Please tell me this isn’t happening.

Democrats in Florida and Michigan decided to move up their Presidential primaries to earlier dates in the calendar, like about 20 other states this year. The Democratic National Committee said, “if you do that, we won’t count your delegates.”

I know what you’re thinking. “But hold on—they’re ALL Democrats. SURELY, they can work out a compromise.”

They didn’t.

So the states held the primaries anyway, with the knowledge that the votes wouldn’t count.

Nobody campaigned. In Michigan, most of the candidates didn’t even appear on the ballot.

Hillary Clinton got the most votes in each primary. So, of course, people from her campaign tried to make the case that the party should count the votes and award the states their delegates, a total of 367 new delegates.

There’s no way it was going to happen, but they had to try.

There’s been talk of a revote, a “do-over,” but that’s not going to happen. Because a “do-over” would cost 37 million dollars, and the Democratic Party would have to spend it, instead of using the money in the general election against John McCain.

Okay, so don’t count those primary votes.

Fine. But there’s one problem. However you do the math, the Democrats will want to win Michigan and Florida in November. It certainly helps their chances if the rank and file members of the Democratic party, and the voters of those states, get to have their say in the nominating process.

To have a convention without delegates from Michigan and Florida, states with a total of 44 electoral votes, just about a sixth of the 270 you need to win, would be a terrible strategic move.

Someone better figure out something.

But for now, two quotes come to mind. The first one is an old joke. “President Nixon is a corrupt, vicious warmonger. If he were running against anyone but the Democrats, he’d have no chance at all.”
The second one goes back to comedy great Will Rogers. “I am not a member of any organized party — I am a Democrat.”