HRC would have been nominated without the superdelegates...that proves we don't NEED them.

[Ken Burch]

189. I am glad to defend my proposals. They are practical and pragmatic.

But the ONLY thing I should have to defend is my proposals-I should not have to prove that I live in reality.

Democrats are supposed to believe in human equality and mutual respect. If you are willing to accord me that as I accord you that, and to admit you don't need to try to prove you're superior to me or to try to use verbal abuse to try and shut me and others up, we can proceed.

Here's a defense:

Primaries,with either same-day re-registration or at least re-registration within a month or so of primary day, so that they can occur when the contest is actually going on(instead of being stopped MONTHS earlier as they always have been in New York, and with delegates apportioned on the proportional share of the vote each candidate received), would be the most democratic way of apportioning convention delegates. By allowing re-registration at least near primary day, they would encourage new people to join our party, and this is purely to the good because we don't have enough people in it to win at this point. Parties should always be trying to grow.

You need to let go of your anger the last primaries, and to stop acting as if I've defended it. Bernie should not run again(and I truly doubt that he will)but it wouldn't have made any difference in the outcome against Trump if he'd been kept out of the primaries. There was never an unshakable consensus for HRC at any point, and a primary process in which the outcome was pre-determined wouldn't have strengthened us at all-years like 1984, 2000, and 2004 prove that we don't do better when the "presumptive" nominee becomes the actual nominee.

In 2008, by contrast, we had a full debate and a process that went down to the wire and won solidly.


Caucuses should be eliminated(I agree with you, as I said above, that what you have there in Texas is indefensible-there is no reason a caucus process after the primary should change the delegate allotment between candidates-although it goes without saying that Obama would have beaten Hillary for the nomination that year no matter what and that Hillary wouldn't have done any better in the fall than Obama did OR been a better president-the performance each had or would have had in the job would have been fine). I have Caucuses are a burden to everyone who wants to be involved and do make it hard for parts of the Democratic base to participate. I've pointed it out that the only legitimate reason to oppose caucuses is disempowerment and inconvenience, not the bogus claims that any candidate has been given an unfair advantage by them(neither was, in 2008 OR 2016, and frankly it's a mystery to me that ANYONE would still be complaining about the result of the 2008 cycle when the result was a relatively successful two-term Democratic administration). So my position is-get rid of caucuses, but also to get rid of the bullshit about caucuses-they were invented by old-time "party insiders"; they weren't somehow imposed on the party by leftists or something.

As to superdelegates, my second proposal, that they be required to stay uncommitted, would actually give superdelegates MORE power. The CBC, for example, would actually have gained something for their delegate. My main point is that institutional memory is fine, but that it's an insult to rank-and-file Democrats to act as if we need something to "save our party from itself".

And I'm fine with the CBC hearing my proposal to give them MORE influence in the process. I admire the CBC and wish its members the best.