Harold Ickes' parting shot suggests more Democratic turmoil

Maybe it will prove an idle threat.

But as the Democratic rules committee ended its lengthy meeting today in Washington today with a decision on the Michigan primary that left Hillary Clinton's campaign irate, the words from one of her chief strategists have to haunt party leaders striving for elusive unity.

"Mrs. Clinton has instructed me to reserve her rights to take this to the credentials committee," Harold Ickes said.

The rules panel, which Ickes serves on, achieved its goal of resolving one of the party's two disputed primaries -- the Florida contest -- in a way that Ickes and other Clinton loyalists indicated they could live with. And combined with the more contentious action on the Michigan vote, the result was to put Barack Obama on the cusp of securing the number of convention delegates needed to soon declare himself the presidential nominee-in-waiting.

But Ickes' admonition on Michigan means that the Clinton camp has not signed off on the new "magic" number: 2,118 delegates. And that means any claim by Obama to be the presumptive nominee will carry an asterisk -- perhaps all the way to the late-August convention in Denver.

Indeed, along with Ickes' words, the chants of "Denver, Denver" by disgruntled Clinton supporters as the rules committee gathering broke up must be uneasily echoing in the ears of other Democrats.

-- Don Frederick

Photo credit: Associated Press

Comments

[TJ]

Nobody "stole the nomination" from Clinton. Regardless of how the Florida/Michigan issue was resolved, Obama was going to be the nominee. He had a lead of more than 200 delegates. He was going to win the nomination no matter what. The Clinton supporters need to do the math -- they were going to lose, no matter what. They need to just get over it and move on.

[DemForLife]

You Hillary supporters are all telling lies...

How and why do you people keep claiming that the votes were not counted? All of the peoples votes were counted, only the Superdelegates and Pledged delegates were affected by todays rulings.

All of the voters that voted in this sham election were counted. Why do you keep on insisting on perpetuating this lie about not counting the votes?

[BJ]

what a biased prickly little article this is.. do you obamabot much ?

[TJ]

An election with only one name on the ballot is not a fair election. Any fifth grader would tell you that. Even Clinton would admit that, if she were being honest. But I guess honesty is not a trait that she thinks is important in a presidential candidate, because she has pushed for an utterly ridiculous, intellectually dishonest position throughout this process: that she should get 73 delegates and Obama should get none.

Come on. That's just indefensible. It shows the utter foolishness of counting an election with only one name on the ballot. Clinton supporters should be ashamed of their candidate for making them defend such a ludicrous position, and they should be ashamed of themselves for actually doing it.

Clinton didn't care about Michigan or Florida until she was losing. She doesn't care about the manifest unfairness of an election with only one name on the ballot. It's quite evident that there is no principle at stake here, other than the principle that Clinton wants to win.

But there's no way she can win. She doesn't have the delegates, and there's no way she could get them from Florida and Michigan. That has been clear for weeks to everyone but her. This has been over for weeks. She's done. All she's doing now is trying to take the party down with her.

[js]

"You Clinton supporters are pathetic, you should just leave the party." Matt

"Doesn't Clinton get it? People want her to just go away."
Lena

Mat and Lena, CAN YOU SPELL STUPID!
Congratulations, you win. WE ARE GOING AWAY AND VOTING FOR JOHN McCAIN! Hillary's already won the popular vote. Take Hillary supporters and Republicans and we'll easily put McCain in the White House in November. And that' just what we intend to do. Keep your crappy party. We don't need it!

[Dangle]

McCain/Palin '08

[Deanna , Canada]

How can you call youself a truly democratic party , when you don't allow the fundamental right , that is available to every citizen everywhere in the free world , to vote and have that vote counted.
I watched with dismay how a panel of 30 people took it upon themselves to make a decision for hundreds of thousands of people.
Those votes were based on which candidate they supported and was an absolute farce , as it was quite clear that a decision had been made beforehand.
The Democratic Party has lost integrity and from what I have seen it would not be a Party I would cast my vote for.

[John]

Bad Losers! I began as a Clinton supporter because I knew the name but now I support and donate regularly to Obama because he is the better candidate. Hillary can't even run a good campaign. How many millions of dollars in debt is she? How is she going to run the country if she can't run a campaign. Why do we have to keep dragging this out? It is over.

