For those who haven't been been watching, Mr. Super has posted a FL/MI timeline detailing the back and forth of the MI and FL moving up their primary dates. It's really fascinating to read, as he's updated a whole bunch this morning.
I'll extract just a couple of things that I found of note in there, but it does really help to shed some light on things.
Mr. Super (yes yes I know, we all know who he is now, but we still like calling him that ;) ) starts today off with quoting an article from the Washington Post, simply stating that (as we all know), that the crying over MI/FL didn't begin until after their primaries were finished and their votes needed by the Clinton Camp.
Then if you go on to reading the actual timeline, he shows us quite a few things that have happened:
Jan. 19, 2002: Michigan Senator Carl Levin testifies before the DNC and asks for a rule change to break the lock that New Hampshire has had on the presidential nominating process. The DNC unanimously votes him down.
February, 2003: Michigan Democrats call DNC Chair Terry McAuliffe to inform him that they will move their primary date up to coincide with New Hampshire. Participants on the call include Senator Carl Levin, Congressman John Dingell and DNC member Debbie Dingell. McAuliffe, who had also previously supported changing the primary calendar, states that he can not support Michigan because he is bound to uphold the rules of the DNC.
So, this already started back in 2002, this whole plan of changing MI's primary date.
Then, as you can read the timeline yourself, there's a whole lot of state back and forth with Florida jumping into the fray. But here's where things get really interesting as far as I'm concerned:
June 15, 2007: DNC Chairman Gov. Dean met with members of the Florida congressional delegation.
June 27, 2007: Michigan submits state legislation to move its primary up to January, 2008.
July-early August, 2007: Discussions between DNC and FDP officials continue. The DNC develops a proposed State Party-run caucus system, with congressional district caucuses to take place after February 5, 2008. This system fully complies with the DNC’s Rules and affords an opportunity for all Florida Democrats to vote for the Democratic presidential nominee. The DNC offered to pay approximately $880,000 to implement the caucus system.
This whole concept of the the Clinton campaign that the DNC is "disenfranchising" voters, is clearly crap. The DNC, and most notable, Gov. Dean worked very hard during these 5 years to make sure that Florida and Michigan would be within compliance, even so far as to offer helping to pay for a caucus.
It then goes on to show why the candidates (with exception of Hillary) removed their names from MI, but not from FL in this Politico Article
I bring up the Politico article simply because I keep hearing from Hillary supporters of how Sen. Obama did not remove his name from there. Well, he couldn't, if he hoped to be on the GE ballot, that's Florida law, not DNC.
I thought it was extremely interesting (if dry) reading), and it helps if you're talking to Hillary supporters and they bring up these points, that you can actually understand the entire timeline.
Happy day everyone :)
P.S. - If I didn't get my tags right, well, it's first diary, so don't yell too much!