Does anyone know when Ms. Brazile plans to quit the Democratic party?  I recall her making the following comment:

Super-delegate Donna Brazile said to CNN, "If 795 of my colleagues decide this election, I will quit the Democratic Party. I feel very strongly about this."

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LA Riots

Would Obama supporters become disobedient to the Democratic Party if the super-delegates suddenly gave the nomination to Hillary, in spite of Obama having won the majority of the votes and the earned delegates?

Today, young people, white and Black and Latino, are participating in the nomination contest in record numbers, after a long period of disaffection, because they want to believe that there is a future for America other than endless wars and endlessly shrinking incomes.   In all-white states and mostly-Black cities across America, young people are voting for the first time, because they want to believe in something bigger than the wars that George Bush proposed and Hillary Clinton voted for.

In contrast to older generations, young Americans live in a peer culture where color-aroused social redlining is decreasing, while bi-chromatic social and political relationships are increasing. They want a president who represents their generations' hopes, not their parents' and their grandparents' color-aroused nightmares.

Conservative critics have been lighting up the airwaves and blogs for the last 48 hours after Sen. Barack Obama's speech to the Hampton University Annual Ministers' Conference raised the combustible topic of the burning anger among the nation's poor African-Americans.

Much of this was the result of a terrible story written by Bob Lewis of The Associated Press, who wrote in his lead that "Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said Tuesday that the Bush administration has done nothing to defuse a 'quiet riot' among blacks that threatens to erupt just as riots in Los Angeles did 15 years ago."

After seeing the story I was stunned to read such a thing, and immediately sought the transcript of Obama's speech. In reading it, Obama used the word riot nine times; the phrase "quiet riot" three times; and never suggested that America was on the verge of seeing African-Americans lash out like they did during the Los Angeles riots in 1992.

But what he did try to do was give the 8,000 attendees, and anyone else watching, an understanding of what is a real problem in America's inner cities. And more importantly, his blueprint for fixing the problem.

"(Quiet riots) happen when a sense of disconnect settles in and hope dissipates," according to a written version of his speech. "Despair takes hold and young people all across this country look at the way the world is and believe that things are never going to get any better.

"You tell yourself, my school will always be second rate. You tell yourself, there will never be a good job waiting for me to excel at. You tell yourself, I will never be able to afford a place that I can be proud of and call my home.

"That despair quietly simmers and makes it impossible to build strong communities and neighborhoods. And then one afternoon a jury says, 'not guilty' -- or a hurricane hits New Orleans -- and that despair is revealed for the world to see." CNN Commentary 

And that speech came before the sub-prime loan crisis was acknowledged as truly devastating for inner-cities and nearby suburbs, before an all-white judge declared New York Police not guilty of having pumped over 50 bullets into the body of Sean Bell, on the eve of his wedding, killing him and seriously injuring others.

If any political party considers the social political effects of its decisions, it should be the party of women, the party of workers, the party that is 20% Black.  When Blacks warned Hillary Clinton that a color-aroused scorched earth campaign against Obama would alienate 90% of Black voters, those voices were ignored.   And now Queen Hillary proposes to effect a coup-de-etát in the Democratic Party against the first Black man to win the nomination, in the middle of a long, hot summer?  Has Hillary Clinton completely lost her mind?  Is raw power so dear to her?

It seems like the next 30,000-person Jena Six March may occur at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, if Hillary Clinton has her way.

Just as George W. Bush assured us that the Iraq war would be over in a matter of days, Hillary Clinton once assured us that she would have the nomination rapped up by Super-Tuesday.  Having failed at that, she now assures us that a "surge" of super-delegates can hand her the trophy regardless of the vote and delegate counts, which will unite a Party torn by Queen Hillary's insistence that Barack Obama might be a drug dealer, that Blacks achieve only by dint of their skin color.  "Mission Accomplished."

Those of us with brains are entitled to ask ourselves whether everything will turn out as Hillary Clinton predicts.  There will be immense and intense attention to what happens in the months leading up to Denver, and young people's hopes are already raised, with millions deeply involved in the results, identifying with Obama as their own personal opportunity for hope.   Rather than asking ourselves whether denying Obama the nomination after he won it would provoke riots, we should ask whether we can safely assume that it would not provoke riots.   We should question whether this war will turn out as planned even if its chief proponents turn out to be wrong about their rosy predictions.

When Hillary insists that she has a plan for wresting the nomination from Obama regardless of the vote and delegate counts, we should also ask whether Queen Hillary also has a plan for winning in November, in the aftermath of summer riots provoked by her ascension, and with John McCain running as the candidate of law and order?  Of course, it is also possible that Obama supporters, white and Black, teenagers and elderly, will great a Clinton coup-de-etát with flowers, like the Cheney army was greeted in Iraq with flowers.

Like a petulant child, Hillary (and George W. Bush) have been motivated by their greedy wants, without ever having considered or prepared the nation for the possible consequences.  Is hers a strategy for uniting the nation, or for bringing back the civil strife in America that accompanied the Vietnam War?  Hillary's levees will not hold in the face of the storm she is creating.

Now, some commentators are asserting that the Democrats who support Obama are holding the Democratic Party hostage.  More aptly, those Democrats are holding the superdelegates' feet to the fire of America's legitimate aspirations, based on the hope of America and the established rules of the Democratic Party.

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Amidst the frenzied flurry of Clintonista talking points filling the air like confetti at a ticker tape parade, the voices of reason are having a harder time getting heard.

One such voice is political analyst Charlie Cook.

If this contest were still at the point where momentum, symbolism, and reading tea leaves mattered, Clinton would be in pretty good shape. Everything she has needed to happen is happening now. Obama is getting tougher press coverage and critical examination. He's also getting rattled a bit, and he didn't perform well in the recent debate in Philadelphia. Clinton is winning in big, important places, but it's happening about three months too late.

Cook proceeds to pour some cold water on frenzied goalpost-moving Clintonites trying to change the rules of the contest. >>>

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So let's touch on an argument which came up after Ohio and Texas and seems (for whatever reason) to be getting a lot of play once again. It usually goes something like this:

Hillary's wins in Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, while embarrassing for Obama, don't actually change the likely outcome of the election. During February Obama was able to acquire a substantial lead in pledged delegates and, because the Democratic primaries grant delegates proportionally, Hillary won't be able to overcome that advantage. Since Obama will have the lead in pledged delegates, super-delegates will feel obligated (both by moral and by political reasons) to respect the popular will and support Obama.

The argument here assumes a link between a lead in pledged-delegates and an eventual rally of super-delegates (without which, neither candidate can win the nomination). The link is made plausible with a pair of claims:

• Super-delegates are politicians and are unlikely to buck the popular will. Popular support is demonstrated by a lead in pledged delegates.


• A lead in pledged delegates bolsters claims of electablity, and super delegates want to support the candidate who can win in the general election.

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We interrupt your regularly scheduled Obama-trashing for an important message from Hillary Clinton's campaign to voters in the upcoming states.

"Don't bother voting for us. No, really. How you vote makes no difference to me. We don't need your vote, little people. Might as well vote for Obama. You like him better anyway. Do it."

The source of this astonishing announcement? None other than Harold Ickes. Yeah, that Harold Ickes, the guy who voted to not seat the Michigan and Florida delegations.

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