HillBuzz proudly wears our Hillary Clinton for President gear wherever we go: buttons, stickers, tee shirts, baseball caps, you name it, the way a lot of people wear gear for their favorite sports teams. We get stopped on the street and on the train by other Hillary supporters at-large, excited to see our support for our very own New York Giant, and are asked several times a day, the same perplexing questions:
Why do Tim Russert and Chris Matthews say Hillary should just quit, especially when she’s got more votes than Obama?
“Why do we have a party Convention in August and primaries scheduled through June if Obama’s surrogates want this race ended in April?”
“Has any other candidate been told they should just give up, while he still had supporters and money to keep campaigning?”
HillBuzz knows the idea of Hillary Clinton quitting (when she now leads Obama by over 100,000 in all popular votes cast) is ludicrous, since no one in history, in her position, has ever been bullied out of a primary race. But, many of Hillary Clinton’s supporters don’t know how to hit back at Russert and Matthews, and all their ilk, when they perpetuate mistruths and misperceptions about Hillary Clinton’s very real path to nomination in this race.
Telling Hillary Clinton she needs to pack up and go home is like stopping the 2004 World Series at game three and just arbitrarily calling it for the Yankees, because all the media experts know the Red Sox are never going to win, and because “everyone” finds the Yankees so inspirational (it’s their pinstripes: they’re dazzling).
Or, while we are being arbitrary, what about ending the 2008 Superbowl at halftime, or even with half an hour left to go, just because people have to get up early in the morning and are tired of watching the game go on, and “everyone” just knows Tom Brady and his Patriots have the game all sewn up, so why not just skip ahead to the conclusion pundits want, and the story they want to tell, with Tom Brady and the Patriots taking home the prize? Eli Manning: it is time for you to go!
Or, how about, in this year’s NCAA match up between Kansas City and Memphis, turning off the lights and shooing out the crowd with 5 minutes left on the clock, because “everyone” is sure Memphis has the game in the bag? Conventional wisdom, of course, knows best, and the talking heads always know best of all.
We could throw some hockey, soccer, horse racing, tennis, golf, cricket, water polo, and competitive mahjong at you too, but you get the idea (or, we hope you do, because we don’t really have a good mahjong example at hand, in the interest of full and complete disclosure here).
Let’s recap:
Baseball has nine innings.
Football has two halves.
Basketball has four quarters.
This is all set up well ahead of time, and nobody leaves before all innings, halves, quarters, or whatever are completed. That’s just not how things work. Nobody wins until the entire match is played, to conclusion, regardless of what the media thinks or the experts predict, or what the odds are in Vegas. Nobody left the Super Bowl at halftime because Chris Matthews wanted them to.
The Democratic Party, in its infinite wisdom, scheduled primaries through June, culminating in its Denver party convention in August, which ostensibly is required to choose a party nominee (or else, the question begs, what is the party convention for, and why do taxpayers foot any of the bill for it?).
In the past, Obama supporters, such as Ted Kennedy and Jesse Jackson, took their campaigns all the way to their respective year’s party conventions, without any qualms from the media. That’s what the Democratic Party Convention is presumably for, to decide the party’s nominee. Right? Or, hence, you’ve just established the convention’s irrelevance.
In 1980, the Democratic Convention was held in New York City, with sitting-President Jimmy Carter challenged for the nomination by Ted Kennedy. Despite Carter having 2,129 delegates to Kennedy’s 1,150 (and Carter’s 37 states to Kennedy’s 12), Kennedy contested the nomination through the convention and actually fought to switch delegates from Carter to himself. That’s right, Obama-supporter Ted Kennedy fought for the nomination through the convention, despite trailing Carter by roughly ONE THOUSAND delegates. There were no calls for Kennedy to quit, despite this 1,000 delegate difference between them.
