Washblog || Lobby the six Washington State Democratic Central Committee Superdelegates

Lobby the six Washington State Democratic Central Committee Superdelegates

By noemie maxwell
Fri Feb 22, 2008 at 12:14:56 PM PST
Section: United States Topic: Election news/info

Dwight Pelz, Chair of Washington State Democratic Party, has sent out a mass-email inviting people to lobby the six Washington State Democratic Central Committee (WSDCC) superdelegates on the issue of their vote in the Democratic presidential primary. Here's the link: Lobby the WSDCC delegates.

Washington state has 17 superdelegates. Six of them, Ed Cote, David McDonald, Eileen Mcoll, Pat Notter, Dwight Pelz, and Sharon Mast, are WSDCC members. Of these six, only Pat Notter has announced which candidate she will vote for, Senator Obama. A list of Washington's committed and uncommitted superdelegates can be found here: 2008 Democratic Convention Watch.

Below the fold I've listed all of Washington's superdelegates and have copied the email I sent through the form linked to by Dwight Pelz. I share some of the concerns about Obama's policies that Eridani voices here. My support of Obama's candidacy is not an endorsement of all his policies, but of his leadership for a unified American ownership of democracy. It also appears that a Clinton nomination will be more likely to bring us a McCain presidency. And the the leadership of Senator Clinton's campaign, starting with her chief strategist, Mark Penn who has actively defended and facilitated some of the most murderous corporate and governmental regimes in today's world -- as well as the divisive and unfair tactics and rhetoric that have characterized her campaign -- are alarms we should heed. It concerns me, as well, that Senator Clinton appears to be emeshed in a questionable religious-political partnership: Hillary's Prayer.

Here's the email I sent to the six WSDCC superdelegates through this form: Lobby the WSDCC delegates-- revised a bit. I didn't notice that the note goes only to a subset of all of Washington's superdelegates -- and not to people like Ron Sims, Jay Inslee, Patty Murray, Norm Dicks, and Maria Cantwell, who have indicated that they will vote for Senator Clinton.

Dear Superdelegates:

I urge you to support Senator Obama's candidacy.

He represents what we most need politically -- unity across America in our common ownership of democracy.

It is clear from the response of voters, who have spoken now with large margins in 11 states in a row, that with the leadership of a President Obama, we have the potential to turn back from the multiple crises caused by a demoralized and apathetic electorate.

I was a caucus area coordinator in the South King County area. The outpouring of democratic energy in that room, where 555 people voted (compared to 140 in 2004) was beyond inspiring.

In the 2004 election, Howard Dean, the Democratic candidate favored by the people, was driven out by the Democratic establishment in favor of their anointed candidate and the general election went to George Bush because there was widespread voter disenfranchisement -- much of it based on depriving people in largely African American areas of the right to vote. Through these actions and the subsequent actions of the Bush administration, American democracy has suffered terrible harm. It is absolutely critical that we take this opportunity to heal. The Democratic Party must, this time, bow to the will of its members and not again express the old party-machine mentality that sees politics as a game owned by the elite.

We have what seems to me a nearly miraculous historical opportunity, after an election lost due to deliberate manipulation of the vote using our racial divide, to take a step toward healing across race lines by electing an African American president -- to become ONE AMERICA.

I woke, on the morning after the Iowa election, in tears, with a kind of happiness and pride I have never felt before in my life -- a new feeling. A state with an overwhelming white majority had voted for a black person to serve as President. I knew on that morning that American people had sent a clear message that race really doesn't matter -- that we want to end the institutional racism in this country that deprives so many innocents of their lives -- and that, on some level, corrupts and deprives all of us of our innocence.

You as superdelegates not only must refrain from what would be considered by many people -- including me -- an essentially violent act of reversing the American will by throwing the election to Senator Clinton -- but you should, in addition -- I would even say you are historically called -- to provide real leadership here by coming out now in support of Senator Obama, by not waiting.
I believe we have before us a once-in-a-nation opportunity to turn a corner at a time of severe Constitutional, ecological, national security, and economic crisis. If we choose the old path -- the divisiveness of the Clinton campaign -- we will be choosing the old machine politics that has brought us to our current state of vulnerability by placing process and privilege over people.That would be a national tragedy.
I can tell you that, if Senator Clinton or McCain becomes President because the superdelegates overrode the votes of Democrats all over the country (and it is clear now that Senator McCain is more likely to prevail over Clinton than Obama), my hope and happiness will be crushed. You have, I believe, a profound responsibility here and I hope you recognize it. Many thanks for your attention.
Noemie

