FLORIDA AND MICHIGAN AND OBAMA'S CORRUPT CAMPAIGN

Nothing is more detrimental to the country as a whole than political corruption in any guise. So the statement issued by Barack Obama the other day regarding Florida and Michigan should be seen for what it is: a politician willing to engage in whatever undermining of the democratic process it takes to achieve his political ambition.

In his statement, Obama said that he would support a solution regarding the seating of the Florida and Michigan delegates "as long as it was fair to both sides". This is Obama intentionally ignoring the fact that the elections and the results they produced were already fair to both sides.

The fairness of those elections and their results are not and never have been in dispute.The validity of those elections have never been in doubt. And both have been certified by their respective secretaries of state.

The only issue surrounding those elections, is whether the delegates won by each candidate as a result of those primaries will be seated and allowed to participate in the nomination process. The entire controversy is an internal DNC dispute involving a scheduling conflict that had nothing to do with Barack Obama. No one was put at any disadvantage because of either state's decision to move their primaries up.

The decision as to whether to allow them to be seated relates only to the threatened punishment by the DNC against the state parties for moving the primaries to an earlier date. It had nothing to do with validity of those elections and Obama has no argument regarding the validity of the results. He was at no disadvantage, the results are valid and accurate and everyone including Obama knows it.

The DNC threat to ban the delegates was simply stupid from day one. And for journalists who have been in the tank for Obama and the Obama campaign itself, to say Florida and Michigan broke the rules so they should not count, is simply all of them sticking their noses into DNC business. None of them work for the DNC. it's an interna party matter about scheduling and whether any of them think the DNC rules are good or bad is irrelevant to what the DNC decides to do. Yet Obama and these journalists continue to say that these states broke the rules. As if they have anything to say about the DNC rules with regards to anything.

If the DNC rules were that candidates had to hop on one leg 10 times in that state without losing their balance or they lose their delegates and Clinton didn't do it what would Obama and these journalists say? She should lose her delegates because she broke the rules?

What the DNC threatened is just as stupid and the Obama camp and journalists who insist on talking about "the rules" are just as stupid when they try and justify not seating Florida and Michigan because they broke "the rules".

If the DNC decides on a punishment that is more in keeping with a petty scheduling conflict instead of one that completely subverts the nominating process for President of the United States, there is no reason for both elections not to stand exactly as they are. Its all or nothing. There is no compromise that makes any sense.As soon as you start to compromise the very democratic process itself everyone loses.

So when Obama says he wants a "fair" resolution what he really means in his patented passive aggressive style is that he wants an unfair resolution. Unfair to Clinton, since the only fair resolution is to seat all the delegates as per the results of the elections. The elections were fair. The only additional fairness needed is to count them.

Every decision and statement coming out of a presidential campaign is the product of people sitting in a room discussing and dissecting every possible angle, going through every possible scenario, and parsing every word used in a statement. So, when Obama issues a statement about wanting a resolution to Florida and Michigan "as long as its fair" , we know this is not the wail in the wilderness of a lost and wronged soul staggering through the forest of an unfair world, pleading for fairness as rain pelts his face and tears stream down his cheeks. It's a well thought out deviously political calculation designed, not to be fair but to be unfair to Clinton under the guise of fairness, since the only really fair resolution is obvious: seat all the delegates exactly as dictated by the results of the election.

If the DNC wants to punish anyone let them punish the party leaders and ban them from the convention not delegates representing the 2.7 million who voted.

When it comes to Michigan, Obama still tries to brazenly argue that his name wasn't on the ballot. He tries to get away with this dishonesty only because he knows the news media he has in pocket will let him get away with it.

Here is what happened in Michigan as reported in the Des Moines Register in October of 2007.

Obama's internal polling showed he was going to get get landslided by Clinton in Michigan. His own polling had him behind by 20 points. So as a political calculation and to pander to Iowa voters in the upcoming caucus he made a gratuitous public gesture of taking his name off the ballot in Michigan, both because he knew he was going to lose big and to curry favor with Iowans and their first in the nation status. But at the same time he was making a deal with the Michigan Democratic Party for his name to be represented in the primary by the line "Uncommitted" and to have that publicized.

John Edwards joined the uncommitted line and every single voter in Michigan knew long before election day that to vote for Obama or Edwards you voted the "uncommitted line. It was well publicized and everyone knew it. And the proof that they knew it is that "uncommitted" received 40.7% of the vote, the second highest total, while Clinton received 56%. The rest went to the other candidates on the ballot (uninformed journalists and Obama supporters have often said Clinton was the only name on the ballot. Not so).

