Another finding, which pollster Jim Kitchens called "stunning," was that a quarter of the respondents - all Democrats who voted in the Jan. 29 primary - said they were upset enough over the issue to consider not voting or voting Republican in November's presidential race.

If Obama, like Clinton, had embraced that the Florida VOTERS count - then he would have been ahead of the game.

Now Obama is playing politics - realy Old-bad politics -- the kind of politics he supposedly is against - or was against.

You can't take people's votes and give them to someone else and maintain any level of integrity.

Link

"hey, i have a great idea, let's not allow the florida primary to count, that'll really get them behind our candidate in the GE!" "brilliant!"

"while we're at it, lets keep MI out too, they'll be revved up for the GE then!" "brilliant!"

spare me the "but they violated the scheduling rules!" mantra, so did SC. yet, i don't see SC being threatened with not having their delegates seated. go figure!

The only way it could happen is if the credentials committee approves it, which they won't since it's members are proportional to delegate counts, or a floor vote at the convention.

There is no chance that Obama will allow those delegates to be seated, and he shouldn't.  

Second, I don't think a re-vote is going to make any substantial difference in the numbers of delegates awarded to each candidate.

Third, the idea that some landslide popular vote victory for Senator Clinton, used to aid the argument that superdelegates should throw there support toward her, is not compelling in terms of fairness at all.

i doubt the obama camp is going to agree with either approach on account of the popular vote totals.

perhaps they would consider one or the other if michigan staged a caucus.  both sides are going to have to give to get.  however, i do not see either budging an inch at the moment.

it might help you case to include your proposal for michigan.

I also think this is the exact reason that Obama is scared of a revote. If the other candidates are ignored in the January beauty contest, Clinton won 60% to 40%. If Obama makes no inroads, and thus far his milquetoast stance on revotes has won him no glorious press in Florida, he could lose a revote by as many 440,000 votes using the same percentages.

   After all, MI is largely to blame for this primary mess, but not its voters.  Speaking as someone who has roots and family in Michigan, I find it rather disturbing that partisans on both sides of this debate are so willing to write MI off.  Senator Clinton cannot claim any kind of legitimate win in MI; she ran against no one and, having talked to friends and family in my own home state, plenty of people crossed over to vote in the GOP primary to influence the choice because they did not have a voice in the Democratic primary and they knew it. Nor can Senator Obama claim any kind of victory; his name was not on the ballot.  He doesn't want delegates seated because (I assume) he worries he cannot win the state.  Tough luck.

     The idiocy that partisans are displaying in this election defies belief.  Florida is important, yes, but it has yet to vote Democratic in the last eight years.  Yet partisans on this board ignore Michigan, a state that barely votes Democratic and is dependent on African American turnout.  One of the reasons I supported Senator Clinton early on was because I thought Dean's decison to disenfranchise MI was misguided.  At the time, of course, I assumed that she would win most states in a landslide.  That is not clear today.  

I really do not understand the objections. Every method enfranchises voters and disenfranchises others, so who in the Fla. house caucus can claim that the primary method in the first vote will be more democratic than the mail-in vote in the second round?

It's then too late to hold revotes, and we likely lose both states in the general election.

I think for the party revotes are a better idea.

First, it has been a defining aspect of the these primaries that Obama does better as people get to know him better. That may simply be because name recognition and familiarity means a lot in electoral politics, and Clinton came in with more at the outset. That process did not happen in Florida leading up to their primary, to nearly the same degree as it happened in other states, because there was not a real campaign.

CNN reported that they had been "flooded" with emails from people who said they didn't show up to vote because they understood that the vote wasn't going to count.

For both these reasons, I don't see how the Florida vote in the way it transpired can be seen as a legitimate process reflective of the views of the electorate. That isn't the fault of Florida's voters, but it's the truth.

By contrast, a re-vote will actually be fair to both candidates. There will be a campaign, to whatever extent the campaigns have time and money to mobilize, there is more familiarity with both the candidates now then there was before, and people will understand that their votes will be counted and that it's important.

Florida did not have a real primary, plain and simple. Why the opposition to a re-vote? By the way, the Clinton campaign opposed a re-vote until about a week ago, presumably because they don't believe that Hillary will net the same margin over Obama that she did before, if there is a real campaign.

Along those lines, another potential big flaw. Military ballots will be sent out before the registration window closes. There will be complaints that military voters are being disenfranchised because they have to make up their mind to register before the general population.

Considering the revelations about mail-in votes and selling signature lists, it would appear the Democrats are at the mercy of Charlie Crist. My guess is he signs an override rather than risk major unrest in his state.

Because Florida and Michigan were not legitimately structured votes, should they happen to tilt the election one way or the other, the side that lost as a result would feel that the election was stolen. The party would be shattered, and we would lose in November.

If the apparent proportions of how votes split in the two states were to change in a re-vote compared with how they came out before, that could cause some bad feeling, but nothing compared to what would happen if the original vote totals were used and they changed the outcome.

Re-votes will consume time and money, and they will delay the final selection of a candidate, all of this unfortunate. But there will a resolution that most people will acknowledge is the least of the various evils available.

Splitting the delegates from the states doesn't seem like a great idea, but on the bright side I doubt that it will have the very negative effect that has been predicted regarding not counting the votes at all. I believe that it will be widely seen as a gesture to the two states, reflecting regret that things turned out the way that the did. Still, I think there should be re-votes.

Most people don't watch debates; a lot of people don't pay attention to the news period.

It takes a lot of hard work to get your name into their awareness - much more than just being in the national media for 6 months.

Clinton had the name recognition factor in her favor so when faced with a choice, more people will select the name the know.

We voted because we expected our votes to count. That's what you do when an election is held.

Hillary has no need to drop out. For an excellent explanation of why, go here.

The candidates only signed a pledge not to CAMPAIGN in our states; not that our votes wouldn't count. Not that they'd remove their names from the ballot. And certainly not that they wouldn't fight to ensure our votes were counted and our delegates seated.

Honestly, why would any Dem want any fellow Dem's vote to not count? Why would any candidate want any American's vote to not count? Unless they're arrogant, think we're a bunch of "Archie Bunkers" and feel they don't need us.