Amie Parnes and Ben Smith put a bright face on what may end up quite a catastrophe for Obama, Hillary and the Democratic Party:
Rep. Loretta Sanchez says she’s happy for the chance to vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton at the Democratic National Convention — and she predicts that as many as half of the Democrats in the House could join her.
Just how many former Clinton supporters will vote for the former first lady during the symbolic first ballot is anybody’s guess, but each of them will be called upon to do so — whether they want to or not.
On Friday, the Obama campaign confirmed that the floor vote in Denver, intended to assuage Clinton supporters still stewing over her narrow loss, will be conducted as a state-by-state roll call…
…For Obama’s camp, the roll call is a ritual that will defuse any potential tension with Clinton or her supporters without affecting the outcome or the theater of Obama’s dramatic nomination.
Said Sanchez: “I believe there are a lot of supporters for Hillary among the superdelegates, especially now that they’ve agreed to place her name in nomination. I think half the House Democrats would probably be Hillary supporters, especially women. … I felt she was the most experienced and the best candidate and I still feel that way.”…
…“It’s a bizarre strategy,” said one Democratic strategist of the roll call. “It could backfire and show that her influence is waning. Chances are, she’s not going to have as many delegates vote for her on the floor as she had in the primary.”…
…“My boss is totally conflicted about it — and pissed Hillary is putting us in this position,” said a congressional staffer for another New York House member. “We still haven’t made up our mind and I don’t know when we are going to.”
Another New York delegate, speaking on condition of anonymity, predicted that as much as 30 percent to 40 percent of the New York delegation would pick Clinton over Obama during the symbolic vote.
Obama’s decision to accept a roll call vote, which came after weeks of talks with the Clinton camp, doesn’t mean he’ll let the process get out of hand, observers say.
“The convention is about nominating Barack, so his people want to speed through the vote as fast as possible so it won’t take too much TV time,” said a Democratic delegate who plans to vote for Clinton. “They also want to avoid a scenario where she’s leading at any point.”(emphasis added)
I highlighted “symbolic” because I’d like to point out that its not symbolic at all – they are real votes being cast at a real convention. The last bit I highlighted shows the danger – the delegates can pretty much do what they want, especially the super delegates, and while the official word is that it’ll just run smoothly through the roll call, the fact of the matter is that no one knows for certain what will happen.
Don’t forget: Obama did not want this roll call. In fact, I’m extraordinarily surprised he allowed it and I can only explain it as a gigantic error on his part, or a subterranean current of pressure from super delegates growing increasingly doubtfull on Obama’s long term prospects. When you add together the disappointment a lot of Clintonites feel, Obama’s inability to generate any significant polling lead over McCain and Obama’s disasterous appearance at Saddleback, the ingredients are all there for the super delegates to come to the realisation that they’ve picked the wrong candidate. Also good to keep in mind that the Clintons never do anything other than actions they believe will advantage themselves – they didn’t set up this roll call in order to help Obama.
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