Some are more equal than others

I remember 1984. It was the first year that I voted, and as a Democrat it was a lesson in humility. Walter Mondale—the presidential nominee who lost in 49 states—had not been my choice in the primaries, but I supported him in the general election because I didn't think the working class in this country could survive another four years of Reaganesque government.

I was torn in the primaries between a personal hero—Sen. John Glenn, D-OH—and the rhetorical magic of Rev. Jesse Jackson, Sr. I was drawn to Rev. Jackson with each speech I heard, but I listened to folks I respected—elected Democrats and local party officials—who told me that Rev. Jackson couldn't win a national election. Their reasoning was based on more than race, it was based on the reverend's divisive political rhetoric from the past.

Mr. Glenn was different. He was a Marine fighter pilot, an astronaut, a centrist and had served in the US Senate for a decade. The fact that I was from Ohio made it rather easy for me to get behind Mr. Glenn so I canvassed for him in the run up to the Ohio primaries.

Whether from a plethora of good choices or from the lack of a leader able to unite the party, the Democratic convention opened without a clear choice for the nomination. It was the first time the superdelegates—created after the debacle of the 1980 convention—were called upon to assert their leadership. The result of the convention and the new power of the superdelegates was the choice of Mr. Mondale for the top job and a virtually unknown running mate—Rep. Geraldine Ferraro, D-NY—whose biggest contribution to the party was the creation of the superdelegate system.

The Reagan win that November was the nearest thing to a sweep this country has ever seen. He carried all but Minnesota and Washington, DC. Mrs. Ferraro's presence on the ticket couldn't even deliver her home state of New York. So much for the wisdom of the superdelegates.

In today's New York Times, Ms. Ferraro—still a superdelegate by virtue of her place on the ticket in 1984—lays out her rationale for obviating the popular vote, dismissing primary elections and caucuses, reversing rules established by the Democratic Party and adopting a Kremlin-like nominating process in an Op-Ed.

Her logic is filled with holes, and her desire to please the party elite meshes so nicely with what the right wing has said about the party that one begins to worry.

In spite of the evidence from the general election of 1984, she says that the superdelegate process worked. She authored the "longest platform in Democratic history, a document that stated the party’s principles in broad terms that neither the most liberal nor the most conservative elected officials would denounce." Ms. Ferraro is saying that the overwhelming majority of voters choosing the other guy wasn't as important as the fact that the superdelegates were pleased with the party platform.

She disputes the validity of excluding Michigan and Florida in spite of the state parties defiance of the DNC, but dismisses the importance of primaries and caucuses because they "do not necessarily reflect the will of rank-and-file Democrats." If that is the case, why should the results in Michigan and Florida matter?

Ms. Ferraro claims it would be "shocking if 30-percent of registered Democrats...participated" after admitting that she's impressed by this year's turnout. She says that primary turnouts are notoriously low. Low or not, these same primaries made it possible for her to ascend to a vice presidential nomination and helped pick a candidate in the 2o years since the DNC developed the superdelegate system.

According to Ms. Ferraro, the purpose of the superdelegates—to eliminate fractious politics at the convention— worked in 1984. How will denying the popularly elected candidate—as she advocates doing—help eliminate fractious politics? Those thousands of rank and file Democrats who have given $25 here, $100 there to Mr. Obama's campaign—the little guys that the Democratic Party has long claimed to champion—will effectively be told that big money matters, not the will of the little man.

For years the knock on the members of the lower economic echelon has been that they vote against their own interests. So here they are, city people, suburbanites, college students and bloggers, donating time and money to a candidate who appears to have their interests in mind and they are being told that "the superdelegates were created to lead, not to follow. They were, and are, expected to determine what is best for our party and best for the country."

In the words of George Orwell, Ms. Ferraro is effectively saying, "All Democrats are equal, some are just more equal than others."