THE PLANK APRIL 29, 2008
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Electoral reform maven Rick Hertzberg has a long, informative but inconclusive post about the fight for the popular vote in the Democratic primary. The one criticism I'd make is that he too readily concedes the fairness of adding the Florida and Michigan votes to Hillary Clinton's totals. As we know, neither candidate campaigned in either state, and Obama did not appear on the ballot in Michigan. Hertzberg argues that the fair thing would be to count most of the "uncommitted" vote in Michigan for Obama, but that still doesn't quite balance the scale. The candidate whose supporters have to figure out that "uncommitted" is the best expression of their preference is obviously at an enormous disadvantage.
Now, I'll concede that completely excluding Michigan and Florida isn't perfectly fair, either. Clinton surely would have won Florida under normal conditions. On the other hand, her margin would very likely have dropped, as it has everywhere the two candidates have campaigned. And I strongly doubt Clinton would have won Michigan under normal conditions by the margin she prevailed over "uncommitted," or even at all. Her margin in Michigan exceeded her margin in Ohio. But Michigan (my native state) has a higher black population than Ohio, and a different political culture. Michigan is more of an upper-Northwest state, while Ohio has significant numbers of Southern-Appalachian "Jacksonian" Democrats. If they held a re-vote in Michigan, I'd bet on Obama. (Unlike Florida, where Clinton would be the clear favorite.)
So, if you really want to gauge the overall sentiment of the Democratic electorate, you'd have to count Florida and Michigan but severaly discount Clinton's margin there -- indeed, I'd probably exclude Michigan altogether. Exactly how much to discount them, I couldn't say.
I think the overall takeaway point is that there are lots of problems with tabulating the popular vote in the primary. The fact that caucus states produce far fewer votes than primary states is another severe distorting influence. At best, the popular vote is a very rough and approximate measure.
--Jonathan Chait
6 comments
Excluding Michigan and Florida is punishing the Democratic voters of those two states for the sins of Democratic party functionaries.
The Democratic Party of all organizations, after eight years waving the bloody shirt of Florida 2000, ought to be going out of its way to "make every vote count".
Instead, the Party has hardly lifted a finger to find a way to provide for a re-vote in both those states. Pretty much exposing the Democratic Party's base hypocrisy.
No one is obligated to pay any attention to the Democratic party in the future when it brays about a vote for every voter.
- ChanRobt
April 29, 2008 at 11:25am
Although I respect Hendrik Hertzberg's writing as I do yours Jon I have to say that I am amazed at how everyone has fallen for this Clinton campaign ruse. By continually dissecting and analyzing the ex-post impact of not seating Florida and Michigan as well as discussing whether the popular vote is a better way determining the nominee, you as well as many others have given credibility to their arguments. They turn from completely compromised and subjective opinions from a campaign to serious political discussion points. This is so Rovian; Pose an argument ridiculous on its face but harp on it and badger the media until it becomes a point/counterpoint issue on every political news show. The simple fact as you, I , the Clinton campaign and almost everyone in America knows is that the total delegate count passing a particular threshold is what will determine the nominee to the party. Not popular votes, not states won, not primaries won, not "battleground states" won, not womens votes won, not African-American votes won and not even the numerous polls on electability. If any of these were the desired metric the Democratic Party should have determined this beforehand.
The idea behind the superdelegates, as I understand it, was initiated in order to avoid a Democratic candidate who was so undesirable and unelectable from gaining the nomination despite winning a majority but non-threshold crossing amount of pledged delegates that the party could intervene and overturn this for the best of the party. This is not, i repeat not, the issue involved this year. If anything, the issue is that we have two very desirable candidates from an electablility point of view and this has simply split the party. Obama would not be a disaster nor would Clinton. What is a disaster is how the Clinton campaign's attempt to turn Obama into a disaster has damaged both candidates. But even this is not irreversible. The majority of Democrats will coalesce around the party's nominee and given the new registration numbers from the primaries and caucuses, due no doubt to these two "disasterous" candidates, the nominee will win in November.
This is not a secret, I suspect the Clinton campaign believes this as well. It is only their disingenuousness and the media's gullability that keep this game of constantly shifting goalposts alive.
- mpintar2
April 29, 2008 at 12:40pm
"Michigan is more of an upper-Northwest state, while Ohio has significant numbers of Southern-Appalachian "Jacksonian" Democrats."
Disagree. Any state that can produce Ted Nugent, Kid Rock, and Tom "Domino's" Monaghan is not part of the "upper Northwest".
Seriously, the Dee-troit and SE Michigan radio market has as many country music listeners as all of Ohio put together. There were probably as many white redneck as afr-amer southerners who came up north to work in the Rouge Plant and the other auto factories after the war.
- teplukhin2you
April 29, 2008 at 2:37pm
Disinformation for chanrobt, as ever. The man is a Republican and a McCain voter. His "advice" to the Democratic party should be understood in that light.
- roidubouloi
April 29, 2008 at 10:07pm
Didn't we talk about this already?? Didn't Michelle Cottle ban talking about it again?
- psantillana
April 30, 2008 at 1:42am
The only way to count Florida and Michigan is to run a free and fair election in those two states. Not an election in which one candidate is missing from the ballot, nor an election in which one candidate with a "name" advantage can scoop up votes that might have been contested if the candidates were permitted to campaign there. Why would anyone count such tainted votes?
Florida and Michigan deliberately fouled the water - now they want us to drink it. I say, fuck Florida and Michigan.
Neil
- purcellneil
April 30, 2008 at 9:15am