'Disenfranchised' is term of convenience

This scheming woman is absolutely disgraceful and dishonest.

Hillary knew the rules at the time and now wants to change them. She wasn't fighting for the people of MI and FL to be heard in Feb, of course, she didn't think she needed them at the time. I find her arrogant, hypocritical and false, I hope she gets put out of her misery soon and her canpaign dies a quiet death.

Hillary has shown herself willing to do anything which will further her own self interest. She packages it as being for the voters. It never is. We have had enough of that in the White House. America is in ruins over that kind of avarice.

We need Obama / Ron Paul. That would be a ticket to represent the people of America.

What about the disenfranchisement of the millions of Florida and Michigan voters who stayed at home and did not have a chance to weigh in on the nomination because they were told their votes wouldn't count?

Hey stunod...
you forgot to mention one key fact brainiac.

It was the opposition party that moved the vote up in Florida and Michigan not the democrats.

remember?

or do you actually follow politiks?

How did you get this job writing for the Chicago Tribune?
You don't think the Florida voter is being screwed over for a second time?

ha !
you are a pretty funny cat!

Steve Real, you need to get real! The Democrats in Florida did not object to the "opposition" party proposed. Florida Democrats are equally responsible for the decision to move the date up knowing full well what the consequences would be. If Florida wants to stop being "screwed over", they should vote out all their local and state Republicans. Get a clue already!

Encouraging to see that some people have a handle on what really happened in Florida. The Replicants devised a scheme to disenfranchise the Democratic primary voters, by attaching the movement of the primary date to legislation that had implications for the cleaning up of our voting system. What the DNC should have done is to counter the Replicants' actions and not penalize the Florida primary voters. Don't understand what transpired in Michigan, but the primary candidates knew the score and went along with what the DNC decided, so for this jezebel to now press a claim on the "behalf" of FL & MI voters leaves me speechless. The fact that the American people have been able to re-discover the calumny of these two sociopaths is absolutely priceless.

As someone from Michigan, please, disenfranchise me!

I got to "vote" in a Soviet-style election with only one person on the ballot, and where even write-in votes for other candidates were thrown out. If that kind of election deserves to be counted, then I'd better vote Republican in November.

The untold story is that the "superdelegates" here in Michigan wanted to help Clinton by moving up the primary, and pushed the rules violation through. Since the primary, they've been trying to stack the "uncommitted" delegates (votes for anybody-but-Hillary) with Hillary supporters.

I support the Michigan grassroots Democrats' rules challenge that was filed last week, asking the DNC to enforce ALL of the rules on Michigan, including the penalties for campaigning in the state and the rules for selection of delegates. This George-Bush-style attempt to manipulate results has got to stop.

Hillary really, really needs to go.

She'll get a book deal worth zillions, so I don't feel sorry for her and her debt. She managed this pathetic campaign, so she can work out the debt payments. Maybe she will need to listen to an economist......

I vote NO on the VP offer. If I were Barack Obama, I wouldn't want that family one heartbeat away from my job. No way.

Obama and his supports should stop whining and start taking responsibilities for their poor judgement. Nobody forces obama to keep his name on the ballot for Florida and take if off in Michigan. Clinton honors the rule of not campaigning! She did not force people to vote for her. Their votes were certified legally and should be counted.

1. If the Democrats used the same winner takes all formula as the GOP then HC would be leading Obama by 400 delegates.

2. 1.7 million Florida primary voters pulled Dem ballots. One cannot argue that Florida voters "stayed home."

3. Dem's in the Florida legislature were supportive of moving the primary date forward. It was a VERY bi-partisan effort.

4. I see her beef. Bottom line she's won California, New York, Penn, Ohio, Florida, Mass and New Jersey.

So, I guess that when a boxer claims he's going to win by a knockout in the 3rd round, he's "disenfranchising" the judges who might score points for his opponent in subsequent rounds, right?

How moronic can you get.

