May 5, 2008

A Path Secured, Part 2

By: Sonny Bunch

As I mentioned last week, the Clinton camp has been pushing the meme that, regardless of whether or not the delegates from Michigan and Florida are seated, the raw popular vote must be added to the candidates’ totals. Terry McAuliffe was on Fox News Sunday saying just that yesterday morning.

And now Thomas Edsall reports that Hillary and co are getting ready to unleash a hail mary: using the Democratic party’s “Rules and Bylaws Committee” to “to ram through a decision to seat the disputed 210-member Florida and 156-member Michigan delegations.” And the RNC said “Excellent.”

In all seriousness, I can’t imagine a worse outcome for the Democrats. James Clyburn was on Face the Nation Sunday morning, and he talked about the damage such an event would do to the party’s chances in 2008. He had recently chatted with some students from historically black colleges, and

they were very, very upset at all this talk about superdelegates overturning their energies and overturning their efforts. They wanted to know from me whether or not I felt that this is what was going to happen. And a lot of them were saying that they felt that all of this talk about Senator Obama were just ways to damage him permanently.

Considering all the talk recently has been about the emerging Democratic majority amongst the youngest age cohort, the GOP is on the verge of being handed a rare gift: not only might Hillary secure the Republicans a win in 2008, she could irrevocably split both African Americans and an entire generation of voters from her party.

(It actually reminds me a little of this year’s NBA season. When the Lakers pulled off the highway robbery that was the Gasol trade, they forced panic moves by both the Suns and the Mavericks, who traded for Shaquille O’Neal and Jason Kidd, respectively. The Shaq deal ruined the Suns’ once-formidable run and gun style this year and for the future, whereas the Mavs mortgaged their future for a shot at glory this year–a shot that flamed out in the first round of the playoffs.)