Hillary's anti-democratic agenda.

Hillary is at it again with her anti-democratic talk during the Democratic Presidential Primary. And I don’t mean her negative shots where she implies McCain is better than Obama, thus undermining the Democratic party’s chances of winning the Presidency. I mean her statements against the actual values of democracy. Here she goes again.

Choice quotes:

For the second time in three days, Sen. Hillary Clinton told reporters that the pledged delegates awarded based on vote totals in their state are not bound to abide by election results.

"Every delegate with very few exceptions is free to make up his or her mind however they choose,"...

"We talk a lot about so-called pledged delegates, but every delegate is expected to exercise independent judgment," she said. "And also remember that pledged delegates in most states are not pledged," she said Monday.

"You know there is no requirement that anybody vote for anybody. [Pledged delegates are] just like superdelegates."

Nice. That’s just classy. I like how she’s taking the few semblances this primary has to a democratic process and publicly attempting to destroy them. After all, did you think that your vote actually counted?!?! Hahaha... you idiot. Votes only counts if you’re a delegate. Don’t you feel better about this whole system now that the charade of having some form of an actual democratic process has finally been exposed for the lie it is?

Of course, the Democratic party has a rule telling delegates that they "shall in all good conscience reflect the sentiments of those who elected them." But that’s so ambiguous! I mean, the people who elected me voted for Barack, but do their sentiments really lean that way??? And aren’t reflections backwards? You know, like my right hand is actually my left hand in the mirrror. So if I’m reflecting the people’s votes, then shouldn’t I do the opposite? Ugh, this is so confusing! I mean, does democracy mean that the people get a voice or no voice?!?! I JUST DON’T KNOW!!!

[turning off the sarcasmotron]

Of course, I think that it’s completely fine and even laudable for any candidate to identify the shortcomings in the Democratic primary system, but only when the goal is to fix the problems and make the system more democratic. Hillary is trying to exploit the shortcomings for her own gain and make it less democratic. And it’s not like her argument is really even colorable. The system is set up so that the pledged delegates should vote for the person their constituents voted for! This is not complicated! What Hillary is doing is the antithesis of democracy. She’s trying to find a loophole to crown herself regardless of the outcome of the vote. Regardless of the voice of the people. This kind of hypertechnical argument about such a simple issue is exactly the kind of shit the Bush administration pulled with respect to torture and wiretaps and a million other issues.

And one more thing. The Electoral College has similar rules to the pledged delegates. Not all states require their Electoral College delegates to vote for the winner of the majority vote in that state. So in 2000 and 2004, where was Hillary with this argument to help a Democrat win the White House and keep Dubya out? This argument would have worked just as well, if not better since winner-take-all seems rather undemocratic. But Hillary didn’t go there. My guess is because she saw nothing to be gained for herself. But Gore didn’t go there, either. Nor Kerry. Why? Methinks (mehopes) that, although the Electoral College system may be seriously flawed, Al and John did not attempt to undermine the little bit of democracy that it does embody. Granted, each of them actually won their elections and they should have fought harder for the true result to be known. They should have fought harder for the bit of democracy the Electoral College does embody. For not fighting harder I am sorely disappointed in them both. But at least they did not try to subvert the system for their own personal gain. They left that to Dubya. And now Hillary.