"I like my delegates like I like my coffee ... dark and bitter"
Posted on 04/12/2008 8:08:05 PM PDT by anonsquared
Editor's note: Margaret and Ray Copenhaver were among more than 800 state Democrats whose eligiblity to be pledged delegates for Sen. Barack Obama was reinstated by the Obama campaign late Thursday. The Copenhavers will travel to a Sacramento caucus meeting on Sunday, where two Obama delegates will be chosen to represent California's 3rd congressional district. Those interested in joining them can call 257-0270.
It was supposed to be a feel-good story.
Margaret and Ray Copenhaver had chartered two buses to take them and all the voting-age friends they could gather to a Sacramento caucus meeting on Sunday, where they hoped to become pledged delegates for Barack Obama. Not content with merely being ardent Obamacrats, the Calaveras County couple with a tax practice in Jackson wanted to make their support for the Illinois senator official.
The Copenhavers were among 25 Obama supporters running to be pledged delegates for the 3rd congressional district, which envelops the counties of Amador, Calaveras and Alpine, as well as most of Sacramento County and part of Solano County. Fifteen from the district are running to support Hillary Clinton.
Then political reality set in and Obama's campaign office in Sacramento "pruned" the Copenhavers from the list of running delegates. Margaret said she and her husband were given no explanation, though she has her theories.
"We believe they've already picked delegates they want to win," she told the Ledger Dispatch Thursday. "They don't know Ray or I. We live in a rural county. We're strangers to them."
Kim Mack, the regional field organizer for Obama's California campaign, said that claim was "based on no fact whatsoever."
Mack said she received a "threatening" e-mail from the Copenhavers demanding to have their names reinstated, but said the decision was made at a higher level by state campaign directors. She admitted that the Copenhavers weren't flagged as Clinton supporters during her vetting.
The Copenhavers plan to fight the decision - they expected to meet with a Sacramento attorney yesterday and file an emergency writ to get themselves back on the ballot - but their disenfranchisement reveals the cracks in an increasingly competitive race between Obama and fellow Democratic Sen. Clinton to be the party's nominee for president. With neither likely to secure the needed number of delegates to be the party's chosen nominee, both candidates are jockeying for position as they head to August's Democratic National Convention in Denver.
On Wednesday, the Clinton campaign abruptly switched the location of its caucus meeting from Davis to Mira Loma High School in Sacramento. The move was said to be due to complaints that the Veterans Memorial Center was nowhere near the geographical heart of the district, but it came soon after a flap over money the University of California at Davis says it is owed by the Clintons from a speaking engagement last month.
The intensity of the race has carried over to California, where thousands are running to be pledged delegates for one of the two candidates. California has 370 delegates to award, 204 of which are supposed to go to Clinton as a result of the Feb. 5 primary. An estimated 2,500 people are running to fill 241 delegate spots open Sunday. The remaining pledged delegates will be chosen in May. Mack is running in District 5.
In an historic race like this one, convincing registered Democrats they will vote for who they say they will is one hump the Copenhavers expected to face. But they figured they'd have the chance to at least make their case.
According to state delegate rules, "no delegate at any level of the delegate selection process shall be mandated by law or party rules to vote contrary to that person's presidential choice as expressed at the time the delegate is elected."
Of course, nothing says pledged delegates have to vote as promised, either. There's a growing concern that delegates will go to the Democratic convention and flip, or be flipped, by the opposing campaigns.
With only a week to weed through roughly 1,900 names, Mack said Obama volunteers did the best they could. Something she said hasn't been acknowledged is the "significantly larger" number of people who are running to be Obama delegates rather than Clinton delegates. "It just made it unmanageable," she said of the large numbers.
Of the Copenhavers, Mack said she had "never heard of these people" before the delegate race.
"Campaigns are paranoid by nature," said Judy Hotchkiss, a member of the Democratic Club of Amador and Clinton supporter. "(Delegates) can go against their word, but it's rare. It's extremely rare."
Hotchkiss was a pledged delegate for Jimmy Carter when he was challenging Edward Kennedy for the party's nomination in 1980. Hotchkiss remembers that race being "fairly contentious," though no one lobbied her to switch sides.
On Wednesday, the Copenhavers said they were drawn to Obama because of his pledge to end the war in Iraq, his health care plan and economic policies. The only way they could see themselves supporting Clinton would be if Obama backed out and supported her or if she became the eventual nominee. "We need to convince our supporters that we're loyal and honest," Margaret said.
She may not get that chance. Margaret and her husband are hoping Obama will intervene on their behalf and are still planning to make the trip Sunday.
"Our buses are still on. Our campaign is still on," she said. "This is not democracy if you don't let a democratic vote happen."
Despite what some are saying, Hotchkiss believes this elongated race has been good for the Democratic Party. At least, that was Wednesday, when she said an unprecedented number of people are flocking to the party and turning red counties blue.
"I haven't seen this kind of energy since McGovern," Hotchkiss said, though she hopes Democrats fare better this time. "Everybody's aware that we can't let this rip us apart."
"It's important to remember this is about getting Obama elected," Mack said, "not who becomes the delegate."
For more information about the upcoming caucus meetings on Sunday, visit www.cadem.org.
So late Thursday the Obama campaign reinstates these delegates. Do you think it has any thing to do with trying to head off a RURALGATE?
Did they sign a Loyalty Oath to General Party Secretary Obama? Have they pledged their loyalty to the Party of the Proletariat and Toiling Typical White Masses?
Notice this line:
“Of the Copenhavers, Mack said she had “never heard of these people” before the delegate race.”
These people? THESE PEOPLE?!? But of course, Democrats are not prejudiced.
Surprise, surprise, Kim Mack lives in an urban center and in fact has a job working for the County of Sacramento. Got a question for you Kim, why is it YOU PEOPLE (leftest socialists) always have government jobs? And how much time at work - AT TAXPAYERS EXPENSE - are you spending coordinating the Obama Sacramento campaign?
Thank you Rush.
There are so many interesting and reveiling stories out as a result of OC a person doesn’t know where to begin.
Well, perhaps this couple will wake up and smell the dark, bitter coffee - and realize the Democrat party is not the place for truth, justice, and the American way.
??? That doesn't leave anything out, then. Obama wins, it's moot; Obama quits, they'll roll 666; Hillary wins, they'll still roll 666.
You can't make this stuff up!
President McGovern! Don’t we all remember him well? /s
Too late. Obamasama and his 120000 dwarves have lost rural America.
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