Clinton Camp wants to Disenfranchise 2 Million People

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Wednesday May 28, 2008 · 9:38 PM PDT

2008/05/28 · 21:38

Take it easy on me folks, this is only my second diary...Thanks for reading!!!

Much ado has been made about Michigan and Florida for breaking the rules of the DNC, and how we should settle the delegate dilemma. Hillary Clinton wants the votes to count that were held pre-maturely, as-is, claiming it would disenfranchise 2.5 million voters.

However, there were many people who did not vote because they were told their votes wouldn't count anyway (even by Senator Clinton herself). Do we just say "screw them"? According to the Clinton campaign, that's exactly what we should do...

Studies and polls have shown as many as 2 million voters stayed home and did not bother to vote in the Michigan and Florida primaries because they were told the vote didn't count for anything anyway.

Based on a statistical comparison with turnout in other states' primaries, it appears that roughly two million more people would have voted in Florida and Michigan had they expected their delegates to be seated.
Although the Democratic turnout rate was impressive in Florida and Michigan, it was not nearly as high as it has been in other primaries so far. Of the first 37 states that have held either a primary or caucus for both Republicans and Democrats, only six states have had a larger turnout for Republicans than for Democrats: Florida and Michigan, plus heavily Republican Alaska, Alabama, and Utah, as well as Arizona, where many voters turned out to support home state favorite John McCain. In many other states, Democratic voters outnumbered Republican voters by at least 3 to 2. Simply stated, in states where Democratic voters expected their delegates to count and the candidates spent time and money campaigning, Democratic turnout has vastly exceeded Republican turnout. The fact that Republicans outnumbered Democrats in Florida and Michigan suggests that many would-be Democratic voters in those states chose not to vote at a much higher rate than in other states.

Are these voters less important than ones that the Hillary Clinton campaign are "fighting for"? Is this the way that all the votes of Michigan and Florida are counted? If HRC will only fight for half of the voters in Michigan and Florida, will she only fight for half of us?

They say, again and again, that the people who bothered to come out and vote can't be ignored, and deserve to have their voices heard. But an election only has meaning if it's a fair reflection of the voices of all those entitled to be heard.
So what about the people who didn't vote? Of 4.1 million registered Democrats in Florida, for instance, only 1.7 million voted. The rest of them -- 2.4 million -- were told the election didn't count. Presumably, that influenced a bunch of them to not vote.

Now, if you switch around and count the votes, you put the party in the position of having essentially lied to 2.4 million registered Democrats in Florida, tricked them out of having their voices heard. Why are the people who ignored the party more deserving than the people who took the party at its word?

Any way you cut it, if you count the outcome, you've stolen the votes of an even larger number of Democrats by misleading them.

So the HRC campaign wants the people who listened to the Democratic party and the candidates (HRC herself) and did not vote to be penalized over the people who went ahead and voted.

My husband and I support Sen. Barack Obama, but we didn't vote for him in the Florida primary because the DNC said the vote would not count.
-Tomasina Galanti, Ormond Beach, Florida

Yet many people, like me and my entire family, stayed away from the polls that day because there was no compelling reason to make the effort.
-David T. Young, Michigan

So according to the Clinton campaign we should disenfranchise Mr. & Mrs. Galanti, Mr. Young, and 2 million other voters in Michigan and Florida because they followed the guidance of the DNC and the words of Hillary herself.