WASHINGTON SUPERDELEGATES
National Democratic Party
Ron Sims

Democratic Governor
Christine Gregoire

U.S. Senate
Maria Cantwell
Patty Murray

U.S. House of Representatives
Brian Baird
Norman Dicks
Jay Inslee
Rick Larsen
Jim McDermott
Adam Smith

Distinguished Party Leader
Thomas Foley

< Victory Today: Local governments can once again offer public campaign financing | The Most Significant Surge in America is Hope >

Lobby the six Washington State Democratic Central Committee Superdelegates | 11 comments (11 topical)

Beautiful letter, Noemie

with your heart so well expressed by your words. I share your thoughts, share your feelings, and appreciate greatly the choosing of your words. Thank you for sending the letter. I got the same email and haven't yet acted on it. Can I plagiarize your letter some -- grin -- well sort of a real request, but mostly a reference to Hillary Clinton's shot at Obama that fell quite flat in the debate last night.

I didn't get to see the debate on tv, so spent all of this morning watching the eleven youtube videos of the debate. I become more and more impressed with Obama each time I see and hear him. I absolutely agree with your thought that this is a historic time, and somehow I believe our super delegates will respond to that reality.

If not, I, for one, will be watching very closely and reacting strongly if what is very real, very obvious in the outpouring of support for Obama is 'played' or politicked into something illusional. I'm very sick of living with Bush's illusion of reality while we live with the reality of the Bush Administration Illusion.

Oh, oops, in fairness, I should acknowledge that I am an Obama delegate for my precinct and being a military family with loved one in Iraq now in his second deployment, I 'NEED' to put my hope in the inspiration Obama generates.

I had an appointment in Aberdeen yesterday, and the young man (20 something) who was helping me, trying to find opening conversation asked me a simple enough question - do you work? I answered, well yes, I do, I left my paid employment five years ago to work on ending the Iraq war, but five years later look where we are. He said "I take it you're not a McCain supporter, then". "Absolutely not! He's talking about 100 years in Iraq", I answered. I shared with him that I'm supporting Obama because he seems to have found a way to bring together different factions and excited the young. And after all,I told him, it is the young people, like you, like my kids, my grandchildren who inherit this; so it's amazingly satisfying to me to see the young so engaged in politics and this election. I asked him who does he support? And he said 'Obama intrigues me'.

He repeated the word intrigues or intriguing several times as I asked him different questions. I acknowledged that I recognize that I don't know or speak the language of young people of this generation, and that I know they do have their own views of events and seemingly their own language in trying to communicate their thoughts on events.I had I acknowledged that efforts I have seen in past five years from many in the activism movements to try to get the young to do what was done back in the day (the 60s) is a mistake, not the way to reach the young. He nodded yes without saying anything.

I thought his use of the word intrigued, intriguing to describe his reaction to Obama an apt word for how the young,who see things through quite a different lens than people my age, describes this intriguing political time in history. I earnestly do hope the super delegates will listen closely and heed the call.

Lovely letter, Noemie!

On the Surge in Iraq "--we have set the bar so low it's buried in the sand at this point." - Barack Obama

by Lietta Ruger on Fri Feb 22, 2008 at 01:25:19 PM PST

* 1 none 0 *

Intriguing by noemie maxwell, 02/23/2008 08:22:35 AM PST (none / 0)

Send Dwight three letters

cuz he has three votes. This is as result of the fact that in addition to being a Super Deligate himself, Dwight gets to pick two folks to also be super deligates. Any two folks regardless of who they may support.

by Particle Man on Fri Feb 22, 2008 at 01:49:42 PM PST

* 2 none 0 *

Technically, you know that's not quite true. by gibney, 02/22/2008 04:15:08 PM PST (none / 0)

I know all six delegates personally.

True, some better that the others. I can say without doubt that it would be hard to find people more dedicated to the good and success of the WSDCC than these six people. They were elected to their office for this purpose among many others. While I may not always agree with them, they are people of honor and integrity.
I trust them to use their best judgement to do what is right when the time comes. I am positive that that judgement will not be to closely reverse sentiment of the results of the ongoing selection process. They, more than most are aware of what that might do to the party's image.
This superdelegate "teapot tempest" is a sideshow and is detracting from paying attention to the real issuses that are and should be deciding this nomination.
For the record, I'm a Obama delegate to the next level. I'll be in Spokane in any event, as I represent Whitman on a committee.

