From the "Delayed gratification" file.

Those of you who were able to resist attempting mischief in the Republican caucuses and thereby retained your eligibility for the Democratic caucuses can collect your reward this Sunday, as Washington Democrats begin the process of selecting 130 folks to represent us at the Democratic National Convention.

(It clicks a bunch bigger)

The main driver for caucus attendance is usually a hotly contested nomination race. This year there's no such motivation.  President Obama will be our nominee, and I fully expect our delegation to be unanimous in that regard. The nomination isn't the only question before the caucuses, though.  As the chart above shows, there is the opportunity at every level to move resolutions and platforms that reflect the principles and positions of the Democratic Party.  In that regard, this is where Washington Democrats can join the movement to include a marriage equality plank in the national platform.

I've already endorsed the language proposed by Freedom To Marry, but I'd happily settle for the language in our own 32nd Distict Democrats platform, which supports...

The right of every adult to marry the person of his or her choice without gender restrictions upon that choice, and to enjoy the same civil and legal rights accorded to all marriages.

Whatever the final language may be, it's time for the national platform to make our support for marriage rights explicit. Officials including the National Convention Chair, at least four former Democratic National Convention and a list of elected officials that includes our own Senator Patty Murray agree.

President Obama, I'm sorry to say, doesn't. Maybe I'm not such an Obamabot after all, but I don't think the Party should, as tradition would suggest, yield this plank of our platform to the nominee.  If he finds leading a Party committed to marriage equality uncomfortable, perhaps it's the irritant necessary to spur his evolution on the issue.  

I'll be caucusing Sunday afternoon, and running for delegate to the LD/County level with a pledge to support the nomination and re-election of President Barack Obama and the inclusion of explicit marriage equality language in the county, state and national platforms.  I'll be asking for a similar commitment from those who seek my vote for delegate to any level as the process advances.

Your precinct caucus is at 1:00 this Sunday afternoon.  If you don't know where, use the Washington State Democratic Party's caucus locator.  

From the "Since you asked…" file.

Steven Thomma of the McClatchy Newspapers can't help but wonder…

Is President Barack Obama worried about a surprise in the Democratic primary this January in New Hampshire?

Since you asked, Steven, no. I'd put White House confidence in the Democratic nomination at 100%, and they're 100% justified in that confidence.

Not even a nice try.

Dear Senator Sanders,

I'm a fan. You're great on the radio and you're right (that is, I agree with you) about many things. I'm glad you're a Senator and hope you keep your job as long as you want it.

That being said, you're not a member of my political party, and the business of nominating our presidential candidate is, therefore, none of your business. We can create all the trouble we can handle internally. Please don't feed the trolls.

Thanks,

Upper Left

From the "Time flies" file.

Barack Obama accepted the Democratic nomination for President two years ago today.

Oliver has video. Go get inspired again.

She's up, she's down…

…she's out, she's in.

Although Clinton had resisted pressure from donors, allies and supporters to accept demands to allow her name placed in nomination, she and aides to Obama seemed to realize independently that doing so would be the best way to incorporate and welcome Clinton's supporters into Obama's general election campaign, both symbolically and practically.

The resistance was, apparently, out of concern about how many of her 1896.5 elected delegates will, in fact, cast a Clinton vote for a roll call. I don't have any problem with her being nominated. When the '92 Clinton campaign tried to block Jerry Brown from nomination, declaring that he could not address the convention unless he withdrew his name and endorsed Bill before the balloting, I was among the delegates crowding the floor in protest. Our battle cry at the time was "Unity doesn't demand uniformity." In fact, the drive to achieve uniformity through unanimity in that contest was the most divisive element of the '92 convention. This will be better than that.

While the extended "will she, won't she" charade has been more irritating than amusing, now we know she will, and that's fine. I'm unconcerned, too, about the amount of time that will be devoted to all things Clintonian in the run-up to the ballot. I think there's sufficient political acumen between them for Bill and Hillary to understand that the only way to improve the damage done to the family brand during the primaries is to demonstrate uncompromising zeal for the nominee and a Democratic victory while on the conventions stage.

On with the show.

OK, then…

…maybe it was worth it. Obama campaign manager David Plouffe…

I am proud to announce that our presidential campaign will be the first in a generation to deploy and maintain staff in every single state.

The network of volunteers and the infrastructure built up during the historic primary season — on behalf of all the Democratic campaigns — have given us an enormous and unprecedented opportunity in the general election.

Of course, Obama won't win 50 states, but the down-ballot impact of a truly national campaign has huge potential for Democratic hopes for Congress, Governors and legislatures. If that turns out to be the legacy of an extended nominating process Hillary could turn out to be the Democratic MVP after all.

