BlakeHuggins.com

This was a big weekend politically speaking.  At least two major things happened.

First, Barack Obama officially “resigned” (does anyone else find that to be weird terminology?) his membership at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.  To me, this is unfortunate.  From a political point of view, I completely understand why Obama did it and perhaps it is the best for Trinity as well since members have been badgered and the congregation has been put under the microscope the last several months. (An aside, this is really great article on the whole matter, spot on I think)

But, this is a bit troubling too.  I agree with Jeremy, have we really reached the point of driving our politicians away from their faith communities? As much as I’d like to disbelieve it, it seems that our poisonous, divisive, political arena has become so politicized and partisan that many our elected officials, and in this case even our viable candidates, cannot be involved in a faith community at all. Apparently, the president of the UCC agrees.   That’s sad.  

And on a certain level, I can’t help but wonder if all of this driving away is related to the bitter taste we have in our mouth from the past (and in some cases still present) dominance of the religious right and the “moral majority” in politics.  Hmmm.

Second, the Democratic National Committee did a good thing and a bad thing this weekend in their decision to retain all Florida and Michigan delegates from their primaries with the penalty of half a vote.  Ultimately all of this comes down to the rules and has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with “every person’s vote being counted” as the Clinton campaign keeps preaching.  I support voter’s rights just as much as the most stringent Clinton supporter, but the fact is both Florida and Michigan blatantly disregarded the rules the decided by the DNC.  And that’s all there is too it.  The broke the rules.  They have to be penalized.  It has nothing to do with voters being disenfranchised.  The states thought they were above the law and they have to answer for that.  Period.

So, the good thing.  The DNC allowed the Florida results to stand with all the delegates retain half a vote. That’s fair.  Both Clinton and Obama were on the ballot and neither actively campaign there.  So, the vote is acknowledged while allowing the penalty to take effect.  The result is Clinton gets 105 pledged delegates from Florida and Obama gets 67.  Like I said, pretty fair.

The bad thing.  Although I am a public Obama supporter, I disagree with the DNC’s decision concerning Michigan.  The decision is the same as Florida, but the circumstances a very different.  Clinton received the majority of the vote in Michigan and Obama didn’t even appear on the ballot.  Neither candidate actively campaigned in the state.  However, the DNC’s decision gave Clinton her recorded vote and then proceeded to give all the “uncommitted” vote to Obama.  Now, I know most of those uncommitted voters were likely for Obama, but not all of them were and at that point in time Clinton and Obama weren’t the only candidates in the race.  So I don’t think Obama deserves all the uncommitted vote because it never was completely his in the first place.  The result in Michigan is that Clinton received 69 pledged delegates to Obama’s 59.  Not very fair in my opinion.

The bottom line: none of this really matters anyway.  Before the DNC’s ruling, Obama led Clinton by 202.  His lead has been cut to 174, but it’s still enough.  The numbers simply aren’t there for Clinton.  Obama will be the Democratic nominee.  That will become overwhelmingly clear tomorrow night.  I doubt it will become official.  I hope it does, but the Clinton camp has vowed to take this all the way the the rules and credentials committee the end of this month.  

But, it won’t matter.  It’s over.  And I’m becoming more convinced the Hillary Clinton is hell bent on hurting Obama’s chances as much as she can by carrying this on so she might have a chance in 2012.