Hello to all and good-bye to the popular vote meme

[babylonsister]

Hello to all and good-bye to the popular vote meme

by liza
Sun Jun 1st, 2008 at 12:41:02 PM EST

Hello there, my name is Liza Sabater. I am the founder, resident blogdiva and unabashed black Puerto Rican feminist of culturekitchen and The Daily Gotham two of the oldest blogs in the national and New York state political blogosphere. It feels like forever but this December it will be 7 years since I opened culturekitchen as a blog.

snip//

Puerto Rico is not a state. It's neither a sovereign country. It technically was upgraded by the United Nations from colony to "unincorporated territory". The "Estado Libre Asociado" or ELA is sometimes translated as "free associate state" but that's deceiving. Puerto Rico is technically an unincorporated territory with commonwealth rights of the United States.

What does this mean? It means that even though Puerto Ricans are granted rights under the US Constitution, it's fate as a nation rests at the feet of the US Congress. So yes to citizenship but nay to statehood or sovereignty.

And since we are not a state, there's that little detail of, you know, of how the US Constitution itself would categorize the island's "popular vote". This from Article II, Section 1 :

Section 1. The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his office during the term of four years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same term, be elected, as follows:

Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.

The state's are the only ones that can choose a president. Citizens of the United States have no direct say on the matter. Hence the lie of the Puerto Rican popular vote having any impact whatsoever in these elections.

Look, I don't have an issue with talking about the popular vote in symbolic terms. What is to me outrageous is the outright manipulation of this symbolic vote by invoking the importance of 4.2 million people who have no say whatsoever in who gets to be President of the United States. It's not only ridiculous but another reason why Hillary Clinton is unfit to the President of the United States.

more...

http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2008/6/1/12412/28801

[sandnsea]

1. You can't have a popular vote with caucuses

There never was a popular vote. It's been bullshit since the first time Hillary uttered the word. If we had an honest media, they'd have told everybody it was bullshit. The story is that the MEDIA IS STILL LYING TO YOU.

God why is this so hard for people to get through their heads.

[babylonsister]

2. Someone needs to tell Clinton that, too. She refuses to

include the caucus votes but includes PR? Or includes whatever she feels like including? I think Rachel Maddow took the Clintons to task today about the popular vote.
I just wanted to post this from a Puerto Rican resident's POV.

[still_one]

3. Through most of the campaign she has demonstrated why she is unfit to be president

but it was yesterday, when her campaign effectively said they would not necessarily honor the rules they helped to craft

How can you trust someone who is dishonest?

At the beginning of the primaries, it was agreed upon that the delegate count is what determines the nomination

There is a very good reason why California is NOW going for Obama over Clinton

The more people get to know Clinton, the more they understand how dishonest she is

[babylonsister]

4. Agreed. And since she's giving her speech in PR, this is worth a kick and

another snip from this article:


It seems though that's what Hillary Clinton emotionally needed. She's quoted as saying that it energized her to be in the island because it felt like being at the "Puerto Rican Day Parade". And I can't believe she said that ... it's just not gauche to invoke New York's Puerto Rican Day Parade in ... ahem ... Puerto Rico. Yet, and this is where my cold heart softened a bit, she says it's the most fun she had all through the campaign trail.

Wow.

The article though goes on to say that the "Puerto Rican Day Parade" like event she described was a far cry from what reporters and other attendees witnessed.

... the sidewalks were practically empty and even though members of the campaign reassured {the newspaper} that the caravan contained 200 cars, a member of the press counted only a little over 20. Nevertheless, the candidate received warm welcomes in Toa Baja and Guaynabo where big groups of aproximately 100 people waited for her with t-shirts, posters and banners referring to her, her husband former president Bill Clinton and their daughter, Chelsea.

This primary has become the psychodrama of the Clinton dynasty and it's telling that it ends in what the United States refuses to call a colony, yet even Puerto Ricans themselves call it the US Congress' little banana republic. After 8 years of the Bush's treating the mainland as their own big banana republic, am sure mainlanders will have had enough of that.

Yet after reading this article and seeing the angry desperation of Harold Ickes at the R&BC meeting, I take it that Hillary gets this is the last time she'll have her say on her own little banana republic parade.

[Maraya1969]

5. She was just on the TV telling everyone that she "won" the popular

vote and not saying a damn thing about delegates. I had to turn the volume off or else I would have kicked the TV in.

In my opinion she is misleading these people who are not informed about how our process works. If not why would they be standing behind her and cheering? They have to believe that she is winning too. Unless I'm missing something here.

[Swamp Rat]

6. Pontapé

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL!!!!!!!!!

[libnnc]

7. kick

I'm so sick of this shit I can't see straight.


:kick: