Obama Now 66 Delegates Away From Nomination

with the florida and michigan delegates resolved, here's the rundown of what it means. obama should be able to gain those (about) 66 delegates with delegates from the south dakota, montana and puerto rico primaries (84 delegates altogether) and superdelegates to be the nominee by june 3, when obama will be in st. paul, minnesota with michelle for a rally.
hillary is too far behind to catch up.
let's hope that the superdelegates step up to the plate and finally end this so hillary doesn't plod on to the convention.
after watching the rules and bylaws meeting, i have to wonder: what is it that hillary's supporters are really fighting for or against? they've sort of got a mob mentality going on and were highly disrespectful of the proceedings. here's a hillary supporter who's switched to obama after ickes incited the hillarys.

Hillary's Crowd Goes Bonkers

omg. they start shouting "denver" when the motion to seat all the florida delegates in full. "you just took away votes," one person yelled.
alice huffman, hillary advocate, tries to bring some solace to the crowd as they vote for the half vote for each florida delegate. "when we get this vote we will leave more united than we came," alice said. hillary's crowd got ruder.
the motion passes by 27, considered unanimous.
michigan next.
harold ickes said the process was flawed. it's all wrong, wrong, wrong. more lunacy from the hillary camp.
he poked fun at wexler for drinking too much wine (according to the hillary loyalist), incited hillary's crowd. i think these people truly have crossed the line.
lastly, ickes said, as per hillary, she reserves her right to continue on like the never ending candidate to the convention.
hillary's voters keep needing reprimanding, shouting out while the committee members are speaking. it sounds like it's going to come to blows. these people are vicious and hillary's campaign needs to be shut down now.
cheers and ovations when one of the committee members tells the hillarys to stop with their propaganda.
the michigan motion: all pledged delegates restored at one half vote. hillary 69 delegates; obama 59 delegates. the motion passes 19 votes in favor; 8 votes against.motion passed. hillary's supports go nuts once again. they won't be quiet enough for people to hear what the vote was. security has been called.
the committee co-chairs get standing o for job well done

Obama on Making an Impact This DNC Weekend

from the obama campaign:
On Saturday, the Rules and Bylaws Committee of the Democratic National Committee will meet in Washington D.C. to determine whether Florida and Michigan delegates should be allowed to participate at the Democratic convention in August. We look forward to the meeting proceeding smoothly—and we're asking that our supporters not demonstrate or disrupt the proceedings in any way.
Instead, we're urging supporters from across the region to make a positive impact this weekend by helping out with voter registration and organizational events taking place on Saturday.
Here are just a few of the many going on in Virginia this weekend:
In Arlington, supporters will meet at the Court House Metro Stop at 10:00 AM on Saturday morning before heading out to register voters throughout the area
Also in Arlington, Spanish speaking volunteers will be manning a nonpartisan voter registration table at the Arlington Mill Community Center, before heading out to register voters at shopping centers, grocery stores, and other high traffic areas in the neighborhood
In Clifton, volunteers will be going door-to-door talk to unregistered voters
In Alexandria, Gloria will be hosting an "Obama Mamas" Women For Obama House Party
In Norfolk, supporters will be canvassing to register new voters and to recruit new volunteers
In Manassass, supporters will be registering new voters throughout Prince William County
In Petersburg, volunteers will be meeting at the public library before heading out to register voters
And in Richmond, Kristen is organizing a series of voter registration events as part of an ambitious, ongoing effort to register 4,000 new voters, with staging locations at:
Chimborazo Park
Broad Rock Sports Complex
Battery Park Pool
Randolf Pool
There are dozens of grassroots events like these taking place across the country this weekend, and there will be many more in the weeks and months to come. You can search for an event in your own community, or sign up and create your own.
As the attention begins to turn towards the general election, there is no better way to make an impact than by registering new voters and bringing more people into this movement. No matter where you are this weekend, you can connect with people in your own community and continue the work of building a true grassroots political machine, one new voter at a time.

