Democrats have some big quirks in their nomination process. Those arcane rules actually work to Hillary Clinton's advantage even if she loses a lot of primaries in the months ahead. Jay Cost over at Real Clear Politics delves into the arcana and breaks it down for mere mortals to understand. Bottom line, Clinton could lose a lot of primaries and still win the nomination. (Democrats can blame their own fundamentally undemocratic rules for this oddity.)
As you probably know, voters do not directly elect nominees. They register their preferences for presidential candidates – either through primaries or caucuses – and those preferences determine how many of a candidate's delegates go to the national convention. The nominee is the person who wins a majority of delegates. Strange indeed – but delegates, just like the conventions they attend, are holdovers from the era of state party dominance.
There are two features of the Democratic nomination process that could help Hillary.
First, Democratic primaries and caucuses allocate delegates proportionally. Candidates win "pledged" delegates based not on whether they win a state – but on how many voters support them. So, for instance, even though Clinton and Edwards lost Iowa, they still won a few delegates.
Second, about 20% of all delegates to the Democratic convention are "super" or "unpledged" delegates. This quirky provision – which does not have a corollary on the Republican side – has its origins in Chicago, 1968. In the wake of that disastrous convention, the DNC formed the McGovern-Fraser Commission to recommend improvements for the nomination process. McGovern-Fraser suggested that the process be opened to rank-and-file Democrats on the principle of "one Democrat, one vote." The reforms contributed to George McGovern (the same McGovern from the commission) winning the nomination in 1972. The party establishment did not like this. So, it added the super delegate provision to serve as a check on the party rank-and-file.
This year, according to the indispensable Green Papers, there will be 798 super delegates at the convention in Denver. They include all elected members of the Democratic National Committee, all current Democratic members of Congress (including non-voting delegates), all sitting Democratic governors, and past party luminaries (e.g. former presidents). Unlike pledged delegates, who are bound to particular candidates, super delegates are free to vote their consciences.
Cost lays it all out in detail. You can safely bet that these calculations have also been made by camp Clinton. Obama is still not assured the nomination, regardless of how the press is now playing the stories. Nor is the Clinton campaign dead.
There is another issue that is going to change both parties in a major way and that is the “open” primary. This is where Independents can vote in either party’s primary. Independents are the fastest growing political demographic in America and in places like Texas, out number both parties. This means that the candidates that garner the most independent votes during the primaries gets their candidate elected even though that candidate is not the favorite of the party base. The Independents can now swamp a party base in open primary states.
Looking at Iowa, it appears that most of the independents voted Democratic for Obama. That would explain the massive turnout for the Dems and a high but not massive turnout for the Reps. They were mostly independents. Independents will beat Hillary in New Hampshire, not fellow Democrats.
Open primaries pollute the system.
Question: Who will be the first to claim voting irregularities or fraud and who will be the accused?