Tee hee hee...

:-)

Barack Obama’s stirring victory in Iowa was also a good night for our democracy. The turnout broke records and young people – who were mobilized and organized – participated in unprecedented numbers. And now that Iowans have spoken – the first citizens in the nation to do so – here’s the Democratic delegate count for the top three candidates (2,025 delegates are needed to secure the nomination):

Clinton – 169

Obama – 66

Edwards – 47

“Huh?” you say. “vanden Heuvel, you made a MAJOR typo.”

In fact, those numbers are correct: the third-place finishing Sen. Hillary Clinton now has over twice as many delegates as Sen. Obama, and more than three times as many delegates as the second-place candidate, Sen. John Edwards. Why? Because the Democratic Party uses an antiquated and anti-democratic nominating system that includes 842 “super-delegates” – un-pledged party leaders not chosen by the voters, free to support the candidate of their choice, and who comprise more than forty percent of the delegates needed to win the nomination. Many have already announced the candidate they will support.

In a clear attempt to protect the party establishment, this undemocratic infrastructure was created following George McGovern’s landslide defeat in 1972. It was designed to prevent a nominee who was “out of sync with the rest of the party,” Northeastern University political scientist William Mayer told MSNBC. Democratic National Committee member Elaine Kamarck called it a “sort of safety valve.”

http://cashewlib.wordpress.com/2008/01/05/superdelegates-are-super-fucking-stupid/


Short victory for Obama I'd say...

Obama had all of those voters show up, and in the end, he ended up with less delegates. Even though he was the winner of the most delegates.

delegates to the county convention will vote on delegates to the district/state convention and THEY will vote on delegates to the national convention (and those are the only delegates that count) :crazy: Most folks shift with the winner of the caucuses and by June Obama will receive all the delegates, so the count you see now is only a soft count and will change in March, April and June.

The more I learn, the more confused I become.

Superdelegates aren't solid pledges - they can move from candiate to candiate throughout the primary process. Those folks were pledged with Clinton before the caucuses, but wait and see how they shift after New Hampshire and after Nevada and so on. By the time the National Convention hits they'll all be with the highest delegate winner and pretend they were there all along (kind of like Biden's NH supporters who took all of 24 hours to jump ship).

I don't have a horse in the race, remember?

are shifting sands not hard counts. They'll change as soon as the county conventions occur in March.

lined up with Howard Dean initially and then dumped him as he lost contest after contest. They're so flighty...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18277678/