But Obama topped that display about six weeks ago when he floated the idea that he and Clinton split the delegate count in Florida and Michigan 50-50 as a way of resolving the problem. In other words he wanted delegates that didn't belong to him. This was an attempt at a political mugging. He wanted delegates that weren't his, delegates the voters clearly said were meant for Clinton and delegates they clearly didn't want him to have. It was about as brazen an attempt to to corrupt the political process by a candidate for high office as has been seen in recent memory.

If Clinton had made such a proposal the likes of Andrew Sullivan, Betsy Reed, Roger Simon, the ethically and racially challenged Richard Kim, Olbermann, Arianna Huffintington and every other journalist who has corrupted every journalistic principle in existence in supporting Obama, perhaps as a way of somehow absolving themselves of their own racial issues, would have accused Clinton of the lowest form of political bottom scraping.

Yet Obama was ready willing and able to do just that, to take delegates he didn't deserve which is nothing short of stealing the voices of the people he pretends to champion except when those voices interfere with his personal ambition. And this coming from the side that has accused Clinton of doing anything to win.

Given everything that has gone on, the cheap shots of the Obama campaign from his hit and run tactics with his foreign policy advisor calling Clinton " a monster" and then quickly resigning ( as if that was a spontaneous outburst), Richardson and Leahy's pathetically transparent and orchestrated good cop/bad cop routine where they call for Clinton to get out of the race and then have Obama come along, knight in shining armour that he is, and proclaim that she "should stay in the race as long as she wants", ( as if he had to anything to say about it), and then playing the race card in South Carolina, there is a case to be made that Barack Obama is the most politically dishonest, corrupt and underhanded politician since Richard Nixon. He even has his own Helen Gahagan Douglas in the person of Alice Palmer.

The joke pinned on Richard Nixon in the Fifties and Sixties for his political underhandedness and dishonesty was "Would you buy a used car from this man"? Well, would you buy a used car from Barack Obama? Not if you lived in Florida or Michigan. Maybe not if you live anywhere.

To contribute to the to the running of a full page ad and a 30 second TV commerical I have written for the seating of Florida and Michigan for the PAC Countthevotescast.org click here: COUNTTHEVOTESCAST.ORG

NOTE: .I was told today that the DNC is in big trouble financially, down to $3.5 million against $35 million for the Republicans. Anyone supporting the full seating of Florida and Michigan can call the DNC and the finance committee in Washington and let them know they will not see another contribution now or in the future unless all the Florida and Michigan delegates are seated.

The main switchboard for the DNC is: 202-863-8000. The number that deals specifically with contributions or questions about contributions is: 877-336-7200

Additionally, anyone making a contribution to the Clinton campaign via the link provided (Hillary Clinton For President), will have the contribution matched by a contributor to the
Count the Votes Cast.org PAC for the running of the ad and TV commericial. Contributions will be matched from $25 to $5,000. For every contribution sent under $25, $1 will be sent to the Count the Votes Cast PAC. You can also get more information about contributing to the Florida and Michigan seating here:ACTION ALERT FOR FLORIDA AND MICHIGAN

FLORIDA AND MICHIGAN AND HOW DEMOCRATS LOSE ELECTIONS

What Howard Dean, the Democratic party and most of all Barack Obama was hoping wouldn't be the case is going to be the case. It cant be avoided any longer. There are 3 million 800 pound gorillas in the room and they are the voters of Florida and Michigan.

Like it or not,its all going to come down to Florida and Michigan. Howard Dean, uncscrupulously is still hoping the super delegates will bail him out. But if super delegates hand Obama a nomination he would have lost if Florida and Michigan were counted not only will it hand McCain a landslide victory in November it will divide the democratic party so badly ( one of the only things Obama has actually demonstrated he knows how to do) it will take years for the Democrats to come together as a party again just as it did in 1968. And Obama will end up persona non grata in the democratic party probably for life as the central cause of the divide.

This is the nightmare scenario the Democrats are looking at by not counting Florida and Michigan. A guaranteed landslide loss to McCain, losing congress and losing all influence in the affairs of the nation. And over what? a scheduling conflict that amounted to nothing more than a parking violation?

