Our precinct had a total of 30 delegates to the county convention which had split 20 delegates for Obama, 10 delegates for Clinton. Our mission: Elect two delegates to represent us at the state convention. I was one of the Obama delegates.
Tuesday before the County Caucus, our precinct chair (who was an Obama delegate) called all of the Obama delegates together to meet a a local watering hole to discuss voting strategy for the upcoming county convention. The parking lot was full with 20 cars circling around looking for spots that didn't exist so I pulled out of the lot and parked on the highway and pretty soon a line of cars had followed me up the hill and parked too. The woman who parked in front of me said, "That was a smart idea parking out here." and we proceeded to walk down to the ice house together. I asked her as we were walking, "Are you here for the Obama meeting?" to which she responded, "We prefer to think of it as the Clinton meeting."
Oops. Not the first time I have put my foot in my mouth, it's why I always make sure to wear good shoes.
By random chance, the Clinton precinct captain had called a strategy meeting at the same time and same place. Great minds think alike, birds of a feather drink together. The Obama camp was seated outside under the oak trees, the Clinton camp met in the game room. All 20 Obama delegates showed up plus more than half of the alternates. I didn't count, but it appeared as though there was a full house for the Hillary camp also.
Once we were all there and seated, we went around the table and introduced ourselves and then got down to business.
The way the system works at the convention is this:
* Nominees for state delegate are called for in the caucus.
* Each delegate gets one vote for state delegate.
* The top two vote getters become the state delegates.
* The 3rd and 4th place vote getters become the state delegate alternates.
* In the event of a tie, "a game of chance" determines the winner.
Our 20-10 Obama/Clinton delegate split made strategy important. If the Clinton delegates voted as a bloc, we would lose a delegate if we split our vote. If we vote as a bloc for two Obama delegates forcing a 3 way tie, we automatically get one delegate and a chance for a sweep. The best the Clinton delegates can hope for is a tie. We decided that we would go through the entire process tonight, nominate our delegates, vote for them and agree to split our votes 10-10 for our top two delegates to insure one delegate and one tie.
Then we overplayed our hand. Somebody (yours truly) brought up the possibility if they split their vote, or if they all didn't show up, the possibility of a complete Obama sweep of the delegates and the alternates. A few of us started ciphering out all of the possibliities, figuring out the voting scenarios for each possible split and what to do if they didn't have all 10 of their delegates present. One of our delegates was a parlimentarian and provided a key piece to our strategy: The precinct chair can control the order of the vote so we would be able to force a vote on all of the Clinton Nominees first, then vote on our nominees giving us an edge should they not bloc vote.
Meeting adjourned, I stopped by the Clinton meeting (which had already adjourned) and talked to the Clinton precinct chair and a couple of the other Hillary delegates that were still there and exchanged pleasantries and talked a little politics.
Fast forward to Saturday morning, County Convention. It was chaotic. There were a lot of people who didn't know what to expect, what to do and where to go. It seemed that there could be a real possibility of people not making it to the convention making it a real possibility that our different voting scenarios might come into play. Check in time was originally 10:00 AM but extended to 11:30 due to circumstances. All delegates are in attendance.
Fast forward to caucus time.
We headed outside to where we could talk and be heard. The Clinton precinct chair (an attorney) moves to have the votes taken by roll call. Awesome move on her part, we all vote yes without taking into account the ramifications of this. About 12 delegates are nominated total, split 50/50 between the two candidates. Some great speeches are given by the nominees about why they want to be the state delegates.
Time to vote and all of a sudden the implications of the roll call vote sink in. We no longer can control the vote by setting the order of the nominees. Whatever advantage we had evaporates. Wheel move, gears turn. Wait. the precinct chair can control the order of the roll call vote, and there is nothing that states what order that vote must be taken in. The chair orders that the vote will be taken in the order of Clinton delegates first, Obama delegates last.
The protests come fast and furious from the Clinton camp that the method of vote is unfair (it was!). Our parlimentarian assures us that this is one of the powers of the chair. They are free to make a motion to change the order of the vote but that motion will be decided by an at large vote which will most likely split 19-10 (the chair doesn't get a vote in this). Outraged, the Clinton camp calls for a ruling from the County Parlimentarian. We send two alternate delegates (one from each candidate) to contact the parlimentarian for a ruling. Things grind to a halt, the Clinton delegates are fuming, feeling the tyranny of the majority. I am uneasy about this but say nothing at the time wanting to see how it all plays out, but our little strategy has created some bad blood on the Clinton side towards us on the Obama side. The delegate position we are fighting over is less significant in my mind than the possbility of 10 Clinton voters not voting for Obama should he win the nomination.
The Chief Parlimentarian arrives listens to the problem and rules in favor of the precinct chairs right to call a vote in order of the chairs preference, rules that protest of the voting order is valid but settled by delegate vote. He is a Hillary supporter and sympathetic to their plight but everything is okay according to Robert's in practice if not spirit, nothing they can do.
We take the vote by roll call, Clinton delegates first, Obama second. It's a 3 way tie, 10 votes each between the 2 Obama delegates and the one Hillary candidate. We play the game of chance, final tally, our precinct sends one Obama and one Clinton delegate to the state convention. We are one of the last precincts to report our results.
Some people took off immediately, some lingered. I went over to the Clinton precinct captain to talk with her. I was curious what their strategy was. I praised her on her game, and let her know she had got the drop on us with the roll call vote. I told her I thought we should have had the roll call in a neutral order and asked her what their strategy was. "We're not stupid, we were always going to bloc vote for one delegate. We did think their was a slight chance one of your people might miss vote and give us a delegate." I told her our game plan and showed her the cheat sheet we had come up with for all of the various scenarios.
I decided to linger for a while and went back inside. I found the precinct chair filling out the paperwork for our vote. The process had left a bitter taste in his mouth also. While we had played technically by the rules we did go outside our ethics when it came to fair play. A couple of Clinton delegates from our precinct stopped by and dropped into the conversation.
Suddenly, it hit me. Here we were, all of us more alike then different, our disagreements on minor points. We started out as strangers on a train, got to know one another, and had all had a great time on this little trip we had taken together. Despite all of this we had got caught up in playing a game arguing over the rules that were meaningless given the outcome would have been the same no matter what.
I said to them, as well as to myself:
What is wrong with us. We all showed up by random chance at the same place and same time to strategize. We are all excellent game players and the best strategy to play this game was the same for both sides. Why couldn't we have all met as a single group, discussed the options, and come up with a scenario where we would have acted as a team to advance our individual interests? 10-10-10 and draw cards to see who goes to state.
Even supporting different candidates, we could have worked together, agreed to a fair resolution and ended up with the same results that we had reached as adversaries without the risk of poisoning the well.
That's the lesson learned.