Ann Coulter remarks in Human Events on the irony of media’s “Shut-up-and-go-away!” approach to Hillary’s primary popular vote victory.

When Gore won the popular vote in the 2000 election by half a percentage point, but lost the Electoral College — or, for short, “the constitutionally prescribed method for choosing presidents” — anyone who denied the sacred importance of the popular vote was either an idiot or a dangerous partisan.

But now Hillary has won the popular vote in a Democratic primary, while Obambi has won under the rules. In a spectacular turnabout, media commentators are heaping sarcasm on our plucky Hillary for imagining the “popular vote” has any relevance whatsoever. …

After nearly eight years of having to listen to liberals crow that Bush was “selected, not elected,” this is a shocking about-face. Apparently unaware of the new party line that the popular vote amounts to nothing more than warm spit, just last week HBO ran its movie “Recount,” about the 2000 Florida election, the premise of which is that sneaky Republicans stole the presidency from popular vote champion Al Gore. (Despite massive publicity, the movie bombed, with only about 1 million viewers, so now HBO is demanding a “recount.”)

So where is Kevin Spacey from HBO’s “Recount,” to defend Hillary, shouting: “WHO WON THIS PRIMARY?”

Results:

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by over 300,000 votes. Barack Obama has 130 more pledged delegates.

POPULAR VOTE (all primaries and caucuses)
Hillary Clinton: 17,785,009
Barack Obama: 17,479,990

PLEDGED DELEGATES
Barack Obama: 1766.5
Hillary Clinton: 1639.5

And, on that basis, Hillary is reported “by informed sources” to be planning to drop out of the race and concede on Friday or Saturday.

The mystery is why “pledged delegates” are assumed to be set in stone.

Suppose Patrick Fitzgerald follows up his recent conviction of prominent Obama supporter (and real estate subsidizer) Antoin Rezko with a pre-August indictment of B. Hussein himself?

Suppose the Michelle Obama “Whitey” tape is produced pre-August, and provokes scrutiny revealing intimate ties on the part of the media’s preferred candidate to Louis Farrakhan and his Nation of Islam?

Barack Obama has been a national figure for a very short time, his relatively obscure career in Illinois politics is only now gradually becoming known, and there is a real possibility that the microscopic and intense attention inevitable in a presidential campaign might any day pop open one of his personal closet doors revealing a deal-breaking skeleton.

Short-circuiting the convention process and conducting a media-led instant coronation doubtless gratifies the infantile democrat party base, which can happily worship, and fantasize over the New Age and Socialist Utopia soon to be created by the arrival of their redeemer and god/king, but wasn’t the whole idea of having superdelegates supposed to be preventing these kinds of democrat party swoons? Weren’t superdelegates supposed to be wiser, more politically astute party leaders who would stop the crazies from charging over the cliff and nominating George McGovern II?

So here we are, and they’re apparently ready to line up behind the most leftwing democrat in the Senate, a candidate with no record of meaningful political accomplishment beyond miraculously getting elected to the Senate, who lost the popular vote in the democrat party primaries, and who already seems to have a great deal of disadvantageous personal baggage against a war hero with strong cross-party-lines appeal. Those democrats obviously have a death wish.

Conventional Liberal Republican versus wacky leftwing democrat who opposes national defense, it’s 1972 all over again. Quick, somebody hand B. Hussein a shovel, he’s going to need it to dig himself out from underneath the landslide come November.

Peter J. Wirs points out that the DNC Rules Committee’s artificial assignment of Michigan delegate votes to Barack Obama (who did not even run in that state’s primary) may not be as easy to pull off as the power brokers in that party’s back room supposed.

The democrat bosses forgot that federal election law exists. Hillary’s side has recourse, and it looks like Arlen Specter may be preparing to give her a hand.

This past Saturday, the Democratic National Committee Rules Committee voted, as many anticipated, on seating the Florida and Michigan Democratic delegates with only half of vote. Moreover, 59 Michigan delegates were awarded to Barak Obama, notwithstanding he was not on the January 15 Michigan primary ballot. As Clinton adviser and Rules committee member Harold Ickes asserted, the outcome for Michigan was a hijacking of voters’ intent because it assigned delegates to Mr. Obama even though he did not win them.

