Clinton's Ace in the Hole

Here's an interesting read: "Hillary Clinton's Superdelegate 'Firewall'" courtesy of Sean Gonsalves at Alternet. In short, don't think that just because Barack Obama is ahead in the primaries that he will necessarily win the Democratic Party nomination for President of the United States. Hillary Clinton might get the nomination, partly through the efforts of superdelegates voting for her at the party convention at the end of August this year, and the irony here is how essentially undemocratic the idea really is. Normal delegates are supposed to be locked into their votes - there isn't really anything stopping them from being able to vote for whoever they want to, but the whole point of primary elections is to get a certain number of pledged votes at the convention (through the delegates) for the presidential contender. It is very bad form for normal delegates to vote for anyone other than who they are pledged to, which is why most delegates don't do that. Superdelegates, on the other hand, are officially unpledged; that is, they can vote any damn way they please. Essentially, this is a political machine; this encourages candidates to kiss the asses of those prominent Democrats whose support they need, and ensures that nobody gets nominated that the elite party leadership does not approve of (as happened with Jimmy Carter in 1976). This is where Clinton has the advantage; many superdelegates are politicians (including former President Bill Clinton, former Vice President Al Gore, and former President Jimmy Carter) with some of whom she has established relationships. So, Hillary Clinton has a major advantage because of her political experience at the federal level. Obama unfortunately does not have this advantage, being a first term senator who has been involved in politics at the federal level for many less years than Clinton has.

I'm not saying that I buy into the idea of a Clinton nomination as inevitable, which I'm sure the mainstream media is going to start hyping up again, once the superdelegate issue really starts to take off in the nightly televised newscasts. Still, Obama is going to have to win really big in the upcoming primaries to have a true advantage at the convention. Those of you supporting Obama are going to have to step it up to counter the Clinton advantage with the superdelegates.