Obama Supporters Countering on Michigan and Florida

obama has always contended florida and michigan delegates would be seated but they would be seated in a manner that is fair, given obama's name was not on the michigan ballot and both candidates agreed to abide by party rules and not campaign in those states.

hillary, in her despicable desperation, has incited her followers to protest the dnc may 31 to have the delegates seated according to the results of the january primaries. obama supporters are countering.

cnn:
Supporters of Barack Obama’s presidential bid are planning to demonstrate outside the Saturday meeting in Washington where Democratic officials are slated to debate the seating of the Florida and Michigan delegations at the party’s summer convention.

The move comes days after backers of Hillary Clinton’s White House run announced plans to converge on the Washington, D.C. hotel where members of the Democratic National Committee’s Rules and Bylaws Committee are meeting.

“Hillary Clinton's supporters are going to be bussing in protestors for the Rules and Bylaws Committee meeting, so it's critical that we show up for the counter-protest,” wrote on organizer in a post on the Daily Kos Web site Tuesday morning.

Last week, the pro-Clinton Committee to Count Every Vote said it was organizing a day-long May 31 rally outside the RBC meeting.

“Our purpose is not to divide the party or attack the DNC or Senator Obama. Michigan and Florida, however, in addition to Hillary's strong support nationwide, cannot and must not be dismissed in DNC efforts to unify the party.”

Hillary's Mad Dash

hillary's popular vote argument is positively bogus. she's pretending to be a hero for women, acting like she cares about florida and michigan voters, when earlier in the race, when she thought she was THE ONE, she didn't care. why can't people see this? she knows better.
she's adding in florida and michigan votes but both parties--obama and hillary-- agreed not to campaign in those states, so how can they possibly be counted? obama might have even won in michigan.
obama's name wasn't on the ballot in michigan, so she doesn't have anything but a dream. i can't believe she thinks otherwise.
i can't believe that anyone is entertaining her. the clintons may not be in office but they rule the roost. they still have so much control over the democratic party. they need to be shut down.
hillary has no chance of winning but once again, she's exploiting her supporters who think she does.
she's serving no purpose, not even her career.
newsweek goes further in the explanation of why her argument is bogus:

But Clinton has continued with one claim that could have a pernicious effect on the Democrats' chances in November. While she knows that the nomination is determined by delegates, Hillary insists on saying at every opportunity that she is winning the popular vote. And she has now taken to touting the new HBO movie "Recount," which chronicles the Florida fiasco of eight years ago. Everyone can agree that the primary calendar needs reform. But popular-vote pandering is poison for Democrats. For a party scarred by the experience of 2000, when Al Gore received 500,000 more popular votes than George W. Bush but lost the presidency, this argument is sure to make it harder to unite and put bitter feelings aside.

Oh, and it's not true.

Let me go through the numbers without making your head spin.

After Kentucky and Oregon, Obama has an official popular vote lead of 449,486.

This does not include Iowa (where Obama first broke from the pack), Nevada (where Hillary won the popular vote narrowly), Maine (where Obama won easily) or Washington state (another strong Obama state). Why? Because these caucus states don't officially report their popular votes. But if we're going to truly count all the votes, official and nonofficial, as Hillary advocates, you can't very well not include caucus states.

Adding in the unofficial tally from caucus states, as estimated by realclearpolitics.com based on official caucus turnout and the number of local delegates selected at the precinct level, that gives Obama a lead of 559,708.

Now we come to Florida and Michigan, whose popular votes Hillary says should be counted. The argument for counting them is no better than for counting the caucus states (and maybe worse, considering that these states violated party rules by moving their primaries up on the calendar, and no one campaigned there). But for the sake of argument let's count 'em. That gives Hillary a lead of 63,373.

HILLARY WINS POPULAR VOTE!

Not so fast. If the Democratic National Committee completes its expected settlement on May 31, Florida and Michigan will each get half of their votes counted. Translated to popular votes, that would subtract about 325,000 votes from Hillary, putting Obama back into the lead.