Howard Dean made a mistake and he knows it. He threatened to punish both states if they moved their primaries up, but who in the end is being punished? There were other things he could have done. He could have threatened to fine the parties in both states. Or suspend their leadership. Maybe even ban them from the convention. But does it make a shred of sense to punish 3 million people, 14 million Clinton voters and the entire democratic process for something the voters had absolutely nothing to do with?

Does the Democratic party really want to punish 3 million voters in Florida and Michigan and 14 million Clinton voters for what the Republican Florida governor and legislature decided? After what happened in the 2000 Presidential election, Is this how the Democratic party wants to choose their nominee for President? Many people have been waiting for Al Gore to weigh in. I have no idea what he is thinking but if I had to guess it would be that he of all people would never stomach the Democrats sending out a nominee who is there only because votes weren't counted in Florida.

And what of Michigan? Remember why Michigan wanted to move up their primary? The state was (and is) going through tremendous economic distress, more than many other states. The party wanted to move the primary up for one reason -- to get the national spotlight on Michigan and their problems at a time when they felt it would matter to the candidates and the country.

They were concerned that the nomination would be decided by the time Michigan's turn came and that the problems of the people of Michigan wouldn't get the attention it deserved, the same problems that Michael Moore threw under the proverbial bus in his letter to Pa voters, almost gleefully telling Pa voters that his Michigan vote isn't going to count because Michigan isnt going to count and to vote for Obama. The old Michael Moore would have been fighting like a man possessed to get the voters and voices of his beloved Michigan to count. He would have been incensed and would be railing at the injustice of silencing them, disenfranchising people who needed to be heard, and would have been outraged that inside party politics would take away the voices of people in need. He would have been offended at Obama and Howard Dean telling them their voices wont be counted over something as trivial as a scheduling conflict. But that would have been the old Michael Moore. The new one has been lying face down in the Kool Aid punch bowl with his cap floating on the surface for a long time now along with other members of the mainstream media.

Negating Florida and Michigan over a parking violation would be the equivalent of giving a life sentence for stealing a loaf of bread and then locking up the guy's family too..It is punishing 3 million innocent people for a decision in which they had no say and in which they did not participate. In the case of Michigan, there were noble motives for wanting to do it.

There were and are better ways to handle it and Ive mentioned them before. Fine the party. Fine the party leaders. Ban the leaders from the convention. Let Dean stand up and say he made a mistake, a horrible mistake, let him say why ( I'll volunteer to write it for him) and then do the right thing and resign.

The reason we have higher courts is to overturn wrong and unjust decisions made by lower courts judges. In this case we have many higher courts not the least of which is the court of public opinion and at least half the Democratic party and all of Florida and Michigan which will turn their back on the Democratic party if Florida and Michigan are not counted.And any Obama nomination that is obtained by not counting Florida and Michigan will be, not just in perception but in reality, a farce.

There are also two other courts. The Democratic Rules Committee and super delegates.Super delegates know how to add. And if they cant Im sure they have aides who can. And there is only one question to decide. After what happened in 2000 is the Democratic party really going to send out a nominee who is there only because votes werent counted in Florida? And Michigan as well? What of Obama supporters? Are they really content with getting their candidate in through the back door and seeing the nomination handed to him that he didn't win at the ballot box? Are they really Democrats? Members of the same party who went door to door to register African American voters in the 60's?

There are five primaries left. Super delegates need to wait till the last primary is over and then factor in the popular vote and delegate count including Florida and Michigan regardless of what the Democratic party as decided up to that point. Voters should start insisting that, until this is resolved, media outlets include the Florida and Michigan totals along with the non Florida and Michigan totals so we see where things really stand. You can't count on the news media who has treated Clinton like she was the black candidate and they were an all white jury in Mississippi in 1952, ( so much for Reverend Wright and how Clinton never had a cab pass her by -- as good a reason as any not to vote for her) but that shouldn't stop people from writing,calling or emailing media outlets insisting the Florida and Michigan totals be there side by side.If you're not sure how to do it and you know a Republican, ask them. They know how.

With regards to Michigan, since we know taking his name off the ballot was just a ploy ( see the article in the Iowa Independent) and everyone who voted knew Obama and Edwards were represented by the "uncommitted:" line which drew 39% of the vote, lets be generous to Obama and give him 30% of the uncommitted line. That is incredibly generous since Edwards had been consistently getting 14-15% of the vote and more and its inconceivable that a populist like Edwards would have gotten only 9% of the vote in Michigan. But lets bend over backwards and have the Obama campaign agree to 30% of the popular vote and 30% of the delegates.

