allowed by party rules. But could the 30th District really have had 73 such turncoats, and was I really one of them? I was a Precinct Captain for the Obama campaign for the California primary; I’ve donated several hundred dollars to Senator Obama’s campaign (the first politician I’ve ever supported financially); and I’ve boosted the campaign in numerous posts on this website…
It’s hard not to be cynical. Remaining on the list of approved candidates is the slate of candidates (longtime campaign volunteers) that the Obama campaign has officially endorsed, as well as several names recognizable from local politics. These delegate candidates aren’t to be faulted for being longtime political activists, but the cynic in me wonders why those names remained while the “nobodies” on the list disappeared. The Obama campaign owes those of us who were cut a fuller explanation of the decision process.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/04/09/calif_delegate_lists_under_scrutiny/
Clinton is doing it too.
(remember Switzerland)
I can’t imagine why they would have been concerned about the loyalty of people who immediately wrote inflammatory posts on high profile blogs upon learning that they wouldn’t be going to the convention. Boggles the mind really.
I believe that this is a direct result of Clinton repeatedly pointing out that pledged delegates are not obligated to vote for the candidate that voters actually elected them to vote for.
… because apparently disenfranchising voters only counts if Clinton gets an advantage.
I guess that does explain why she agreed in writing to not seating FL and MI … until she blew the early campaign and found she needed the results of their not quite democratic primaries.
memyself, have you actually read the pledge they signed? It said nothing about seating the delegates, and it said nothing about any end result for Michigan and Florida.
And, though you may hate Clinton with all your heart, it does not change the fact that she was right about the pledged delegates. Don’t be upset because she knows the rules in and out: she didn’t make them, she just knows how to play inside them.
Yes according to today’s San Francisco Daily about 900 Obama delegates were purged and 30 Clinton delegates were purged. It’s the scale that is noteworthy.
900 purged! Obama is a political Stalin, ha.
Advocating for seating the delegates after the non democratic primaries is very clearly participation in Florida or Michigan delegate selection process - which Clinton pledged NOT to do unless they held a DNC sanctioned vote.
According to this Kos diary, the Obama campaign reversed course on this.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4/10/211336/770/769/493487
Has anyone seen confirmation?
DK is an Obama 527 organization…
Friends don’t let friends link to DK because linking drives traffic to them.
and by the way…Marcy Winograd on HuffPo in a different post really is quite put out by the whole affair. These are comments from Marcy, an Obama supporter…
I see a number of Obama themes going down in flames here…
memyself writes:
Let me translate this into the vulgate:
Glad to help out. No thanks necessary. (Though I’m surprised this was #3 in the thread. I would have thought #1, for sure.)
White n AZ:
Thanks for being ever so helpful. I was asking for confirmation, not stating it as gospel. =P
me me me - I live in SE Mich. where Obama’s people were actively soliciting votes for “uncommitted,” knowing they’d put up delegates who would be loyal to him. So much for that “no campaigning.” It’s oly when Clinton got a solid majority that the he got fully behind the disenfranchisement bandwagon.
But he didn’t technically break the rules, the same as with that “national ad buy” in Florida, so it’s okay, right? I swear, Obama’s campaign and supporters project as badly as Rethuglicans. BTW, Clinton’s campaign purged 50, versus 900 for Obama’s. A big difference, I’d say.
Everyone take the pledge, let Howard Dean know:
We can put a stop to the FL - MI problem. Take the pledge:
“If MI and FL are not brought into the national picture immediately and their votes counted, and if Obama is the Democratic nominee, I will not vote for president in November. If MI and FL are returned to the national picture immediately and their votes counted, then I will vote for the Democratic nominee whomever it is”.
If enough of us take the pledge then Dean has few choices. If he makes the wrong choice then Obama will have no chance to be President. Period. The only chance for Obama and choice for Dean is to bring FL and MI into the equation, now.
“WTF?”
If you find this surprising, you really haven’t been paying attention to the Obama campaign over the past year.
Their decision to oppose universal healthcare was the signal that, appearances aside, theirs was an explicitly anti-progressive campaign.
When candidates openly talk about “raiding” the delegates of their competition, it makes sense to ensure your delegates are those that “can’t be raided”.
I’m so frickin tired of this election.
lambert,
when you translate any criticism of clinton into “the bitch made me do it!” you’re minimizing the real sexist attacks used against clinton. people can be against clinton for reasons that have nothing to do with her sex. i know you’re being flip, but actually it’s comments like yours that make people take outcries about actual sexist attacks against her less seriously.
Advocating for seating the delegates after the non democratic primaries is very clearly participation in Florida or Michigan delegate selection process - which Clinton pledged NOT to do unless they held a DNC sanctioned vote.
Really, do yourself a favor and look at the actual pledge; the only thing the candidates pledged not to do was campaign or participate in the primary of any state that broke the timing rules. “Campaign” was defined, but “participate” was not, meaning that there is no way to say that one action or another is “very clearly participation” since “participation” is very much open to interpretation. The pledge said nothing about delegate selection, which makes perfect sense because delegate selection is not within the authority of the candidates.
I don’t hold out much hope that you will look at the actual pledge, though; I’ve been asking people to read the rules and the pledge for a couple of months now, and nobody takes me up on that.