Today the Democratic National Committee’s Rules sub-committee will meet to rule on the status of Florida and Michigan’s delegates. There is speculation that a compromise will be put forward and Obama will accept it and most likely Clinton will not. In a game of chess, it is time for Clinton to lay her king on its side.
The focus on who will be the Democratic nominee tends to overlook the actual closeness of the race between Obama and Clinton, two qualified and popular candidates. There is spit separating their popular vote especially when you consider the total votes cast (and even more if you could figure in those that were instead channeled into caucus voting. The delegate situation is a total puzzle. Some States were winner take all, others were winner take your share only, and in a few like Texas, it was take a share that reflects some previous voting pattern and not the current election. It should be clear that for Americans to understand this process, Democrats should adopt a more straight forward method.
I can understand the strength of Hillary’s argument and in fact she should win the Presidential election if she gets nominated. For Obama, the story is the same and by most assessments he is narrowly ahead in the delegate count and by the “rules” should be the winner. This is the hard pill for Hillary. America has always advertised itself as a country that plays by the rules, for example, baseball, and it is time for the primary race to end and the delegates to decide.
It will be a shame and truly a mistake if Hillary forces the nomination decision to wait until Convention.