With five primaries left, counting Florida and Michigan, Clinton is behind by approximately 80 delegates. That can be overtaken or closed to a statistically insignificant number which would then require the super delegates to vote based on other factors and what they feel is best for the party's chances in the fall since the result of the primaries will be that close.Or they can vote for the delegate and popular vote leader regardless of how small the lead. Its up to them. But either way everyone would feel honest about it and the air would be cleared.

Whatever the outcome, the delegate and popular vote lead has to be decided at the ballot box. Obama cant be sent out as the nominee based on a delegate and popular vote lead he didn't win and didn't earn, only because Howard Dean made a mistake in judgement. The will of the people has to be the will of the people, not the will of a biased press, or Obama supporters willing to stifle the voices of 3 million voters in Florida and Michigan, or Obama himself who publicly says "voices must be heard" and "every vote counts" but who seems very willing to keep the voters of Florida and Michigan from being counted simply.to further his own political ambitions., The Democrats cant send out a candidate who is walking around with an asterisk on his back.

It comes down to only one thing for the Democratic party. The nominee wins honestly or not at all. All the votes have to be counted. That Obama is willing for them not to be counted tells as much as about who and what he really is as any speech he has ever given. This the candidate who is trying to tell (and sell ) people that he is a "new" politician "rejecting the divisive politics of the past".If so then let him prove it.Or prove that he's not what he says he is. And super delegates can take that into consideration too.

There cant be any slipping in through the back door. Its up to the higher courts to right the wrong, whether its the Democratic Rules Committee, super delegates, public opinion or Dean himself. We wont hold our breath that Mr.Every Vote Should Count will stand up and demand they be seated on principle. After all, what's principle when your personal ambition is at stake?

Dean and many weak kneed super delegates are probably worrying that if they allow Florida and Michigan to be seated Obama and his crew will start screaming that the party is playing politics and trying to "give" the nomination to Clinton. The answer to that is, who knew that when Obama said he was rejecting the poltics of the past he was talking about elections?

The other thing super delegates and Dean might be worrying about is that Obama himself and other surrogates might scream racism in a crowded convention center. How ironic for the first credible African American candidate for the nomination for President would start screaming racism because people's votes were being counted.

To listen to the surrogates of Obama's campaign ( not to mention Obama himself) it doesn't bother them at the moment that they are trying themselves to be given the nomination by not counting votes. They have no second thoughts about trying to steal the nomination the way Obama tried to steal delegates he didn't win and didn't earn and ignore the will of the people by floating the idea that he be given 50% of the delegates of Florida and Michigan in one of the most brazenly dishonest and self serving moments of the primary season.

There is only one thing the Democrats can do and that is the right thing and that is to count Florida and Michigan.If they dont its going to be 1968 all over again for the Democrats. The November election will be a landside for McCain and the Republicans since Clinton voters as a whole and Florida and Michigan specifically will never support a nominee who is there only because votes weren't counted in Florida and Michigan. Super delegates trying to get Dean off the hook by declaring for Obama and then letting Florida and Michigan be seated as a cosmetic gesture when it doesn't matter wont work either. Everyone would see through that.

If Hillary Clinton should end the primary season with the popular vote and delegate lead including Florida and Michgian, and she doesn't get the nomination, it will ensure a major disaster in the fall elections in both Presidential and congressional elections, and will divide the party in ways, and cost the Democrats elections in the future, that they wont recover from for years to come. There is a lot more riding on seating Florida and Michigan than just this election.

The easiest and quickest solution right now would be the one I stated earlier. Dean should hold a press conference admit he made a terrible mistake, issue a statement that the Democratic party, especially after 2000, stands for every vote being counted, that he is going to recommend to the Rules Committee to let the Florida and Michigan results stand as is, and then resign. And then let the candidates do what they are supposed to. Fight it out at the ballot box in the 5 remaining primaries so the Democrats can go forward with the air cleared, everyone supporting a legitimate nominee and no one feeling like they've been robbed.

Howard, I'd be glad to write it for you. Just drop me a line.

To further support the seating of Florida Michigan visit: COUNTTHEVOTES
For a list of super delegates you can contact to tell them to include Florida and Michigan in their decision visit THE SUPERDELEGATE TRANSPARENCY PROJECT