Here's a clue: Senator Clinton didn't make the rule which stripped Michigan & Florida of their voice in the primaries. So claiming that her attempt at -- horrors!!-- winning early is equivalent to making rules which silence voters is a false equivalency I wouldn't expect from a High School newspaper.

And for some of you other fact-challenged folks commenting, here's a couple more clues:

1. Millions of voters didn't stay home in the Florida primary. In fact, the turnout for that primary was 1.7 million, or 42% of Florida Dems, 2x the number of 2004, and nearly 3x the votes in 2000.

2. No matter how the Dems voted in the Florida legislature, they were outnumbered 2-1 by Repubs and had no chance of affecting the decision to change the primary date. In the 2 votes affecting the primary date, the scheming Repubs bundled the issue with other important legislation -- a paper-trail for voting machines and a fiscally destructive property-tax issue. Any halfway intelligent national party would not have punished them for that.

3. The only reason you had "a Soviet-style election" in Michigan was because Senator Obama and others CHOSE to remove their names from the ballot. There is NOTHING in the rules which required him to do that. Instead, he expected to lose, so took his name off the ballot just to avoid an entry in the Losses column. His decision, yet somehow it's evidence of Senator Clinton's perfidy.

4. Senator Clinton has been calling for the votes of Florida and Michigan to be counted since mid-January -- before she won in Florida. http://www.hillaryclinton.com/news/release/vi...

5. The rules removing the voice of Florida and Michigan which are suddenly more sacred than the right of the people to vote have been applied very selectively, but there seems to be no outrage about that. Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina all moved their primaries up in violation of the rules, yet were not penalized at all. In South Carolina, the move was completely voluntary, since the date is set by the parties individually, without the involvement of the state government.

6. The penalties specified in the rules required the party to strip HALF the delegates from states which violated the rules. Instead, the brain-dead rules committee chose at their discretion to strip all the delegates. By getting vindictive, they put themselves and the party in an unsupportable position where they don't want to hear from those 2 states now, but they'll be begging for their support in a few months.

I have great respect for Senator Obama. It's a shame his supporters think that demonizing Senator Clinton and her supporters is the way to "heal" the party. You are going to need to motivate Senator Clinton's supporters to support Senator Obama, and you are going to need to motivate them to get out and vote.

Those of you stupid enough to believe that an attitude which alienates half the party is going to help win the election in November should get used to saying "President McCain."

"I pledge I shall not campaign or participate in..." signed by Hillary, Barrack and John Edwards
http://www.fladems.com/page/-/documents/THREE...
If only "uncommitted" had campaigned harder in Michigan it could have gotten more than 40% of the vote.

Finally Michigan and Florida will have a real choice -

1. turn down well paying law jobs after graduating MagnaCu*Laude from Harvard and fight of civil rights for blue collar folks – black AND white
2. sponsor over 800 bills in 8 years in IL – inlcuding the only candidate to pass Healthcare reform for 150,000 parents/children
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2007/07/29/...
3. Risk his US Senate run with a no-holds-barred position on Iraq when nearly the entire Congress was beating the war drums
http://www.digg.com/politics/Full_text_of_Bar...
4. Reach across the isle to Lugar, Coburn and Hagel in a republican controlled government to pass WW threat reduction bill, government ethics bill and immigration reform bill
5. risk the attacks of his Senate peers by arguing for meeting enemies without pre-conditions but with preparation (Reagan and Nixon were the last presidents with similar policies)

Obama has more to his credit than most Americans know. And when it comes to experience, it seems Obama actually has more government experience than Clinton. The math says Obama spent (8) years in the Illinois Senate and has 3 1/2 years experience in the US Senate. His total years of government experience = 11 1/2. Seems Clinton has her first Senatorial term (4) years + 3 1/2 years of a second term. 4 + 3 1/2 = 7.
Obama 11 1/2 years of government experience. Clinton 7 1/2 years of government experience. Obama comes out with 4 more years of government experience. Some want to count Hillary's First Lady experience, but wouldn't that imply that Laura Bush would have 8 years experience to qualify her to run for president? Most would say this is nonsense and that's exactly what First Lady experience is ... nonsense!