40% of the delegates needed to clinch Democratic nomination won't be selected by primary voters.

By Tom Curry
National affairs writer
MSNBC
Updated: 31 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - It’s fine entertainment to watch Sen. Hillary Clinton warbling the National Anthem in Iowa or Sen. Barack Obama getting a hero’s welcome from zealous Democrats in New Hampshire last December.

But the meeting of the Democratic National Committee this Friday and Saturday here in Washington eclipses those events in significance.

Here’s why: Each of the DNC members is a “super-delegate” with a vote at the Democratic National convention which will nominate the party’s 2008 presidential candidate.

While Mark and Molly Democrat in Peterborough, N.H. can vote in their state’s presidential primary next year, they themselves do not have a vote at the Democratic convention. They vote for a slate of delegates pledged to Clinton or one of the other Democratic contenders.

But each of the DNC members does have a vote at the convention.

In fact, the super-delegates — a category that includes all DNC members and elected officials such as Democratic governors and members of Congress — account for nearly 40 percent of the total number of delegates needed to clinch the nomination.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16926533/

The Democratic Party would be invigorated if the decisions as to who to to nominate were left up to the citizenry, not a bunch of party officials.

Not too terribly democratic, is it?

even walked into the room. A real joke, but not very funny.

can't have that. The money boys have a much better idea who we should run.

The fact is that the presumptive nominee locks up enough delegates for the nomination far before the convention and therefore the Super Delegates are just ceremonial.

If you want to complain about how un-democratic the primaries are, focus on how now candidates need to raise $100 million before the Iowa Caucus to be considered "viable" due to the front loaded system.

Unfortunately, if the Congress doesn't kill such legislation (either by a few pro-big donor Democrats killing it in committee, or by a Republican filibuster) then Bush or the SCOTUS will.

And starting in 2008 it's very possible nobody will take it in the general election, either. The problem is that the amount of money candidates can raise and are expected to raise each cycle goes up but the matching funds stay the same.

We could raise the matching funds, but the public hates the idea that more of their tax money is going to campaigning. Forcing spending caps was deemed unconstitutional by the SCOUTS in 1974 (I believe) and isn't likely to be overturned by this court. One thing we could do is lower the individual contribution limit significantly like to say $500 but that will be difficult when a presumptive nominee starts competing with the Republicans, especially against an incumbent President.

Campaign finance reform is a huge mess and so far, short of constitutional amendments, nobody has figured out a perfect solution. In an ideal world we could get constitutionally mandated spending caps.

Is that in the event of a brokered convention, the super-delegates could bolt for Gore (I'm assuming that he won't run for the primaries.) And if that happens, it will be the first time since 1968 where the primaries are irrelevant.

It would be so cool.:beer:

it would be very hard to bring everyone back together to vote for the nominee.

And by not running during the primaries, he can stay "above the fray." Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if the GOP has the same result. Giuliani, McCain or Romney don't excite the party base, but many of Bush's corporate donors will give to them instead of Brownback or Huckabee or Tancredo.

Also, another reason why I think he should put off announcing now is because he was part of the Apple board that exonerated Steve Jobs from the stock options issue. If there's an investigation, you'll have the RW and MSM asking "Did Al Gore cover up Steve Jobs' stock options scandal?" I'd rather wait until we find out what happens.

would likely lead to one of the candidates who ran getting nominated. I don't think Gore has any interest in running for President right now.