As we reported last week, Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA), the former chairman and now ranking minority member on the Senate Judiciary Committee, is seriously evaluating whether he should call for Congressional hearings. …

Specter, probably one of the most legally astute of GOP Senators, contends the DNC is violating one of the most fundamental of all constitutional rules, that once a vote is cast it must be counted. This constitutional principle, pronounced by the United States Supreme Court since Ex parte Yarborough (1884) and reiterated as recently as Gray v. Sanders (1963), is simply beyond reproach. This rock-bottom constitutional demand applies to primaries as well as general elections. …

No one is disputing the Democrats have every right to set what its rules are and how its delegates are to be selected.

But once the Democrats evoke the state’s machinery in order to hold a public primary, a bright line is crossed. As the Supreme Court in Gray v. Saunders observed state regulated party primaries “show that the State . . . collaborates in the conduct of the primary, and puts its power behind the rules of the party. It adopts the primary as a part of the public election machinery. The exclusions of voters made by the party by the primary rules become exclusions enforced by the State.” Grey v. Saunders went on to assert that “state regulation of this preliminary phase of the election process makes it state action.”

The issue isn’t that the DNC is asserting some “for members only” admission to a clubhouse. The issue is that the Great States of Florida and Michigan held primaries, which although concerning one or another of our two major political parties, is part of the electoral process. These primaries weren’t private affairs. They weren’t even party affairs. They were official state actions. The DNC was acting by virtue of the power delegated to it by the legislatures of both Florida and Michigan. The taxpayers of both Florida and Michigan, not the DNC, paid for the primaries. If the DNC wants to exclude voters, or count only half of the votes cast, or award Obama delegates he did not win, then they should hold private affairs (like that San Francisco cocktail reception where Obama asserts most of us are bitter by virtue of believing in God). Let them sell tickets and pay for the events themselves. …

when I go to the polls to vote, I don’t want someone to cancel or dilute my vote. I expect my vote to be count as one vote, nothing more, nothing less.

An Obama-packed rules committee, operating behind closed doors, first ejected a number of unhappy pro-Clinton demonstrators (see videos below), then cut the votes of the Florida and Michigan delegations in half. They then proceeded to divide Michigan’s votes (where Obama did not appear on the ballot) between Hillary and Obama > 69 (halved to 34.5 votes) – 59 (halved to 29.5 votes), conceding Hillary a slightly larger number. The slight concession secured Obama’s team a whopping 19-8 Rules Committee majority.

Dana Milbank describes how it all went.

Clinton campaign advisor Harold Ickes expressed indignation.

I rise in opposition, but I’ll sit. … We find it inexplicable that this body that is supposedly devoted to rules is going to fly in the face of, other than our affirmative action rules, the single most fundamental rule in the delegate selection process, that is fair reflection. …

I am stunned that we have the gall and the chutzpah to substitute our judgment for 600,000 voters. …

Hijacking four delegates is not a good way to start down the path of party unity.

Ickes argued that the principle of “fair reflection” should guarantee that delegate allocation reflect the actual vote tally.

Under the Rules Committee’s “compromise,” the state shifts four delegates to Barack Obama without justification, Ickes said.

Hell, why not take 10 of them, take 20 of them,” Ickes said. “Just keep on going.

Ickes threatened to take the fight to the August Convention.

———————————–

Deborah Foster was roughed up & ejected: 1:33 video

Harriet Christian of Manhattan is very angry, and promises McCain will be the next president of the United State 1:44 video

Hat tips (video 1 and video 2) to Jane Hamsher.

Politico describes democrat party efforts at negotiating a compromise between the Clinton and the Obama camps on the issue of the seating of delegations from Michigan and Florida.

Those people who believe all problems have solutions may be unfamiliar with the inner workings of the Democratic Party.

On Saturday, the party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee will try to solve a big problem, in order to avoid a huge problem in order to prevent a train wreck.

The big problem is what to do about Michigan and Florida, two states stripped last year of their delegates to the Democratic National Convention because both broke party rules and moved their primaries up too early in the election year.

The rules committee will try to work out a compromise Saturday to try to seat those states in some form or fashion. It will be difficult, and the 30 members of the committee, who come from all over the nation, have been warned to keep their hotel rooms Saturday night, because the meeting may go into Sunday.

The huge problem is what happens if one side or another does not like the rules committee’s compromise. In that case, the controversy would go to the 186-member Credentials Committee, which will convene in July or August.

And if that happens, the party will be presented with a possible train wreck: Whatever the Credentials Committee decides will have to be voted on by the Convention in late August as its first order of business. And this could create what the media might love but the party dreads: a floor fight in Denver.

