The Super Delegate Wiki-Watchdog: Find Out What's Really Happening in '08 Race

Posted by Jennifer Nix, The Literary Outpost at 10:43 AM on February 6, 2008.

A quick tour around the blogs and media sites this morning is confirming that Clinton and Obama are still neck and neck in the pledged delegates race after yesterday's 24 primaries and caucuses. This means the prediction of a "brokered convention of the worst sort" is likely what we've got coming down the pike. And it also brings up that murky business of the super-delegates, those "party professionals" who have the power to legitimize the will of rank-and-file voters, or to flout it.

Chris Bowers warned Monday that unless either Clinton or Obama drop out of the nomination race, it's pretty much a given that super-delegates are going to pick our Democratic nominee.

"With Michigan and Florida removed from the equation, 2,025 delegates are required to win the nomination, and there are 3,253 pledged delegates.

To date, four states with a combined 137 pledged delegates have held nominating contests.

Currently, Barack Obama is projected with 63 pledged delegates, and Hillary Clinton is projected with 48 (source).

On Super Tuesday, 22 states and a couple territories with a combined 1,688 pledged delegates will hold nominating contests.

From this point, quick math shows that after Super Tuesday, only 1,428 pledged delegates will still be available. Now, here is where the problem shows up. According to current polling averages, the largest possible victory for either candidate on Super Tuesday will be Clinton 889 pledged delegates, to 799 pledged delegates for Obama. (In all likelihood, the winning margin will be lower than this, but using these numbers helps emphasize the seriousness of the situation.) As such, the largest possible pledged delegate margin Clinton can have after Super Tuesday is 937 to 862. (While it is possible Obama will lead in pledged delegates after Super Tuesday, it does not currently seem possible for Obama to have a larger lead than 75). That leaves Clinton 1,088 pledged delegates from clinching the nomination, with only 1,428 pledged delegates remaining. Thus, in order to win the nomination without the aid of super delegates, in her best-case scenario after Super Tuesday, Clinton would need to win 76.2% of all remaining pledged delegates. Given our proportional delegate system, there is simply no way that is going to happen unless Obama drops out.

So, there you have it. Unless either Obama or Clinton drops out before the convention, there is simply no way that the nominee can be determined without the super delegates. In the broadest definition of the term, "a brokered convention" is a convention that is determined by super delegates instead of nominating contests. Through a deadly combination of a primary calendar race to the bottom and an anachronistic method of delegate selection, we Democrats seem to have already arrived at that point. Short of one candidate dropping out, there is simply no easy way that this situation can be resolved. Given that Michigan and Florida combine for 313 pledged delegates, it is likely that this situation won't be resolved without severe bureaucratic fighting on the DNC rules and by-laws committee, or even a credential fight at the convention itself."

(By the way, for those of us in need of a quick overview of how the super-delegate process works, here's one of the best I have found.)

The delegate count from Super Tuesday is not yet fixed, but Bowers' prediction is looking fairly spot-on at this point-even if the race is significantly tighter than his proposed scenario on Monday. So, what we have here, friends, is a potential FUBAR. What will those pesky super-delegates do?

We need to pressure the super-delegates to be accountable to the will of the people-not to a party machine or political favors. And, frankly, not to pundits caught up in a love fest either. Our next President should be elected BY THE PEOPLE.

Such a situation calls for some immediate action and collaboration-to drive a stake of transparency into the heart of this beast-of-a-process. The Outpost's Mark Myers has an idea, which could build on the efforts of OpenLeft and DemConventionWatch. And we could use your help to flesh it out. Here's the LO-down:

We're setting up a Super-Delegate Wiki-Watchdog, to centralize the effort of collecting the raw data about super-delegates, who they are committed to and how people in their region voted in the primary. So, as the convention approaches and the situation comes into sharper focus, we will be in a position to call on real data rather than hypotheticals to highlight this issue.

There will likely be uses for the data that we haven't thought of yet. But here are the uses that Mark currently envisions:

1) Openly track which elected officials are effectively canceling out the will of their constituents. All Dems in the House are super-delegates and have a vote. So the voters deserve to know if their elected official has canceled out their voice. For instance if a congressional district goes for Obama 3:1 but the S-D from that district backs Clinton.

2) Track the impact of the party officials who are given S-D votes.

3) At a national level, calculate the net impact of the S-Ds. For instance, what is the percentage of votes/regular delegates/super-delegates for each candidate and what are the differences between those delegates. (DemConWatch hints at this but it doesn't really give the numbers-however the data on DemConWatch will be invaluable in terms of building out the table.)

4) Provide some means of summarizing this data so we can get it out into the hands of journalists and bloggers so that voters have visibility regarding the impacts. (This is not there now, since we need the raw data first).

5) The other thing that could be really ironic here is that Democratic voters in Republican controlled congressional districts could be better represented at the convention simply because they *don't* have SD coming from their area. Possibly something we could measure.

Clearly, we'll need a lot of co-conspirators to make this baby fly. Jump into the comments and let us know what you think about how this might best work. And if you want to get involved, make your intentions and email contact known and we'll get right back to you. Spread the word to other folks you think may want to get involved, too. Onward!

[Note: We've just launched this blog today, and are encountering some of the glitch "fun" of Wordpress. So, apologies if a few technical matters are suspect. We're working on it!]

Tagged as: clinton, obama, democratic party, super delegates

A former National Public Radio producer (”On the Media”) and staff writer for Variety, Jen’s also written for New York, The New York Observer, The Nation, Village Voice, National Law Journal, Salon, AlterNet, FireDogLake, DailyKos and other media outlets and blogs