I am no fan of the NY Times. The hatchet job those folks did, in editorials and largely fictional "news" of the Duke non-rape, non-assault case was appalling.
But, they have it right, right now.
First, on the Bear-Stearns bailout. Are you KIDDING me? I remember in the late 1980s when all my cheeKAHgo boy friends who worked in Chile were telling me confidently that the regime meant it, it really did. No bailouts. Oh, until some banks failed, banks owned by the pro-regime elite. 1983, and again in 1989. Turned out that free-market principles don't extend to letting your pals go bankrupt, even if they deserve it. In 1989 Chile passed the "Law Establishing the Central Bank of Chile, Law No. 18840." To make these bailoutsofourrichfriends easier. Bye, bye, now, cheeKAHgos.
Second, Stanley Fish (Stanley FREAKING Fish, of Duke Psychotic English Department fame!) totally nails the issues, the analysis, and logic of the superdelegate "crisis."
3 comments:
But, didn't BS shareholders lose their shirts? In what sense do you mean that BS was bailed out? Seems that BS creditors got bailed out, and perhaps JPM picked up a bargain (or is on the hook for a big payout--which they will transfer to the Fed/us). But to suggest that somehow the owners of BS have been made whole seems a bit, ummm, inaccurate?
Or am I wrong here?
Fish is correct. If their only function is to follow the will of the majorities in their districts and their states, then the superdelegates serve no purpose.
The thing is this: the superdelegates do have some responsiblity, one could argue, to maximize the likelihood of the Democrat winning the general election.
If the superdelegates vote differently from the primary election voters--specifically, if Obama enters the convention with a lead among pledged delegates and the superdelegates cause the nomination to go to Clinton--it will destroy the party going into the general election.
Yes, as Fish argues, such an argument is consistent with the "rules". But what matters to public perception--and in the effort to turn out voters--is the perceived legitimacy of the process, not a legalistic determination of its validity.
I certainly hope the superdelegates are not foolish enough to put their own political loyalties to Clinton above the need to win the election in November.
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