[crat3]

Obama disenfranchised FL and MI voters with 1/2 votes. The cut-and-dice-the-vote Obama gamed the system and prevailed with the DNC.

Sen. Clinton should appeal the fundamental unfairness to the credentials committee to get every vote counted in full, undo the MI hijacking, and save the Democratic Party from defeat in November.

[M. and E Steadmann]

Hillary fans: exactly who do you think stole votes in Michigan and Florida? Was is not HRC herself -- she did, after all approve sanctions against both states. This when she didn't think she needed those votes to win the nomination.

How can you continue to stand by this woman's arguments when the record is clear: Hillary NEVER wanted to count your votes in the first place.

But let's say for a moment we ignore this fact. How can you, with a clear conscience, accept as legitimate election results in a pair of races where candidates did not have their names on the ballot, or where the candidates never campaigned at the request of the DNC? By supporting HRC's demands to count these election results as legitamite, you are guilty of the same crimes as Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe. You are asking for a rigged election.

Your leader, HRC, is getting much more than she deserves here. The fairest thing to do would have been to toss the results, or have a redo at the expense of the Democratic party in the respective states, or on HRC's dime. If she'd followed her party's rules as she AGREED to, this mess would never have happened.

The Steadmanns

[Mitchell in New York]

The DNC reached a compromise today (May 31st) on Florida and Michigan. It is fair and prudent. The Clinton camp appears satisfied with 50/50 split in Florida, but unhappy about the resolution in Michigan. From the Clinton camp:

“We strongly object to the Committee’s decision to undercut its own rules in seating Michigan’s delegates without reflecting the votes of the people of Michigan.”

Are we really supposed to believe that Hillary Clinton, after stating publicly that the election in Michigan would not count–an election in which her opponent was not on the ballot–is now in a position to claim that the decision of the DNC has undermined democracy? Does she really believe this? Is she actually outraged?

The outrage from the Clinton Camp is real, but to be more exact, it is really fury at the DNC for undermining its case about the popular vote.

“Why is Clinton Really Objecting to the DNC’s Decision?”
http://msa4.wordpress.com/

[SS Massachusetts]

Email Sent to Sen Carl Levin. Similar email sent to DNC. Getting queued up to send to all on the Rules committee.

Misc Issue: MI Primary Resolution

Comments: That was a horrible thing to do ... taking away Clinton delegates based on fabricated assumptions and then awarding ALL uncommitted delegates to Obama. If it takes gross unfairness to achieve unity in MI then give me acrimony. You have sown the seeds of national discontent rather than unity in the party -- and you will have yourselves to blame when John McCain becomes our president. This is shades of 1972 all over again -- and I am appalled. That was the first election in which I was able to vote ... and now I see that the party to which I generally give the benefit of the doubt has made me doubt them and this entire process. I am thoroughly disgusted with all of you.

[Karena]

After reading some of the comments , I am amazed how narrow minded some of you are.
This is not about the candidates , this is about the voters.
The right to vote and have your vote counted.
America invades other countries to export Democracy and you don't respect and value it in your own country.

[Bryant Gross]

I was for Hillary until Ickes opened his profane mouth today and embarrassed Hillary, himself and the entire Democratic party with his poisonous personality and lack of integrity.
Shameful.
BG

[jl]

I guess every vote does not count. Some are just half votes... let me see that places the people from Florida and Michigan somewhere between slaves and illegal immigrants who have no right to vote and fill citizens....the DNC should be proud. As for me it the DNC does not count every vote I will vote a straight republican ticket till h--- frezzes over. I can not support a party that does not count every vote. The election is over, McCain wins.....I hope Hillary does not wimp out and makes the DNC count every vote even if they go to court. Right is right and wron is wrong ......The DNC has harmed the party for decades....We vote June 3 in Calif and I will be voting republican and changing my registration....Am embrassed for the DNC and our country....we no have a new under class of citizens whose votes dont count...Way to go DNC.......

[Rex Range]

YOU MACHINE CRYBABIES, ESPECIALLY ON THIS PAGE, HAVE PROVEN FOR ONCE AND FOR ALL THE WISDOM OF THE DNC AND OF THIS NATION FOR THROWING YOU AND YOUR BELOVED MACHINE OUT AND EMBRACING THE ONLY REAL HOPE FOR CHANGE SINCE JFK, RFK AND MLK. SCREW OFF AND DIE. ALTHOUGH BEING MACHINE-DRIVEN SORE LOSERS, YOU STILL WON'T BE DEAD. SO DIE AGAIN.

