Today: Florida GOP Primary; Dem Beauty Contest
January 29th, 2008Things are looking pretty grim for America’s Mayor. The final polls before today’s voting put Rudy in third - running barely ahead of Mike Huckabee. Romney and McCain are in the lead. Pollster.com has Romney ahead of McCain by a little more than 1%.
According to Pollster.com’s collection of polls… it currently stands…
- Romney 32%
- McCain 30.8%
- Giuliani 13.5%
- Huckabee 12.5%
- Paul 3.6%
Rudy gambled his entire campaign on Florida and it’s looking like it was a very bad gamble.
McCain received the endorsement of Florida’s popular Governor Charlie Crist three days ago. There’s probably no way of telling how much that might be helping McCain.
Democrats will also be voting today - but their votes won’t count toward the nomination because of a rules dispute between the state and the Democratic National Committee. Reader Alex points out how crappy it is for Florida Democrats to not have their votes counted…
I voted today and if the Democratic party doesn’t take into account Florida’s delegates, I may never vote Democratic again.
It’s a crappy situation and my heart goes out to the Dems in Florida. The Florida Democrats were put over a barrel by the state Republicans which pushed the primary date ahead of the DNC’s agreed February 5 date.
The political BS aside, it doesn’t mean I think the delegates should be rewarded retroactively in any state where no campaigns were held. it’s a lousy situation made more terrible by Hillary’s efforts to exploit the situation.
The dispute between Florida and the DNC is well-documented by the Washington Post here. In December, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Florida in Tallahassee upheld the DNC’s right to enforce its rules.
According to the Post, the DNC stripped Deleware of delegates in 1996. If I can find out what eventually happened to Deleware’s delegates (did they, in fact, get to go? I assume so), I’ll post an update.
– Steve
Stumble it!
January 29th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
Don’t let the facts get in the way when you want to trash Hillary.
On Sept 30th when Obama was violating the pledge by talking to reporters in FL he vowed to “Do what’s right’ by Florida voters.
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2007/sep/30/obama-vows-do-whats-right/?news-breaking
January 29th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Thanks for that link. The more information the better.
I think this story makes Barack look like a million bucks.
From how I read it, the story is about a September event that amounts to a short interview where press gathered outside a completely-legit fundraiser. The story sums it up, “Obama seemed unaware the pledge he signed prohibits news conferences.”
Whoops.
Obama’s statement supporting Florida’s Dems at the time is in the context of the Florida Dems still challenging the DNC’s crappy decision and it wasn’t for three months before courts ruled in the DNC’s favor.
I believe every fair-minded person would want Michigan’s and Florida’s Primaries to have been full contests and “do right” by Michigan’s and Florida’s voters.
Only a completely dishonest person would try to equate that with retroactively awarding delegates for Michigan’s uncontested primary.
– Steve