Obama's Name Didn't Appear

on the michigan ballot and obama barely campaigned in florida but hillary has her angry face on and is not letting up. that's just nasty, completely unfair. the obama camp, which has always contended that those two states delegates would be seated, says it's willing to compromise with hillary. but that probably won't be enough for her. she's awfully ungracious.

cnn: Obama senior adviser David Axelrod says the Illinois senator’s campaign is “open to compromise” and willing to cede Hillary Clinton the advantage in talks over the seating of the Florida and Michigan delegations at the Democratic National Convention this summer.

"We are willing to go more than half way. We're willing to work to make sure that we can achieve a compromise," Axelrod tells National Public Radio’s Michele Norris in a Wednesday evening interview. "And I guess the question is: is Senator Clinton's campaign willing to do the same?"

Clinton spent Wednesday in Florida highlighting her push for full delegations from both states to be seated in accordance with their January votes, which were not sanctioned by the Democratic National Committee because of the early primary dates. Her campaign has charged the Obama team with blocking a compromise on the issue – a claim that campaign has denied.

Obama's Dignity Politics

Never Mind What Went Wrong with Hillary's Campaign

what went right with obama's. give obama his due.
if i read another story about how hillary made this mistake or that mistake, i'll scream. she's made a lot of mistakes. the biggest according to me was exploiting the bigoted voters for her gain.
the other is the constant griping about florida and michigan, which she didn't care about until it mattered. lastly, her darned kitchen sink strategy that drug us all down in the sewer.
but as this story says, it wasn't about her mistakes. the simple fact is obama is the better candidate. cheers to that.
one other thing, it really irks me that she stays in the race, goading her supporters to be more defiant. many of these people have lost perspective. they don't even realize she can't win. she can't even win with superdelegates. she can't win and she's making her supporters believe that she can. maybe she has good intentions but as far as i can tell, she's only serving her ego.

npr: Bob Kerrey, who ran for president in 1992 and lost the nomination to former President Clinton, says Clinton's tactical errors in her campaign pale in comparison with a much bigger, much simpler reason for her troubles — mainly, that her opponent is a great politician.

"I'm not sure Bill Clinton could have beaten Barack Obama," he said. "Every mistake that she made, if she had not been running against Barack Obama, wouldn't even be a footnote. They're exaggerated. They're magnified because he kept out-raising her, because he was drawing enormous crowds, because he kept getting better."

Now Obama is fewer than 70 delegates away from the nomination. Clinton is left making hopeful declarations like the one she made at her victory rally Tuesday night in Louisville, Ky.: "I'm going to keep making our case until we have a nominee, whoever she may be."

It's an extraordinary reversal of fortune for a candidate who seemed unbeatable less than six months ago.

Hillary Backer Harvey Weinstein Threatens Pelosi?

what's the deal with hillary's backers always threatening Pelosi? harvey weinstein? isn't he some film guy. big whoop de doo. more clinton baggage. we don't need these kind of folks wielding their bucket loads of money when obama is running against mccain.

cnn: Weinstein and Pelosi talked on the phone late last month, the sources said.

The three officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly about the conversation.

They said Weinstein, a top supporter of Clinton's presidential campaign, appeared determined to buy Clinton more time in her battle against Sen. Barack Obama by pushing for the revote. He was also pressing Pelosi to back off her previous comments that superdelegates should support the candidate who's leading in pledged delegates in early June, the sources said.

Weinstein, a co-founder of Miramax Films who now runs the Weinstein Company, called CNN Thursday to vehemently deny that he issued any threats. "Never, ever was the thought about denying funding to Democrats," he said.

Weinstein said the phone call focused on his offer to put together a team of people to help finance a revote in Florida and Michigan. "I told her people felt there would be a disenfranchisement of voters" unless Democrats came up with a remedy, he said.

