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| FOXX TO SANDERS FANS: 'You big dummies!' |
It’s
downright superficial. It doesn’t mean a thing. When it comes to the process
that Iowa and New Hampshire have already performed (and which Illinois will
undergo March 15), it’s who you pick for the delegates to the nominating
convention that matters.
NOTHING
ELSE! NADA!
Those
votes you cast on your ballot for the actual name of a candidate? Although fun
to do, it was a waste of your time.
And
if you are some sort of politically-unaware numbskull who only cast your ballot
for the presidential candidate and chose to ignore all that political gibberish
about delegates, then you really accomplished nothing.
For
it is the delegates who go to the presidential nominating conventions and
actually pick who gets to be on the ballot for the November general election.
Although in all honesty, by the time the conventions come about, the outcome is
so preordained that they really are a formality.
THE
EQUIVALENT OF a political pep rally – only with people wearing all sorts of
donkey and elephant paraphernalia and most definitely not with teams of
scantily clad cheerleaders on the sidelines. (Whether there are scantily-clad
women hanging around the delegates hotel rooms is a question for a different
day’s commentary).
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| CLINTON: Will her lead grow? |
To
me, all of this is incredibly obvious. I remember back in 2008 when I attempted
to write a commentary making a presidential endorsement of sorts, I began by
highlighting the names of the delegates from my congressional district who were
committed to Barack Obama.
Because
that was the way to ensure that the Democrats would pick Barack over Hillary
Clinton’s presidential bid – which had the same air of inevitability that
fizzled out the same as she appears to be weakening in the presence of Bernie
Sanders, the U.S. senator from Vermont who goes about bearing the “Socialist”
tag with a sense of pride.
But
Hillary isn’t politically dead by any means – and this delegate issue is the
very reason why.
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| SANDERS: The N.H. winner -- Not really! |
CLINTON
MAY HAVE not been the choice of New Hampshire voters any more than Coca-Cola
was NOT the “choice of a new generation.” But she took most of that state’s
super-delegates (there are two who are so wishy-washy they won’t commit to
anyone).
Which
is why after Iowa and New Hampshire, it is Clinton – 42/Sanders – 36. And in
many of the states coming up in the near future, it will be the establishment
Dems likely to make sure all those snot-nosed, punk kids know their love for
Bernie won’t mean much.
It
is likely that the Clinton delegate lead will continue to grow, no matter how
many people are likely to want to make Hillary “feel the Bern.” Actually, by
the time the process gets to Illinois, it may not matter much what we think.
We
may have a pre-ordained outcome. No matter how many people rant and rage about
how New Hampshire could be a “tie” for Clinton and Sanders even though Bernie
took about 60 percent of the popular vote.
SUPER-DELEGATES
CAN be a fickle batch, because they’re usually the party regulars who have no
interest in people who think the process itself (which they have made the
effort to master) is the problem – and that if we’d only get rid of the rules, we'd be better off.
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| TRUMP: Whiners bigger than Bernie's |
Then again, it’s also why I consider Donald Trump on the Republican side to be the ultimate political buffoon – making his way to appeal to people who think we win only if the system is gamed in their favor.
Their
idea of “revolution” strikes me as being the equivalent of the whiny kid who,
realizing he’s about to lose playing Monopoly, decides to knock the game board
flying in the air while ranting about how unfair those rules are.
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