Democratic Election Results Convoluted

The Democratic insiders who built the Democratic primary process are convoluted.

First of all there are the Super Delegates. These are the "political insiders" who can hijack the election at any moment. The history of the super delegates goes back to the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago (that spawned rioting in Chicago). After the Chicago convention, the McGovern-Fraser Commission came up with a way to give a larger voice to the party's disenfranchised. Without the support of the Democratic partly leaders, the candidates didn't fair as well.

Needless to say the Democratic party elders didn't like their influence on the party stripped from them. In response, in the early 80's the Democratic party leaders took back control of the party. It as if the Democratic party leaders have determined that, in the end, the partly leaders will pick the candidate for the Democratic party because they know what is best for the Democratic party. Shaky logic at best.

This means that at the moment, although Hillary Clinton is behind Barack Obama by 101 delegates, depending on how the super delegates go, Clinton could be ahead of Obama as early as tomorrow if some of the super delegates would just switch their vote. Georgia congressman, John Lewis, was a super delegate for Hillary Clinton...until he was a super delegate for Obama.

While the super delegates can vote for who they want on a a whim, the entire Democratic population of Florida and Michigan don't get a single vote (that counts), delegate or say in the Democratic primary election. Their states Democratic party moved up their primary and the Democratic National Committee decided to punish them by taking away their delegates.

Finally, there is the distribution of delegate in the Democratic primary. Obama beats Clinton in Vermont by 3200 votes and gains 3 delegates over Clinton. Clinton beats Obama by 28,000 votes in Ohio and only gains 9 delegates over Obama. While in Texas Clinton beats Obama by nearly 100,000 votes and gained only 4 delegates over Obama! To add insult to injury, Obama will probably win the Texas Caucus (only state in the country where you can caucus and vote) and gain more delegates overall than Clinton in Texas even though Clinton beat Obama by a 51% to 47 % in the popular vote.

In the long run the danger for the Democratic party is that if the race ends exceedingly close as it is now, there will be a lot of "what ifs" the losing side will be able to ask along with all their disenchanted voters. Disenchanting half of the party is no way to go into the general election.