Classy.

Via georgia10...

On the heels of Senator Clinton's excellent speech today, the Obama camp has set up a thank-you page where you can leave a comments of support for her.

I do wonder, though, when some concern will be shown for Obama supporters. Grace in victory is a key to the unity we desire and require. A little humility in defeat equally so. Hillary seems to be doing her best on that score. Hopefully her most ardent supporters will quickly follow suit and credit our nominee with a victory well and honestly earned.

From the "Better late…" file.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Barack Obama effectively clinched the Democratic presidential nomination Tuesday...

True enough, if you're talking about a Tuesday in February. For all the complaints about the media tilt toward Obama, most coverage has seemed remarkably indulgent of the persistent Clinton spin that there's been significant doubt about the eventual outcome for some time. Granted, that indulgence has been granted largely for the media's own purposes - there's a big election news hole to fill between disappearing blondes and philandering athletes - but there it's been.

Complaints about misogyny in the coverage aren't unfounded, but when's the last time a primary candidate lost ten consecutive contests and was still lauded as a contender? Coverage is always a mixed bag, but sometimes bad press is just the inevitable result of a bad campaign, and at times the Clinton campaign has proven to be very bad indeed, squandering their opening advantages in cash, networking and recognition, delivering a progressively more muddled message that seems to have come down to "Hillary should win because she should," and possibly sacrificing decades of good will and influence in the Democratic Party by the time she comes to grips with a reality she has stubbornly refused to acknowledge as she's expanded her attack from her opponent to the institutional underpinnings of the Party itself.

Tonight Hillary will say something. Tomorrow she'll do something.

It doesn't matter.

It's done.

Well done.

OK…

…but what's the problem? Via The Democratic Strategist...

Key figures on the Rules Committee informally agreed by telephone Wednesday night to seat the entire Florida delegation based on the Jan. 29 primary, but to give them each only half a vote. The same principle would be applied to Michigan, but there are still unresolved complications over how to handle the "Uncommitted" delegates chosen in the Jan. 15 primary in which Barack Obama's name was not even on the ballot.

The uncommitted delegates don't need any quotation marks. Uncommitted delegates are a perfectly normal part of the Democratic nomination process, and they can (and should) be seated at the convention exactly as such. How the Michigan uncommiteds - who were elected to represent the people who didn't have a preferred candidate on the truncated Michigan ballot - cast their .5 votes should be completely up to them. They're not anybody's to assign.

Is anybody talking to these people? That's what delegates are, you know - people. Not digits on a vote tally. Not chess pieces to be shifted about strategically. They're people who were elected as, essentially, free agents. The fact is, most of them probably had a preference at the time they were elected, though some of them may have shifted allegiance since. It should be easy enough to poll the uncommitteds for pre-convention tally purposes. In any event, they should be seated as elected and should vote as they wish.

Complication resolved.

The Big Dog remembers...

"On April 7, we also won in Kansas, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. On April 9, Paul Tsongas announced that he would not reenter the race. The fight for the nomination was effectively over."

Hat tip to Political Wire.

Let's leave Kennedy out of it…

…because I'm willing to accept Hillary at her word. I assumed her intention was to emphasize the chronology of 1968, although those of us with long enough memories recognize that as an apple and oranges irrelevancy. The differences between the nominating process and the candidacies are glaring.

No, it's not the invocation of assasination that first caught my eye. It was the lies.

I find it curious. Because it is unprecedented in history. I don’t understand it. Between my opponent and his camp and some in the media there has been this urgency to end this. And historically, that makes no sense. So I find it a bit of a mystery.

(...)

My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right?

Wrong. And "unprecedented"? Well, let's look at that 1992 nomination. By the time of the California primary - during the first week of June, not "somewhere in the middle" - Bill Clinton had held a commanding plurality of delegates in an active three way race for months. In May, the second place candidate in the triumvirate, Paul Tsongas, had suspended his campaign. While it wasn't an expressed reason, DNC Chairman Ron Brown, a Clinton partisan, was making it clear that there would be no insurrection in New York City. No one who had not, at the time of the convention, endorsed the presumptive nominee, Bill Clinton, would be allowed to address the convention from the podium. That ruling, not his anti-choice views prevented Governor Casey from addressing the convention, and that ruling, Chairman Brown assured us, would apply to any candidate who had the temerity to be offered in nomination from the floor. It became the raison d'etre of the Jerry Brown campaign.

