50 State Primary or what's Howard Dean's plan?

[bklyncowgirl]

This has been one hell of a primary season.

Passions are high, Democrats are turning out to the polls in droves dwarfing the GOP turnout in even traditionally Republican states. The voters are loving it. The reputation of pundits and pollsters in just about every state are being made fools of by the voters. People in states which in recent years, with the tendency to have a nominee pretty much selected by Iowa and New Hampshire and ratified by Super Tuesday, are getting to have their say at last. Louisiana, Washington, Kansas and the Virgin Islands had their say yesterday, Texas, Ohio, Maryland, Virginia--you're up next! It cold go all the way to Puerto Rico!

Best of all, the process has winnowed down to two strong, battle hardened candidates who have proved that they can run and effective campaign and should be ready to take the fight to the Republicans.

You could argue that this 50 State Primary was set in motion by one man. Howard Dean. Dean's refusal to allow Florida and Michigan to hold their primaries before Super Tuesday may have prevented Hillary Clinton from locking down the nomination early.

Dean must have known that this would end up in a protracted primary fight. I would assume that this is exactly what he wanted. The 50 state primary has been great for party building. Democrats and Democratic leaning independents and disaffected Republicans have been coming out of the woodwork to vote for Democrats. Dean's hallmark, after all, is the 50 State Strategy and his determination to have active campaigns in every state in the nation (not to mention Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and of course American Samoa) is getting a boost from the excitement over the primaries. We're giving them the first viable woman, candidate and the first viable African American candidate. One's the queen of bread and butter the other's a gifted orator and inspirational leader. They're giving them warmed over McCain with a side of Huckleberries. Who ya gonna love?

Democrats are fired up! The only problem is that neither of these candidates intends to quit and that there's a real chance that if the voters can't make up their minds for them the party leaders may have to step in and pick sides which could set off a war. Oops.

So does Howard Dean have a plan for the end game of his 50 State Primary? I think he does, so far he's been pretty quiet except for some cryptic comments about working something out before the convention. What role will the super delegates play? You'd assume that most of these would be Clinton supporters but many are the same state party officials that put Dean in office and have continuously supported him against the DC establishment. What role will former candidates John Edwards & Bill Richardson play? Neither has committed to supporting either candidate. What role will the party's uncommitted senior statesmen, former President Jimmy Carter and Nobel Laureate Al Gore play? Finally, can the rank and file supporters make up even when the leaders of the campaigns have made peace?

Fasten your seat belts, kids, this could get interesting.

Title edited to remove redundancy

[rateyes]

1. You make a mistake when you say:

Dean's refusal to allow Florida and Michigan to hold their primaries before Super Tuesday....

FL and MI held their primaries before Super Tuesday. The fact that their delegates will not be seated was a rule voted on, and agreed to by the state delegations INCLUDING Florida's and Michigan's.

The blame for all of this in FL and MI lies with the State Parties, not with the DNC, and not with Howard Dean.

And, I doubt that Hillary would have the nomination "sewn up" had the candidates campaigned there, and had there been anything but the sham primaries that the State Parties conducted.

[bklyncowgirl]

2. You're right, of course. The FL & MI primaries were held but the delegates not seated.

I agree with you that the fault lies with the state parties.

Howard Dean was a key player in the decision to enforce the rules laid down by the DNC regarding when states could hold their primares. Do you think Terry McCauliff would have done the same if the decision would hurt Hillary Clinton.

I think that Clinton would have won Florida, given its demographis no matter what, Michigan's a differenct story. Obama might have made inroads here at least in the delegate count if not an outright victory.