The Case for Superdelegate Independence (or "The Voters Couldn't Decide, So Somebody Has To")
I have been hearing a really annoying argument making the rounds ever since it became clear that neither Hillary nor Obama is going to take the nomination on pledged delegates.
It seems that some of the luminaries of our great Democratic Party (hey, right-wing radio, there is an IC on the end of our party name--it's the democrat-ic party, not the democrat party--deal with it) and various lefty-liberal radio personalities (sorry Rachel Maddow) are insisting that the superdelegates should follow the popular vote and go as the pledged delegates go for their state/county/whatever. Intuitively, this sounds like a very democratic notion, right? If you got more votes, you should win, yes?
No. Under the existing rules for the primary process, asking the superdelegates to follow the pledges is very undemocratic and runs counter to their purpose. Here's why:
1. IT DISTORTS PROPORTIONALITY. It is the electoral college writ local. The Democratic nominating process allocates pledged delegates according to proportionality. If you require that the superdelegates vote, en masse, for whoever got the majority of the popular vote, then it is no longer proportional voting, it is proportional voting with a "winner takes all" bonus round. It gives the voters who happen to be part of the majority in their district a bigger say in the nationwide delegate tally than those who happened to be in the minority. The Democratic party rules calls for proportional voting to avoid just this sort of distortion and the "cherry-picking" of states that goes on in the electoral college in the general election.
2. Caucuses. (Can you ask for a more unrepresentative voting mechanism?) This magnifies the proportionality distortion problem, from planet-sized to galaxy-sized. It is a smaller voter sample, with even greater distortion of voting power.
3. Delegate independence. Though it's considered poor form to change a vote, pledged delegates are under no obligation to vote as they are pledged, only to make a best effort to represent the wishes of their state. Why should superdelegates not have the same perogative?
4. Endorsements. Superdelegates are often party VIPs, whose endorsements arguably have some sway. Why are we making the case that these folks can endorse one candidate, and be forced to vote for a different one during convention?
5. Having the "most" votes does not mean having "enough" votes. Whether you are ten votes from the "magic number" or 1,000 votes away, you still haven't "finished the foot-race". If there is a mile-long race, and nobody crosses the finish line by running the entire mile, you don't hand the gold medal to the person who came closest. Neither Hillary, nor Obama has reached the "magic number", so neither one is more entitled to be the nominee than Dennis Kucinich. Superdelegates were meant for exactly this purpose--to represent the interests of the entire party, especially if the voters don't settle on a nominee. (Imagine for a moment that Huckabee had managed to secure a near-draw with McCain like this on the Republican side. Do you think for a moment that the spotlight would be on McCain? No, it would be on the guy breathing down his neck.)
6. Voice of the Voters is Sancrosanct, except when it's not. If the voice of the popular vote is so important, why deny any delegates (FL, MI) seating at the convention? And why did those states lose their superdelegates too? And why would we permit the pledged delegates of a candidate who has dropped out (John Edwards) to vote for someone else at the convention?
7. Voter multipliers. You get to vote more than once. Superdelegates multiply your voting power, but fairly, because they are elected too. Unlike the proportionality distortion issue, these "S" voters multiply the majority voting power of all registered Democratic voters, not just the people who picked the winning side in the primary (or the teeny, tiny group that caucused).
8. Dump the "free-riders". Again, because they are elected by Democratic voters (and others with similar interests), the superdelegates help magnify the voting power of Democratic party voters. If your state happens to have a Democratic governor, and two Democratic senators, for example, and you voted for these fine politicians, then presumably they are more likely to vote the way you would in the primary. This adds voting power to you as a DEMOCRATIC PARTY voter, and helps dilute the voting power of those Republican, Libertarian, Conservative, Working Party, Green Party and Independent Party voters who switched party affiliation just to tamper with YOUR party primary. Take that, you party-poopers!
The Democratic Party is not a small-d democratic organization. It is not there to serve the interests of all voters, only the political interests of registered party members. The superdelegates are there to magnify the influence of Democrats. Therefore they must take responsibility not only for the majority interest in the primary, but for the interests of those Democrats (and others with Democratic preferences) who voted for them, as well as the long-term and political objectives of the party.
(Full Disclosure: I am a Hillary Clinton supporter, a life-long registered Democrat, a supporter of superdelegate independence, a supporter of the electoral college, and have worked on one Democratic Congressional Campaign in New York whose candidate did not make the ballot due to technical challenges. I support a single national primary election date, or rotating regional primaries, and same-day registration. By my calculation, less than 50% of my primary vote will count in New York under current rules without superdelegate influence).
