Let me make sure I have my facts straight first.
Republican majority Florida legislature sets their primary date too early despite warnings of delegate loss (at least half) from both parties. Republican delegates are cut in half*, Dem's go above and beyond the minimum punishment in the party rules and bars all delegates. DNC asks candidates to not campaign in the state and none do. DNC asks candidates to remove their names from the ballots, none do because Clinton didn't in Michigan. Voters go to the polls and vote; every voter in the Democratic presidential primary was disenfranchised. The primary turns out to be very close. The voters of Florida would really like their votes to count. The state democratic party wants a re-vote, the legislature says the state won't/can't pay for. (I don't know as much about what happened in or what they are thinking about doing in Michigan, so I won't discuss it here.)
I understand that politics is often not pretty and that republicans were not the only people to vote for the new primary date and there was no particular reason to think the state would lose all it's delegates from either party.(Also, I see no reason why this couldn't have happened with a democratic legislature and/or the GOP, it just happens it didn't.) I understand that the moving of the date may have been a protest of the rules that make the early states always the early states. It may have also been attempt at snagging more campaign dollars, the two aren't mutually exclusive.
Do I have all that basically right? Then two questions: Why, since the legislature created the problem by thumbing their noses at both parties, can they not help find a solution? And why did the DNC decide to cut all of Florida's (and Michigan's) delegates anyway?
Also, is Florida having another vote for other primaries and/or other things later like Alabama?
*not the actual delegates that would be very messy and counter productive, you need them alive at the convention, the number of delegates
*Fixed the state. Swear I knew that, don't know why I had Wisconsin on the brain. Other than apparently I can spell Wisconsin but not Michigan.*
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About Me
- Marciepooh
- I was transplanted here from Virginia to finish high school. While I can't believe I used to drive on the Washington beltway there are some things I still miss about the 'burbs.
1 comment:
Other than it's Michigan, not Wisconsin, I think you have the lead-up basically right. When the decision was made to strip the states of their delegates, no one could have predicted that the race would be this close. The legislator doesn't want to pay, and the taxpayers certainly don't, even if they want their vote to count. The DNC stripped all the delegates because all the states has agreed to the rules, and then some states broke the rules anyway.
I think the timeline rules are stupid, definitely. But I also don't think that FL and MI shouldn't have a say in the primary. What's really going to get me, though, is if the Dem nomination (and most likely pres) comes down to a court battle, in FLORIDA.
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