Word: dnc
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Florida's famously feckless electoral system usually deserves the ridicule it gets. But not this time. Instead of the typical jokes about Flori-duh, the Sunshine State debacle currently gripping the Democratic Party has evoked reminders of the Dean Scream - the notorious petulance of Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairman Howard Dean. He, along with the other sage bosses of the DNC, has left Democratic voters in what is arguably the nation's most crucial swing state feeling dissed, disenfranchised and, it now seems, disinclined to back whomever the Democratic candidate is in November. And that could harm the party...
...Those risks were already apparent when Dean and the DNC made their original fateful decision. Last May, Republican Florida Governor Charlie Crist and the state's G.O.P.-controlled legislature - fed up with what they call an absurd presidential primary process that gives small states like Iowa and New Hampshire inordinate clout - decided to leapfrog Florida's primary from March to Jan. 29. The move violated Democratic as well as Republican party rules, but many if not most Florida Democrats also supported it. Still, the DNC ruled that all 210 of Florida's Democratic nominating delegates would be annulled. It exacted...
...Dean has consistently argued that the integrity of party rules is at stake. But that seemingly principled stand rests on shaky ground. In a New York Times op-ed article this week, Michigan Senator Carl Levin and Debbie Dingell, a Michigan member of the DNC, pointed out that one of the perennially pampered primary states, New Hampshire, also broke newly established party rules last year by defensively moving its own primary to an earlier date - and the DNC allowed it. Even discounting that apparent hypocrisy, Florida Democrats insist that the moves by their state and Michigan should have indicated...
...Either way, the DNC's lack of foresight is astonishing, even more so now that Florida and Michigan have rejected the idea of costly and less than reliable primary revotes. After all, the Republican National Committee annulled only half of Florida's G.O.P. delegates - a more measured ruling the DNC could have mirrored. And while Democratic rivals Obama and Hillary Clinton couldn't set foot in Florida in January, John McCain and his Republican competitors campaigned there and scored valuable face time with Florida independents, with McCain even winning the endorsement of the popular Crist. Despite all that, Florida Democrats...
...Perhaps because Dean and the DNC painted themselves into a corner. They can't easily lift the Florida-Michigan sanctions after all the authoritarian chest-thumping they did last year. Yet if the party heads into Denver without a clear nominee - and needing the votes of Florida and Michigan to decide the issue - their peremptory action will seem even more ridiculous, making the leadership of the so-called people's party look like a clique of arrogant patricians thwarting the popular will...