Fast-forward to 1984, and the infamous San Francisco Democratic Convention that so inspired Jeanne Kilpatrick. Walter Mondale carried 19 states, Gary Hart took 27, and Jesse Jackson won 4. The race was not decided until June, on what was then called “Super Tuesday III”, when South Dakota, New Mexico, West Virginia, California, and New Jersey voted (all states, save the yet-to-vote South Dakota and West Virginia, that Hillary Clinton has won in 2008, incidentally). Mondale entered the convention with 2191 delegates, Hart 1200, and Jesse Jackson 485. Once again, roughly 1,000 delegates separated the two big contenders for the nomination, and both Mondale and Hart battled it out through the summer and the convention, with no calls for anyone to drop out. Obama-supporter Jackson himself vehemently refused to drop out, despite being a distant third. No one told Jackson he didn’t have the right to fight to the convention.
In 1988, Michael Dukakis, Jesse Jackson, and Al Gore contested the nomination, with Dukakis winning 30 states to Jackson’s 9 and Gore’s 7. Jesse Jackson contested all primaries leading up to the convention, scoring 1218 delegates in the end to Dukakis’ 2687. More than 1400 delegates separated Dukakis and Jackson, yet no one told Jackson to just give up and go home (that made the second time Jackson fought for the nomination to the convention). Jackson ran a spirited campaign and used his strong second-place finish to enact most of the proportionality reforms that have created the close contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in 2008 (Clinton would be close to securing the nomination today, on April 24th, if pre-Jackson, winner-take-all primaries still existed).
Bill Clinton did not secure the Democratic Party nomination until June in 1992, entering the convention in New York City with 3372 delegates to Jerry Brown’s 596 and Paul Tsongas’ 289. Clinton won 39 states, Brown won 3, and Tsongas won 6.
1996 saw no serious challenge to incumbent President Bill Clinton, who won all delegates and all 50 states.
In 2000, Vice President Gore ran unchallenged after Bill Bradley dropped out of the race, subsequent to his second place finish to Gore in New Hampshire. Gore walked into the convention with 3432 delegates, to Bradley’s 414. Gore won all 50 states when Bradley withdrew from the race after just two contests.
John Kerry claimed 46 states to John Edwards’ 2 and Howard Dean’s lone state and special district (Vermont, plus Washington DC) in 2004. Howard Dean was an early frontrunner, propelled largely by the enthusiasm of young voters and Dean’s call for change in American politics. Dean’s impressive Internet fundraising and his support from Moveon.org also made Dean the media’s darling in the race, affording him frontrunner status and positive campaign coverage. John Edwards withdrew from the race on March 2, after Super Tuesday, in which Edwards did not win any states, despite a vigorous and spirited campaign that raised many important issues, such as addressing poverty and healthcare in America. Kerry entered the party’s convention in Boston with 2162 delegates, to Edwards’ 534 and Dean’s 170. Once again, there was more than 1,000 delegates separating the nomination winner from the second-place opponent.
So, in modern history, in the age of increased media coverage, no candidate for the Democratic Party’s nomination has been urged, pressured, scolded, bullied, or ordered to withdraw from the race, despite trailing the frontrunner by over 1,000 delegates en route to the various party conventions.
But, there’s never been a woman trying to break through the all-boys club before.
Hillary Clinton leads Barack Obama in total votes cast during the 2008 primaries. Including the automatic delegates from Florida and Michigan — elected members of government and party officials whose delegate votes are NOT tied to any primary, and whose votes DNC rules have NO PROVISION for stripping —, Hillary Clinton trails Barack Obama by less than 100 delegates. Her two biggest states, in terms of popular vote potential, are still ahead of her in West Virginia and Kentucky.
If primaries are scheduled through June, and every even remotely close race in Democratic party history was carried through to the convention (where “remotely”, up until 2008, was defined as “around 1,000 delegates separating the two leaders”), then there is no valid argument for Hillary Clinton to leave this race when she leads Obama in popular votes and trails him by a mere 100 delegates (when DNC rules regarding automatic delegates are applied accurately to the current delegate tallies).
No one told Eli Manning to quit. A stadium full of people and millions at home cheered him on to keep fighting.
And look how that turned out for the New York Giants.