With no hope of the nomination in sight, we organized a battle for the soul of the Party, asserting our rights as delegates to place our candidate in nomination, and his right as a candidate and Party leader to address the convention. Readers of a certain vintage may remember the televised demonstrations on the floor featuring gagged delegates carrying "Let Jerry Speak!" signs (I remember Senator Moynihan taking great umbrage over our blocking the front row view of the NY VIPs.) We were, ultimately, successful on both scores, but imagine the furor today if Chairman Dean were to announce that unless she withdrew, Senator Clinton would be denied the podium.

At any rate, that's plenty of historical precedent for me on the subject of encouraging opponents to curb their campaigns. (the visit from Clinton 92's campaign manager, David Wilhelm, to the upper left to quell dissidents, well, that's another story, and yet another precedent…) I was there when those precedents were established, and so was Hillary. I don't believe for a moment that I remember the story or schedule of that campaign better that Hillary Clinton.

So her assassination gaffe? Explanation and apology tendered, explanation and apology accepted.

Now about those lies…

Amazing?

Matthew Dowd, via ABC News...

“What is amazing to me is that she has got a camp filled with DNC operatives. These are the people who essentially created the rules. She has been in the game a long time. It’s not as if she’s new to this and didn’t know better. Her campaign is run by the insiders who have been running the party for the past 16 years.”

Well, not to all of us, I suppose. True, though. And revealing.

Hat tip to Len at First Door On The Left.

Hillary in an nutshell…

…according to Aravosis.

Math is misogynist.

Seems to be the latest line, alright.

Yep.

TBogg...

America doesn't need a woman president any more than it needs a black president, a Mexican president, or a gay president. We don't need to prove anything to anyone, we don't need a trophy. We don't need to point out how far we have come as much as we need to decide how far we want to go. What we need is good president or two. That would suffice.

Personally, I think either Barack or Hillary would make a perfectly good President, particularly in light of the precedents. But which isn't the question anymore. We know which.

How, that's the question. Those 75,000 souls in Portland are part of the answer.

Pot…

…meet kettle.

Jerome Armstrong opens...

I don't even like to imagine an Obama nomination...

And closes…

The hatred of Clinton runs deep among the Obama supporters...

Who's hating on who here? And isn't it time we just knock it off?

I can certainly imagine, given only minor changes in the events of recent months, a Clinton nomination. In fact, I came started imagining it quite awhile ago. She's been running for years, and it wasn't all that long ago (though, notably, before any votes were counted) that she was seen as the inevitable nominee. How did I feel about that? She wasn't my favorite, but she'd be fine.

She's lost the nomination now, though, in the reality based universe Democrats like to say we live in. Lost it to someone who, frankly, wasn't my favorite, or even my second choice. But he's fine.

Since 1968, when I picked a candidate for the first time (I 'supported' Kennedy because Mom said so, and, well, everybody supported LBJ way back when) and got clean for Gene, until today, my first choice has won the Democratic nomination race three times - 1972, 1976 and 2004 - in eleven cycles, and I've been a Democrat, on the streets and in the ballot box, in all eleven. In the end, after the convention, they've all been fine.

There's always a way home, and all of us should do what we can now to make that path straighter and smoother. As the young folks say, it's time to chill. As the poet said, ain't no time to hate.

It's time to wake up, join up and get busy.

"The bottom line…

…for that Kerry fella?

"He clearly did more than he had to, and she did not achieve what she had to."

And there it is.

TO: Superdelegates

FROM: David Plouffe, Campaign Manager
RE: An Update on the Race for Delegates
DA: May 7, 2008

...With the Clinton path to the nomination getting even narrower, we expect new and wildly creative scenarios to emerge in the coming days. While those scenarios may be entertaining, they are not legitimate and will not be considered legitimate by this campaign or its millions of supporters, volunteers, and donors…

No, they aren't, and no, they won't, well, they shouldn't be, anyway. Kos has the whole memo.

The Pumpkinhead Primary.

According to Yglesias…

Tim Russert just said "we now know who the Democratic nominee is going to be."

Well, now he knows. Or admits, anyway. I coulda told him awhile back.

Yep.

Tim Noah, via Oliver…

Here’s a rule I would like every political reporter, campaign official, TV talking head, and politician in the United States to follow. Go ahead and say, if you like, that Hillary Clinton retains a serious chance of winning the Democratic nomination. If you say this, however, you must describe a set of circumstances whereby this could happen. Try not to make it sound like a fairy tale.

Sounds fair.

Yep.

Charlie Cook…

...you can’t change how the game is played once it has begun. The Democrats have decided that the nominee will be determined by the number of delegates won, not by the popular vote, and that primaries held in direct violation of party rules (in this case, Florida’s and Michigan’s) don’t count. End of discussion.

Rules are rules, and we can't be the Party of the rule of law, caretakers of a government of laws rather than of men, if we don't follow them.