Whaddaya say we decide which nominee will be the Democratic standard bearer in November in a smoke-filled room?
Of the 795 superdelegates, over 40 percent have not announced which candidate they are supporting; I’m one of them. While it would be comfortable for me to delay making a decision until the convention, the reality is that I’ll have all the information I reasonably need in June, and so will my colleagues across the country.
There will have been more than 20 debates, and more than 28 million Americans will have made their choices and voted. Any remaining uncertainty in our nominee will then lie with the superdelegates, and it will be time for us to make our choices and get on with the business of electing a president.
This is not a proposal for a mini-convention with all the attendant hoopla and sideshows. It is a call for a tight, two-day business-like gathering, whose rules would be devised by the national committee, of the leaders of our party from all over America to resolve a serious problem. There would be a final opportunity for the candidates to make their arguments to these delegates, and then one transparent vote.
I’m sure that Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen’s idea for a convention outside the convention AKA “smoke-filled room” rather than the public, gauche, boring Democratic National Convention will go over swimmingly.
It wouldn’t be filled with real smoke, of course.
The great Seraphic Lords and Cherubim
In close recess and secret conclave sat
A thousand Demy-Gods on golden seats,
Frequent and full. After short silence then
And summons read, the great consult began.
John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book I
Will they send up white smoke when they’ve made their selection? Habemus candidatum!
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Don’t forget that smoking isn’t carbon-neutral, therefore it’s verboten.
Well, of course the candidate at this point will be selected by what amounts to the pre-Watergate rules. The only questions are when the selection will be made, will it be one of the current candidates (and if so which), and whether the process will break up the party (assuming a losing election) or only cause the drastic rejiggering of the candidate selection rules.
In my view the Bredesen plan achieves the opposite of what it might be expected to. It maximizes the sense that a fix is in.
If you’re going to abandon even the pretext of due process, why not thank everybody for their activity and have the Democratic National Committee make the choice? They could do it in a week.