A Crock of S***

That was my reaction when I read this:

A prominent civil rights leader has told the Democratic National Committee that refusing to seat delegates from Florida and Michigan would disenfranchise both states' minority communities.

In a Feb. 8 letter to DNC Chairman Howard Dean, NAACP chairman Julian Bond expressed "great concern at the prospect that million of voters in Michigan and Florida could ultimately have their votes completely discounted." Refusing to seat the states' delegations could remind voters of the "sordid history of racially discriminatory primaries," he said.

Emphasis added.  Funny how in October 2007 nobody was talking about "disenfranchising minorities" but on February 8, 2008, with the Democratic race up in the air, it becomes an issue.  This is sheer, unvarnished hypocrisy coming from the NAACP, an institution that shouldn't lend its name to this type of desperate political pandering.

For once, rare as it is, I wholeheartedly agree with Reverend Al Sharpton.

This morning, Rev. Al Sharpton sided with Obama, writing to Dean to express the opposite sentiment.

"I firmly believe that changing the rules now, and seating delegates from Florida and Michigan at this point would not only violate the Democratic party's rules of fairness, but also would be a grave injustice," Sharpton wrote. "Changing the rules in the middle of a presidential contest is patently unfair both to the candidates (including Senator Edwards) and to Democratic voters everywhere."

Sharpton said that Bond's argument of disenfranchisement "should have been made many months ago before the decision was made to strip these states of their delegates, and, once the decision was made, it should have been vigorously objected to and contested by those who felt it disenfranchised voters. To raise that claim now smacks of politics in its form most raw and undercuts the moral authority behind such an argument."

Not many times will I completely agree with Reverend Al, but he's right on this one.

Tags: Elections 2008, Politics, Democrats

UPDATE 7:19 PM - I received a comment clarifying that the letter Chairman Bond sent to the DNC argued that some mechanism should be implemented to allow Florida and Michigan voters  to make their opinion count, and not that delegates should be seated in accordance with the primaries' results.  The NAACP's position can be found here.  The February 8 letter can be accessed on PDF format at the end of the statement.

Comments

[Kevin Myles]

When I read about Chairman Bond's comments, I was outraged and I am an NAACP Branch President.

So I picked up my phone and started calling members of the board and staff to try and understand what in the world was going on. Now to be clear, I am not speaking on behalf of Chairman Bond or anyone else, but I will share with you what I was told.

The position Bond espoused was not that the delegations should be seated in accordance with the results of the 'primaries'. But rather the people of Michigan and Florida should be given some opportunity to vote and indicate their choice, whether that be through a new primary or caucus or some other means. Bond did not talk about what methods would be used, but from what I have heard, his intent was to push the DNC chair to take some kind of action to resolve this prior to the convention.

Since they had been stripped by the DNC, technically no election took place in either State. Bond's push was that some mechanism be selected for determining the will of the residents of MI and FL.

Kevin Myles
President; Wichita Branch NAACP
Political Action Chair; Kansas State NAACP
www.wichitanaacp.blogspot.com

[El Loco]

The position Bond espoused was not that the delegations should be seated in accordance with the results of the 'primaries'. But rather the people of Michigan and Florida should be given some opportunity to vote and indicate their choice, whether that be through a new primary or caucus or some other means.

Kevin, I went to the national NAACP to touch base and make sure I got this information from the source and not second-hand. Your characterization of the letter is accurate.

However, that doesn't address the issue of why Chairman Bond waited until February 8 to raise an issue that was on the table almost four months earlier. It still smacks of politics to me.

If either Obama or Clinton were well on their way to wrapping up the Democratic nomination, would this matter be an issue?

If the residents of Michigan and Florida believe they have been disenfranchised, they should get rid of the Democratic leadership in their state, or at least, the geniuses who allowed their residents to be disenfranchised.

[La Ventanita]

This only adds to my beliefs and many people's suspicions that the party wants Hillary as the candidate at all costs.

[El Loco]

LV, it's tough to conclude this would benefit Hillary for two reasons. First, right now the momentum is with Obama. Second, Obama has done extremely well on caucuses. Both things favor him if there was either a primary or a caucus.

I think the MI & FL delegations shouldn't be seated. The rules are the rules. They broke them. Deal with it. They should have been concerned about disenfranchising minorities from the start.

The one argument in favor of allowing an alternate procedure to select delegates from MI & FL, however, is this. What is more democratic: allowing MI & FL to have a selection process - primaries or caucuses - and have their delegates seated or not letting them have delegates and, instead, have the superdelegates determine who should be the Democratic candidate?

Interestingly, I haven't heard that argument anywhere. Yet.

[La Ventanita]

Loco, have you read the news this morning?

Clinton is not playing nice

In any case, this is not looking good for the dems so far. It seems there is quite the division inside the party and it will be played out as a racial division.

[El Loco]

If you're referring to seating MI & FL, I think it's a ploy. If they actually tried that, they might as well save everyone the time and money and just go home. Because if she succeeds in getting the nomination that way, I can assure you that I won't be voting for her and millions of others won't. I'd rather vote for Bill Belichick first. Someone who's willing to do something like that not only doesn't deserve to be President. That person is a danger to the nation if they are elected. In addition, doing that would give her exactly ZERO chance of attracting a single Obama vote.

I think it's more likely she will push to have a primary or caucus in those states. Whether that's a winning strategy remains to be seen, but she could portray herself as the defender of the rights of the disenfranchised.

it will be played out as a racial division

I doubt that. I'm not saying nobody will say it, but you could make it a gender issue just as easily. Some people will say that since for some everything is about race, but I don't think that will be the norm.

[La Ventanita]

Gender issue? If this comes down to the superdelegates, and Obama is ahead and they pick Hillary that will not be a gender issue.

As for Hills campaign:

With every delegate precious, Mrs. Clinton’s advisers also made it clear that they were prepared to take a number of potentially incendiary steps to build up Mrs. Clinton’s count. Top among these, her aides said, is pressing for Democrats to seat the disputed delegations from Florida and Michigan, who held their primaries in January in defiance of a Democratic Party rules.

Even seating them as super delegates is offensive and undemocratic. How come everyone was fine with their delegates not counting and all of a sudden they matter? If this isn't self serving politics I don't know what is. The mere fact that she is considering this has already decided my vote - for sure it will not be for her. I'd rather vote for McCain.

I can't believe I just said that.

[El Loco]

Even seating them as super delegates is offensive and undemocratic.

I don't think anyone is thinking about seating them as super delegates. I wrote about it in some detail here:

http://www.latinopundit.com/2008/02/the-florida-and-michigan-deleg.html

If this comes down to the superdelegates, and Obama is ahead and they pick Hillary that will not be a gender issue.

You're damn right about that. It will be pure, unmitigated chaos the likes we haven't seen since the Democratic convention of '68.

And if that happens, not only there's no way Hillary wins. I wouldn't rule out the Republicans taking back the House and the Senate.

[La Ventanita]

Loco,

The problem is that is not what the Hillary camp is (or was) suggesting this morning. They were suggesting to use the results as they are, NOT to hold new primaries.

Either way I disagree; the rules were set in the beginning and all accepted them. Changing them now b/c things are not going your way is childish at best.

Unmitigated chaos? More like all hell breaking lose. If that happens I will not go out of my house the entire day. But I don't think the Dems would be that studpid.