Dave Gibney Pullman

by gibney on Fri Feb 22, 2008 at 04:26:37 PM PST

* 4 none 0 *

I Mainly Asked

that they do not endorse before the convention and that they do the right thing for the party. I asked them to respect the voters. But I also recognize that they are individuals who have, I hope, direct experience with the candidates. And I thanked them for their hard work.

As you might guess, although not a fan of the Superdelegate thing, I'm also not a fan of telling them they have to apportion themselves out or some such. I think they should have been elected delegates like anyone else. So, not prematurely endorsing is my main issue.

I agree that, as alluded to, if Obama has the majority elected delegates, they need to respect that or there will be consequences such as losing the election maybe?

by ktkeller on Fri Feb 22, 2008 at 07:21:00 PM PST

* 5 none 0 *

I rejected this whole conversation!

Hey Noemie, I'm supporting Obama as well, but I sent back a very nasty email to Pelz about how I think we shouldn't even be having this conversation, that the superdelegates should just but out and endorse the winner of the elected delegate fight, and preserve the popular support for the Democratic Party.

I think that's the only sane thing to do here, given the broad base of anger against the anti-democratic concept of superdelegates.

by Tahoma Activist on Fri Feb 22, 2008 at 09:08:43 PM PST

* 6 none 0 *

What's undemocratic about these delegates? by gibney, 02/23/2008 02:24:36 AM PST (none / 0)

Superdelegates' influence

Tahoma Activist and ktkeller have a point -- if I'm against the superdelegates determining the election against an obvious tide of public opinion -- why would I urge them to vote for Obama when the race isn't over?

The thing that's going on with me here - and I think with many people -- is that there is a perception that Senator Clinton is willing and able to use unfair tactics like Michigan and Florida -- and that she has tremendous power that is not publicly accountable and that she may succeed. We don't know what people in the party owe her -- and I'm not talking about Washington State here. We don't know what levers she can pull. Because the kind of power she has within the party machine is not publicly accountable there is a feeling that, once again, the "will of the people" is in danger of being thwarted. This all goes along with the dismissive nature of the rhetoric that she and her campaign and even many of her supporters are using.

Put this along side the feeling of intense disenfranchisement in 2004 -- with Dean getting elbowed aside by party insiders and then all of the shenanigans that went on with voting machines etc. that brought us the Bush administration. And the terrible harm this has brought.

Gibney says that the superdelegates won't go against public sentiment. But right now her campaign is doing what it can to move public sentiment in her favor in Ohio and Texas. And you know what, I don't like how her campaign is doing it. I don't like the kinds of levers and tactics used there either. Public opinion can be manipulated. Clinton's campaign, after all, is using consultant Mark Penn -- a public opinion manipulator who has used his skills to prop up murderous regimes and corporations. Can those guys figure out how to smear Obama? It seems to me a race to unlock the puzzle of how to make people vote against their best interests.

In California, what I read, is that Clinton used her party machine power to get "the Latino vote" and thus win the state. There is so much to read into that scenario which I have no reason to believe is not true. This is a strategy that divides and leverages along ethnic and gender lines to get more votes. I compare that with the same campaign saying after South Carolina that, oh gosh, Jesse Jackson won this too -- as if to diminish the victory of the Obama campaign because it was only based on the Black vote. And I compare that with what I hear from Clinton supporters that women have a special obligation to vote for a woman.

I don't like this kind of politics. But it's the kind of politics I thought we were stuck with. Obama's campaign seems to be creating something new. I fear that manipulation of the superdelegates may stand in the way of a better kind of politics developing here.

by noemie maxwell on Sat Feb 23, 2008 at 08:12:18 AM PST

* 8 none 0 *

Still... It's Fair to Lobby for Obama by ktkeller, 02/23/2008 02:39:55 PM PST (none / 0)

Do you really think that these Elected Officials by gibney, 02/23/2008 05:52:53 PM PST (none / 0)

Lobby the six Washington State Democratic Central Committee Superdelegates | 11 comments (11 topical)

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