photo via Paul J. Richards/Scanpix
Great piece from Paul Loeb:
Hillary Clinton is now campaigning in Florida and arguing that the state's delegates should count, along with those from the Michigan primary. This would sound fair enough, unless you know that both Michigan and Florida moved their primaries up after the Democrats agreed that the only states to vote before February 5th ("Super Tuesday") would be Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina (picked because they were relatively small states, representing different demographics). The Democratic Party agreed that votes from the two renegade primaries would not count. The major candidates made an explicit agreement not to campaign in either state. Florida law required that all candidates keep their names on, but Obama and Edwards pulled their names from the Michigan ballot.
Now Clinton is trying to change the rules mid-game. She's arguing that her delegates from Michigan should count after all. (Running essentially unopposed, and with a netroots campaign to get Democrats to cross over and vote for Romney, she still got only 55% of the vote, since 40% voted "uncommitted" and Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel -- and Chris Dodd, who'd already dropped out -- split the remaining 5%.) She's campaigning in Florida with a wink and a nod (doing closed talks and photo ops, not public rallies), while trying to get those delegates to count too. She seems to be banking on the hope that a Florida win, even if only symbolic, will erase Obama's momentum from his massive South Carolina victory.
via Paul Loeb at HuffPo
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