[steve williams]

At one time in our American history a black man in Florida was considered to be 3/5ths of a person. Leave it to the Democratic, the party of fairness, goodness and light, to reduce him and his wife to 1/2 a person.

[John B Sheffield]

What an eye opener it was watching Harold Ickes, right from the start of the Rules and Bye-Laws Committee, you could actually see STEAM coming from his ears! every time he did not get his own way, is this where Hillary has got it from.

Too many members of the Committee brought shame on themselves, acting more like a footie crowd!

Now can we as a PARTY UNITE??

[Todd]

Why on earth does Obama earn the uncommitted votes??

Why on earth do EITHER of them get ANY delegates from Michigan? After all, the DNC said that the delegates were not going to count toward the nomination and all of the candidates agreed with it at the time.

To those who are outraged (and hopefully feigning outrage because I would hate to think that these folks truly believe it) -- do you really think that Obama would net 0 votes in Michigan? Rasmussen conducted a poll a couple of months ago and Clinton and Obama were in a dead heat there. The LEAST they could do is give him the uncommitted votes given that ALL of the votes were deemed illegitimate by the candidates themselves until Clinton needed them!

Regarding the comparisons to Gore and Florida in 2000 -- it is always understood in the general election that all states count! Gore and Bush did not come to an agreement that Florida's electoral votes would be thrown out regardless of who won. To compare this to the 2000 election debacle shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what happened here.

[TJ]

Clinton had no chance of winning enough delegates from Florida and Michigan to make a difference. She was too far behind. That has been clear for several weeks.

Nevertheless, she deliberately inflamed her supporters to the point of rebellion against the party. It certainly looks like she's willing to sacrifice the party for the sake of her ambition.

Clinton can't be making many friends in the Democratic leadership at this point. The way she's handling this has to be hurting the party, for no good reason because she had no chance to catch up anyway.

If Clinton wants to maintain viability as a candidate in 2012 or later, she needs to do something to heal the divisions she has caused. If she doesn't make the mother of all gracious concession speeches next week and bring her supporters back into the fold, I would guess that many in the Democratic leadership will not forgive her.

[NM Dem]

Its embarrassing to be a democrat as share anything with the likes of icky Harold. He repulses me. Cheaters (and Donna Brazile got it right calling them that) disgust me. Disenfranchised are the voters that went to work instead of voting in a "beauty contest" they were told did not count. Instead they went to work to pay social security benefits never earned to Hillary Clinton's constituents. Frankly I don't care if Obama loses as long as I never have to hear the name Clinton again. One thing for sure is if he does lose its ALL HILLARY CLINTONS FAULT! GTH Clintonistas.

[Gayle in Oregon]

alle21. Right on thank you and keep up the good work. Yes you did miss some but the list is too long and I think your short version in more effective. I personally think Michell O is an equally negative force and they are both lovers of Marxist Socialism. I sense reparations for Black Slavery coming between the lines, too. I wish someone would ask him his position on that in a debate and not let him wiggle. I know he can funnel money to his groups lots of ways besides reparations but I think the idea of calling it that is in the minds of the Black Liberation Theology ranters. I think the reparations folks should go back to Africa and find their relatives and tribal leaders who sold thier ancestors to the Dutch in the first place and get the money from them with interest!

[golden]

wow! talk about an abomination. not voting for obama, not voting for mccain. not now, nor in nov. could i possibly unite with the vile manipulation on the part of the obama camp let alone mccain's. i cannot -- will not -- in good conscience blindly comply with the ongoing rhetorical rubbish the obamites, the dnc, and the media dole out for idle consumption. they won't push me out of the party, though i'm currently a hugely ashamed democrat -- a political orphan of sorts. will someone please reveal the real hope and change?

[Gayle in Oregon]

Vote4thebest, Thank you, perfect and right on. I have written Hillary and encouraged the Independant run. I will do it again now.

[Matt]

Hey JS, you know what. You and the other clinton supporters dont matter. All of you bitter racists can vote for McCain and he will still lose in a landslide. McCain is a hugely flawed candidate that doesnt appeal to conservatives. This is going to be a cakewalk for the democratic nominee, which is now Obama. You Shillary fans can now go back to your holes.