The Final Week

We're studying Revelation tonight at the Bible study, but references to the final week doesn't have any apocalyptic meaning (at least I hope not). No, this is the final week of the 2008 primary season (unless of course the DNC rules committee decides to hold re-votes in Michigan and Florida -- which I doubt since there is neither time nor money to pull it off).
On Saturday the Rules committee will meet and I'm assuming will come up with a compromise solution that will seat the two renegade delegates but not in a way that would reward Hillary Clinton with anything other than few extra delegates. On Sunday Puerto Rico will vote -- electing 55 delegates (I'm not sure why a Commonwealth that can't vote in November has more delegates than quite a number of states that do). From what I'm hearing Hillary will win in this locale that knows the Clinton brand better than the Obama one. Then a week from today the last two states will vote -- South Dakota and Montana. If both go as expected, Obama will go out of the primary season on a winning note, even if the number of delegates available is rather small.
Then, we will wait to see what the remaining super-delegates do. Some may continue to hold out until August, but that's unlikely. I'm assuming that most will declare and urge the party to get behind the candidate with the most delegates. This fiction about popular vote is simply a ridiculous distraction. If this were about tallying up votes instead of delegates then candidates would campaign differently. Obama has an insurmountable number of delegates, unless the DNC were to essentially say to Clinton since she was the only name on the ballot in Michigan -- excepting Dodd and Kucinich -- she gets all the uncommitted ones as well as the ones she "won." In Florida she won 50% of the vote -- Obama got 33% and John Edwards 14% -- Richardson probably got most of the rest. So, since both former candidates have endorsed Obama -- why not that 50/50 solution?
The question now isn't whether Obama will be the nominee -- if the Super delegates were going to give this to her you'd see them move that direction, but they've been moving toward Obama since mid -February. Will she go quietly? Only time will tell. As Eugene Robinson writes in the Washington Post today, Clinton and her campaign -- as evidenced by strange statements -- show increasing signs of desperation and even self-delusion. Hopefully, they'll come back to earth -- and soon.

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