McAulliffe Spins on MI and FL

[Bruzilla]

From Meet The Press today:

MR. RUSSERT: And back in 2003, this was a discussion...

MR. McAULIFFE: Yes.

MR. RUSSERT: ...you had with Carl Levin, the senator from Michigan.

MR. McAULIFFE: Yeah. Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: "I got a call on February 1, 2003, from Carl [Levin]" ... senator from Michigan, "[who] told me they were going to hold the Michigan primary before New Hampshire, which would have led to complete chaos. ... `If you do that, I will take away 50 percent of your delegates,' I told them. They thought I was bluffing. But it was my responsibility as chairman to take action for the good of the party, and taking away half their delegates was well within my authority. ... `You won't deny us seats at the convention,' [Levin] said. `Carl, take it to the bank.'" They'll "`not get a credential. The closest'" thing you'll "`get to Boston,'" the convention city, "`will be watching it on television. I will not let you break this entire nominating process for one state. The rules are the rules.'"

MR. McAULIFFE: Yep.

MR. RUSSERT: Chairman McAuliffe.

MR. McAULIFFE: You bet.

MR. RUSSERT: So now, Chairman Dean is saying the rules are the rules.

MR. McAULIFFE: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: Michigan broke them, they're not going to be seated. Maybe they'll get half. Would you accept that?

MR. McAULIFFE: Well, first of all, that's now out in paperback, I want you to know. But second, I would say the rule is 50 percent. That's the point I'd like to make. I had the right, the party, to take away 50 percent. The party took away 100 percent of the delegates. The rule is 50 percent. Had they only taken away 50 percent like the Republican Party did, Tim, you and I would not be having this conversation today.

What McAulliffe conviently forgot was that Dean's initlal punishment was to take 50% of the delegates away, and all the candidates balked at being punished for what the states had done. They counter offered a deal where the states just wouldn't count and everyone agreed to it.

[Larry Gude (Premo)]

Originally Posted by Bruzilla

MR. RUSSERT: So now, Chairman Dean is saying the rules are the rules.
What McAulliffe conviently forgot was that Dean's initlal punishment was to take 50% of the delegates away, and all the candidates balked at being punished for what the states had done. They counter offered a deal where the states just wouldn't count and everyone agreed to it.

...for pointing out that a person a really loath, McAulliffe, did a better job running the show than someone who I kinda actually like, Dean.

[Bruzilla]

From various sources...


1. 7/2006 The RNC and DNC pick select groups of states that could elect nominees before Feb. 5, 2008. The DNC picks SC and Nevada primaries to move up in the schedule so the heavy African-American presence in SC and Hispanic presence in NV will offset the predominantly white vote in Iowa and New Hampshire.

2. 2/2007 Florida's legislature and governor feel that candidates should be more beholding to FL after the 2000 election, and decide they want more influence at the start of the primaries. They felt they weren't getting the respect--or campaign promises--they deserved from candidates, so they start discussions to move their primary date to Jan 29th.

3. 4/2007 The DNC and RNC warn FL that if they do this the parties will strip away 50% of the state's delegates. Few people believe the threats, including the candidates who say they will campaign in the states. Dean threatens to bar all delegates of candidates who campaign in rule-breaking states and reapportion them to candidates who don't campaign.

4. 5/2007 The Florida legislature decides that the increased visibility of FL will offset the losses of the delegates, and decide to move the primary date. Also, the view is that once chosen, the candidates control the conventions, and none will want to offend key swing states like Florida.

5. 5/2007 Florida Democratic chairwoman Karen Thurman and state executive director Leonard Joseph meet with DNC national party leaders to reach an agreement on how to deal with the DNC's penalties for violating the national party's scheduling rules. "Possibilities include accepting the Jan. 29th date and the penalties that go along with it or holding a party-run caucus at a later date, " Thurman reports in an e-mail to FL Democrats on Tuesday.

6. 8/2007 "On Wednesday the Michigan senate will pass a bill choosing Jan. 15 as the date for the primary. We understand that this violates the rules of both the Democratic National Committee and the Republican National Committee. We don't care," Michigan's GOP chair Saul Azunis tells reporters. Some Democrats protest. Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI) sends a letter to Gov. Jennifer Granholm and Michigan Democratic Party chairman Mark Brewer urging them to keep the party's traditional caucus, which the state party pays for. A state-run primary would cost taxpayers $12M, Stupak writes, and besides, Michigan's county political parties are already preparing for the caucuses.

On the other side of this equation is Gov. Granholm, who Edwards factions in the state believe is acting at the behest of Sen. Hillary Clinton. The theory is that it would be much easier for Clinton to win a primary beauty contest than a caucus, which would require organization -- read: labor, read: the UAW. (Actually, labor power in Michigan is concentrated in the UAW and in the National Education Association, which probably won't endorse.) The MI legislature passes the bill and it is signed by Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D).


7. 8/2007 John Edwards claims he won't let his party's efforts to control the primary calendar dictate where he campaigns. "I'm running a national campaign, so so I'm going to campaign in the states that are participating in the process. My job is not to make the rules, my job is to run."