Another person familiar with the phone call said what might have upset Pelosi is that Weinstein also suggested that if Democratic leaders "did not fix" the Florida and Michigan problem, powerful Democrats may abandon the eventual party nominee in favor of Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, in November.

But the three officials briefed on the call insisted Weinstein went further by suggesting that if Pelosi did not consider his proposal on the revote, he would help slow the flow of donations to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which works to elect House Democrats.

"He was trying to get [Pelosi] to promise not to shut the race down," said one of the officials familiar with the call, which came before the primaries in Indiana and North Carolina.

But Pelosi, who has repeatedly insisted she is neutral in the presidential showdown, refused to meet Weinstein's demands.

"She said, 'Don't ever threaten me again,'" said a second official familiar with the heated conversation.

Pelosi spokesman Nadeam Elshami would not characterize the phone call to CNN, saying only: "This was a private conversation, one of many the speaker has about the presidential campaign."

The possibility of a revote in the delegate-rich states of Florida and Michigan is a critical issue because it may be Clinton's last chance to catch up to Obama in the delegate count.

Currently, Obama has 1,845 pledged delegates to Clinton's 1,686.

The tense confrontation between Pelosi and Weinstein is raising private concerns among some Democrats that tensions run so deep that it may be difficult to heal the party's wounds when the primary season is scheduled to end in early June.

Pelosi's decision to refuse to sign on to Weinstein's proposal for revotes in Florida and Michigan -- which were stripped of their delegates by the Democratic National Committee for moving up their primary dates -- is likely to further irk Clinton allies who have charged that the speaker has been tilting her support to Obama. more

Hillary's Subdued Yapping In South Dakota

well, you've got to give her credit for going on and on and on and on. she's rallying in south dakota but is much more mellow and much more palpable. she is attacking george and not obama.
here is her plea to obama, who has said all along that the delegates of michigan and florida will be seated but maybe not her way. after all, michigan is really unfair because he wasn't on the ballot. she's just blathering on. why doesn't she just pick up the phone? oh, that's right, this is about scoring political points, looking good to her supporters:

cnn:
May 8, 2008

Senator Barack Obama

Obama for America
P.O. Box 8102
Chicago, IL 60680

Dear Senator Obama,

This has been an historic and exciting campaign. Millions of new voters have been brought into the process and their enthusiasm for the Democratic Party and the principles for which you and I have fought and continue to fight is unprecedented.

One of the foremost principles of our party is that citizens be allowed to vote and that those votes be counted. That principle is not currently being applied to the nearly 2.5 million people who voted in primaries in Florida and Michigan. Whoever emerges as the Democratic nominee will be hamstrung in the general election if a fair and quick resolution is not reached that ensures that the voices of these voters are heard. Our commitment now to this goal could be the difference between winning and losing in November.

I have consistently said that the votes cast in Florida and Michigan in January should be counted. We cannot ignore the fact that the people in those states took the time to be a part of this process and to make their preferences known. When efforts were untaken by leaders in those states to hold revotes to ensure that they had a voice in selecting our nominee, I supported those efforts. In Michigan, I supported a legislative effort to hold a revote that the Democratic National Committee said was in complete compliance with the party's rules. You did not support those efforts and your supporters in Michigan publically opposed them. In Florida a number of revote options were proposed. I am not aware of any that you supported. In 2000, the Republicans won an election by successfully opposing a fair counting of votes in Florida. As Democrats, we must reject any proposals that would do the same.

Your commitment to the voters of these states must be clearly stated and your support for a fair and quick resolution must be clearly demonstrated.

I am asking you to join me in working with representatives from Florida and Michigan and the Democratic National Committee to arrive at a solution that honors the votes of the millions of people who went to the polls in Florida and Michigan. It is not enough to simply seat their representatives at the convention in Denver. The people of these great states, like the people who have voted and are to vote in other states, must have a voice in selecting our party's nominee.

Sincerely,

Hillary Rodham Clinton