She's worried that the so-called "super-delegates" will decide the nominee. There are 795 "super-delegates"--office holders, mainly, as well as some party functionaries--who can vote for whomever they want. "If 795 of my colleagues decide this election, I will quit the Democratic Party. I feel very strongly about this," Donna Brazile told CNN this week. Currently, Hillary has about a 60 vote lead among super-delegates, although most of them have yet to make a choice.
We got super-delegates in the first place as a reaction to the "McGovern rules" of 1972. After 1968, there was an effort to make the nomination process more democratic by taking power away from establishment politicians and giving more of it to the people through caucuses and primaries. McGovern, who crafted the rules, was the prime beneficiary of them. He won the nomination in 1972 through a "people-powered" campaign that overwhelmed local party establishments. Carter did it again in 1976.
The idea of "super-delegates" was to re-assert at least some influence by party office-holders and functionaries. Currently, about 19% of the total delegates are in this category. It makes some sense, actually. Office-holders, after all, have to run on the ticket with the party's nominee, and, arguably, they should have a little extra influence.
There is a bit of a move for the super-delegates to be bound to support the candidate who won in their particular state. This is mainly coming from the Obama campaign, and such a move would disproportionally benefit Obama. In other words, there will be a move to change the rules to diminish the influence of super-delegates. I'm OK with that, provided we also change the rules regarding Michigan and Florida.
Donna Brazile, incidentally, was the campaign manager for President Al Gore, and is a "super-delegate" to the 2008 Democratic Convention.
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