In Denver, Howard Dean said the rules committee will meet Saturday to decide what to do about states that are leapfrogging their primaries and caucuses. He said that "there are some pretty strong sanctions in the rules of the DNC that were agreed to by every single state last year, and I expect the rules committee will probably enforce the rules."

[Bruzilla]

8. 8/2007 The DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee holds its meeting to discuss stripping FL of all its delegates. Testifying before the committee, Florida Democratic Party chair Karen Thurman blamed her state's Republican-led legislature for setting the January 29th primary in state law and warns the committee they will be disenfranchising millions of Democratic voters. "I find the word 'disenfranchisement' to be an overstatement," David McDonald, a committee member from Washington State, tells Thurman. Donna Brazile, Democratic strategist and member of the party’s rules and bylaws committee, says “The nominating system should not be determined by a state’s economic development plan or a desire to have candidates focus on parochial issues. I understand Florida's dilemma, but this is not about states' rights; this is about a process we're trying to keep some control over." Many on the committee expressed sympathy that Florida Democrats would likely have to undertake a huge expense to set up a separate caucus, to be held after the primary, but none seemed willing to budge and make exceptions. "It's important that we establish the precedent of a punishment", committee member Ralph Dawson, of New York, said.

9. 8/2007 IA, NH, SC, and NV Democrat chairs coax pledges from all the major candidates that they will not participate in any of the rogue primaries. Howard Dean disassociated the DNC from this pledge saying “what the candidates do is their business.” In order to honor the pledge to the four DNC-sanctioned early states, four candidates remove their names from the MI ballot. Hillary Clinton and Mike Gravel do not.

“It’s clear, this election (Michigan’s) they’re having is not going to count for anything,” Clinton said Thursday during an interview on New Hampshire Public Radio’s call-in program, “The Exchange.” “But I just personally did not want to set up a situation where the Republicans are going to be campaigning between now and whenever, and then after the nomination, we have to go in and repair the damage to be ready to win Michigan in 2008.” NH senator Sen. Peter Burling responds: “Having left her name on, having signed a pledge saying she would not participate, it is Mrs. Clinton’s intention to campaign in Michigan once the New Hampshire primary is over. Again, I ask the question: When you sign a pledge that says ’I will not participate,’ certainly I, as an ordinary man ... have the right to assume that ’participate’ means ’participate.’”

The Dem nominees decide that Clinton’s breaking of her pledge to not participate in the MI primary means she’ll also break the pledge to not participate in the FL primary, so they leave their names on the ballot.

10. 9/2007 Edwards changes his mind about MI and says "Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina need to be first because in these states ideas count, not just money," Edwards said. "This tried-and-true nominating system is the only way for voters to judge the field based on the quality of the candidate, not the depth of their war chest."

11. 9/2007 "There will be no other primary. Florida Democrats absolutely must vote on Jan. 29." Karen Thurman, Florida Democratic chair, makes her decision to stick with the state's decision to move up the state's primary despite DNC threats to strip Florida Democrats of their delegates as a result. The CW is that as heated tempers are now, they will have cooled considerably by the time the convention rolls around in August of 2008. And the credentials committee for the convention, whose membership will be packed by the presumptive nominee, can overrule anything the rules committee decides now. In the interest of party unity and because withholding delegates from a candidate who has already won the nomination would be meaningless, the delegates...would probably be seated.

So... how does all this shake out? First, Howard Dean did not make the rule or the decision to strip the delegates. The DNC Rules Committee did. Dean threatened to take 50% of the delgates, just as McAulliffe did, but the rules commitee upped the ante. The states were aware of this and decided to go ahead anyway. The feeling was that the candidate controls the creditialing committee at the convention, and whoever the candidate is will ensure that the delgates get seated. Oops! No one considers the possibility there won't be a candidate.

Second, the four early states (IA/NH/SC/NV) form their own little cabal and get the candidates to sign a pledge, which has nothing to do with the DNC, saying they won't participate in any rogue elections. This benefits the early states as their predominance is no longer threatened, and benefits the candidates as that will mean two less states they have to worry about at the front end of the primary process. Hillary does a "depends on what the meaning of 'is' is" and decides not participating means leaving your name on the ballot and sending your hubby to campaign. This breaks the pledge and the Dems are all on the ballot in FL, but not campaiging. Apparently, there's was never any DNC sanctions against the candidates for campaigning in the states, although that's been the echo chamber story in the media all along. The campaigning issue was all tied to the non-DNC pledge that the candidates worked out with the four early states.

So, I think there's a lot of blame to go around on this, and lumping it all on Dean's narrow shoulders is just a means to let a lot of others off the hook. The legislatures and governors of MI and FL both had their own self-interests at heart when they moved the primaries. The DNC Rules Committee had their rules to protect, so they acted in their best interests in order to ensure their power. The FL Dem leadership made a bad assumption and gambled that the Dem nominee would swing things their way... and lost that gamble. The early states pushed their pledge plan through out of their own self interest, and the candidates all supported in out of their own self-interests... and Hillary went a step further by breaking the pledge out of her self-interests.

Seems to me like Howard Dean, remarkably, is the only one in this whole mess who's been acting with any sense of honor.