The Democratic race for the White House was
supposed to be finished on February 5th of this year. The American people were
supposed to know who would be they'd be choosing between this coming November. Yet, here we are at the beginning of May and we
still have no Democratic nominee and the party is in a deadlock.
Neither Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton can clinch the 2,025 delegates needed to win the nomination in the remaining primaries. This leaves everyone involved in the process of electing the nominee in an interesting situation. Do the so called "Super delegates" vote for who is the leader in the elected delegates at the time, or do they cast their votes for the candidate they believe will do the best job against John McCain in the general election. Either way the Democratic party is taking a big risk. If you go one way, they run the risk of losing the general election with a weaker candidate. If they go the other way, they may get a major backlash from voters for not going along with their votes.
One major thing seems to have fallen from the minds of the Democratic party, except for Clinton. Michigan's and Florida's delegates are not being counted because they went against the DNC's rules and held their primaries earlier than they were supposed to. However, if those two states are counted as they voted, the junior senator from New York is suddenly leading the charismatic senator from Illinois in the popular vote! People will argue that Obama was not on the ballot in Michigan and didn't campaign in Florida because it was agreed upon that the states would not count. Then again, that decision was made with the mindset that they wouldn't count in the first place because Super Tuesday was going to wrap up the nomination!
So, here is what needs to be done in order to ensure a fair nomination. Both states need to hold new primaries. The DNC and the states split the cost and everyone gets to re-vote. Its a fair deal for everyone, especially the Democratic voters in those states.
If you choose to discount Michigan, you are ignoring the votes of 590,000+ Democrats and 157 delegates. Without Florida you're overlooking 1.6 million votes and 211 delegates.
These two states are too important to not count! We as a nation have witnessed the importance of these kinds of states; Florida in particular. Count all 50.
Count them or seriously consider the fact there will be a Republican living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in January 2009.
