Recently there have been a large number of stories in DailyKos and some in other outlets about super delegates. This story is an attempt to discuss some of the aspects of the vilification and demonization of super delegates. It is an attempt to look beyond the immediate unjustified fears of super delegates stealing nomination process for presidential candidate of Democratic party.
Some alleged and real Bernie Sanders supporters are pre-maturely exhibiting fear that super delegates will steal the nomination and deliver it to Hillary Clinton. This did not happen in 2008. It will not happen in 2016. Whether or not we individually like Debbie Wasserman Schultz is irrelevant. Implications of this planted fear and supposed treachery is being fuelled by Republicans who very well understand the benefits the Republicans reap by making the Democratic Party vilify itself.
First we need to understand exactly who and what are the super delegates. The super delegates are people we have already elected in various elections. Let us look through the various groups of the delegates.
- They are party members in Senate and Congress. We have elected these people as nominees for those seats and subsequently elected them in general election. These are not some hidden cabal and conspirators. These are people fully known to us and represent us in their roles.
- They are the state party chairs/vice-chairs/officers. These again we elected them to mange, run and organize state party and its activities.
- State representatives to the DNC. These are again the people we elected to represent our specific state at the DNC. They participate in the DNC at our behest and make/agree/push policies on our Behalf.
- State governors. Again we elected them to enact, progress and govern under Democratic party platform.
- Current and Former Party Leaders (president/vice-president, senate party leader, house party leader, speakers of house, DNC chairs). These are all people we have elected and entrusted to implement, progress, govern under the Democratic Party platform at the highest levels of respective segment of governance. They have pushed our agenda at the forefront, fought rearguard action against erosion.
All these people falling under different groups have been voted into their offices by us. And because we have entrusted them with their duties and to bring a cohesion to overall agenda we have organized the party thus. Bulk of them are involved in day to day running of party at state levels or national levels. Others are involved in national legislative agenda. These people are the very thread amongst us who have held fast and maintained the party infrastructure. They constitute the skeleton around which we flesh out our party. All of them have been elected by us. They are super delegates in their secondary capacity of fulfilling their primary roles.
This infrastructure of the party, which operates not only in the four-year cycles of presidential elections but also in all other years and all the time. If we are unhappy with these people, we can replace them with others from within the party and many many times we have done so. The super delegates and their participation in national convention which adopts the policy platforms for the party is a good thing. We can not have a national convention where we decide the party platform but not include the very people we have elected to enact and progress the party agenda.
The process of national conversation and path finding, the mechanism of submission, discussion and adoption of policies is our national convention. The people we send to these are either we elect them as presidential nomination process delegates or people we have already elected to fulfil other duties amongst which one of them is participation in national convention. When we elect a senator, we are also electing a member of the national convention, when we elect state party chair we are electing members of the national convention, when we elect a DNC member we are electing member of the national convention. A secondary duty of these people we have elected is our expectation and demand that they participate in the national conversation about the party. Let us not pretend that we did not elect them and they are are not elected.
So the people responsible for maintaining state parties, people we have chosen to oversee the processes of pushing forward local and state level agenda, people we have entrusted with pushing our goals on all fronts of state elections, local elections are the super delegates. They are super delegates because we demand it of them, they are super delegates because they are in the positions we have put them in in order to progress and facilitate the party agenda. These are the very backbone, the very skeleton, the infrastructure we have built for ourselves to promulgate our policies. These are the people we have asked to push forward where possible and fight back where necessary for our agenda.
Any attacks on them, any vilification and demonization of them is an attempt by saboteurs and republicans. This is an attempt to get our party to self-immolate. This is an attempt by the enemies to dismantle the very infrastructure we need in order to fight all the local and state elections. This is Republican agenda to make us harm ourselves to the point that party disintegrates its functioning capacity. That results directly in losses in local and state elections. Republicans know very well that this is how they can capture state and local governments. The benefit is not for the our party and our agenda. The benefit is for the Republican party agenda where they chip away and strike us and our progress at every local and state government thereby effectively nullifying any legislative progress we might have made at federal level. Point example, how many states have not yet adopted ACA. All the off year elections and the on year elections and we loose a lot worse if we devour our super delegates and the party infrastructure they represent.
If we do not like our super delegates, we can change them{except for the 20 odd former president/vice-president/party leaders}. We have robust party election process for these. Participate in local party levels, state party levels, contest a seat at the DNC. But let us not be duped into accepting the Republican agenda and destroy the very binding that holds our party together. This is how we suffer loss at state elections, federal elections. The super delegates are what we have elected and the heartbeat of our party that keeps the party alive during the desolate time. This supposed fear and vilification and demonization is long term Republican election agenda. It will help neither Hillary Clinton nor Bernie Sanders. It is more important than both of them, as it impacts state government and legislatures. It will only help Republicans.
Let us not fall victim to falsehood and chop our own legs.
Monday, Feb 15, 2016 · 5:18:27 PM +00:00
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Torilahure
A little bit of background about election stealing and back room deals:
The last back room deal in nomination election was in 1968 when Hubert Humphrey “stole” an election with help of previous apparatus and rule without having been through the primary process. The new rules were put into place to prevent such things happening again.
Since the adoption of new format of DNC and super delegates and nation convention, the Super Delegates have never reversed, revised, countered, stolen.