People forget that the debacle of 1968 led to serious Democratic Party reforms that included among other things the wholesale replacement of Caucuses (notoriously corrupt) with Primaries.
Then Dr. George “DFC” McGovern, B-24 Liberator pilot who flew 35 combat missions over German-occupied Europe, lost in a landslide to Richard “Not A Crook” Nixon because being against an unwinnable War and for social justice and equal rights were too damn Hippy.
It had nothing to do with Tricky Dick pulling a Trump- honest.
Instead, said the wise men of the Democratic Party, “We need to make sure we never nominate a damn Hippy again.”
And so the Super Delegate was born. While Democratic public servants get them ex officio, a big chunk are reserved for State Party Officials, notable donors, and Emeritus has beens (May has been a delegate at every DNC since ’68). I consider them Tory-Lite Traitors like the Parliamentary Labour Party.
But like 1968, 2016 (is it 50 years? I mean, I have been at every DNC starting with the Chicago Police Riot, but as a writer not a delegate.) was a debacle for the Leadership in that the transparency of their corruption and incompetence became quite difficult to ignore and their strategies demonstrably ineffective.
So while Sanders didn’t win the nomination, he has, through persistence and organization, like Howard Dean before him able to achieve a level of success (50 State Strategy) in setting directions that may result in improved performance at the polls (if that’s really your goal) through the simple expedient of expanding democracy!
It’s right there in the name you dummies.
Here’s hoping this is at least some of what it appears to be.
Democrats vote to limit role of superdelegates in party nomination contests
by Jason Linkins, ThinkProgress
Aug 25, 2018
Officials at the Democratic National Committee’s summer meeting in Chicago voted to radically alter their party’s superdelegate system, which has been the source of controversy in two of the past three presidential election cycles.
Previously, these party elders had an outsize role in determining the Democratic party’s presidential nominee. Going forward, superdelegates will serve in a “break in case of emergency” capacity, playing a role in determining a nominee only in a very few scenarios.
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In previous contests, most of these delegates have been won within the states’ primary systems, and apportioned according to the rules governing each state’s primary or caucus. However, a substantial number of the overall body of delegates (over 700 in 2016) have been superdelegates — in most cases elected officials, but whose ranks also include various Democratic party grandees.These senior figures, unlike other delegates, are free to vote for whomever they wish in casting ballots for a presidential nominee, and their support often has been secured via lobbying and side deals — much to the chagrin of many party regulars.
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The DNC’s new proposal would accord the superdelegates their determining power only in instances where the first round of voting on the convention failed to yield a nominee, a scenario of limited likelihood in the as the nominating process is currently practiced. This new role — as party brokers — essentially strikes a balance between the superdelegates’ symbolic place in their party’s hierarchy and the actual power with which they were vested — which has in recent years become the cause of considerable intra-party rancor.
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(R)eduction of the superdelegates’ power contains its own controversies. As Cramer points out, the superdelegate process allowed the Democratic party to elevate women, members of the LGBT community, and people of color in their midst. Some who supported retaining the superdelegate system fretted that eliminating it would strip these marginalized voices of vital representation.It’s also likely that in the coming days, some will ruefully express regret that the presence of superdelegates is how a party avoids nominating someone like, say, Donald Trump — the theory being that had there been a coterie of Republican party elites similarly vested with this sort of power to alter the trajectory of a nomination, the reality-show mogul might have been kept from the presidential ballot.
This theory, of course, presumes that GOP superdelegates would behave differently than their Democratic counterparts, opting to intervene in the nominating process instead of sitting back and going with the will of voters.
It also makes some rather generous assumptions about Republican party elites having the level of conviction necessary to oppose an objectionable presidential candidate who’s nevertheless popular with voters. While it’s a pleasing sounding idea in theory, it has not been observed in nature in recent years.