Read the whole thing.

This is probably the battle which will decide the nomination. Whoever controls the credentials committee will have the key to securing the nomination.

Hillary is refusing to lie down, and has –as was predicted– finally played the Florida and Michigan card. After all, as we remember from 2000, counting every vote is vitally important to democrats.

Hoist by their own petard, the democrat party left is responding this morning in characteristic fashion to Hillary’s efforts to thwart their desires… by having a cow.

Andrew Sullivan does a particularly nice job of frothing.

The Clintons know no respect for rules or propriety or restraint in the pursuit of power. But Clinton’s latest speech in Florida should cause even veteran Clinton-hating jaws to drop some more….

How do you respond to a sociopath like this? She agreed that Michigan and Florida should be punished for moving up their primaries. Obama took his name off the ballot in deference to their agreement and the rules of the party. That he should now be punished for playing by the rules and she should be rewarded for skirting them is unconscionable.

I think she has now made it very important that Obama not ask her to be the veep. The way she is losing is so ugly, so feckless, so riddled with narcissism and pathology that this kind of person should never be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

Hillary is sitting pretty, armed with the argument possessing the greatest emotive force, and as ABC NEWS reports, she is not afraid to use it.

Sen. Hillary Clinton continued to push her popular vote argument. As an example, Clinton mentioned what happened in the elections in Zimbabwe to illustrate what can happen when the popular vote is not observed.

Speaking in Sunrise, Fla., Clinton said: “You heard Diana talk about coming from a country where votes don’t count. People go through the motions of an election only to have it discarded and disregarded. We’re seeing that right now in Zimbabwe — tragically an election was held, the president lost, they refused to abide by the will of the people. So we can never take for granted our precious right to vote.”

Clinton gave an abreviated version of her earlier speech, but made her argument for the popular vote to be the most important factor in this election again.

“Many of us believe that the candidate who got fewer votes was inaugurated president (in 2000),” Clinton said. “And we know that of all states, this state should have extra attention to make sure your votes are counted.”

How dare she! bleats Newsweek’s Jonathan Chait:

Hillary Clinton’s rhetoric today about counting the results in Florida and Michigan is simply incredible. Her speech compares discounting the Florida and Michigan primaries to vote suppression and slavery. …

They supported this “disenfranchisement.” Here’s a New York Times story from last fall, headlined, “Clinton, Obama and Edwards Join Pledge to Avoid Defiant States.”

Moreover, it’s obviously true that Obama not campaigning, organizing, or advertizing in those states hurt him, and helped the more familiar candidate in Clinton. She decided to campaign to change the rules only after it became her interest to do so.

This gambit by Clinton is simply an attempt to steal the nomination. It’s obviously not going to work, because Democratic superdelegates don’t want to commit suicide. But this episode is very revealing about Clinton’s character. I try not to make moralistic characterological judgments about politicians, because all politicians compromise their ideals in the pursuit of power. There are no angels in this business. Clinton’s gambit, however, truly is breathtaking.

If she’s consciously lying, it’s a shockingly cynical move. I don’t think she’s lying. I think she’s so convinced of her own morality and historical importance that she can whip herself into a moralistic fervor to support nearly any position that might benefit her, however crass and sleazy. It’s not just that she’s convinced herself it’s okay to try to steal the nomination, she has also appropriated the most sacred legacies of liberalism for her effort to do so. She is proving herself temperamentally unfit for the presidency.

It’s a pretty darn depressing election, what with no actual Republican running. At least we are getting some entertainment out of it, as the Clintons and their party’s leftwing base do the Vote Count two-step, hopping back and forth on “counting every vote” depending on exactly who is benefiting.

The nutroots left is adding another variation to its performance: the Clinton two-step. What fun it is to see the MoveOn.Org crowd which so passionately defended the Clintons through scandal after scandal, and then through Monica-gate and Impeachment, suddenly awake and discover the Clinton’s dark side.

We may have tragedy in November, but we’ve got comedy today.

Former UN Ambassador (and college classmate) John Bolton defends Bush’s “appeasement” remarks on Hannity & Colmes.

1:30 video

Via Gateway Pundit.

New York Post:

Today, Americans finally will start working for themselves rather than for their government masters. This milestone arrives two days later than in 2007, clearly proving that the era of big government is back with a vengeance. May 19 is Friedman Day, when the American Institute for Economic Research calculates that citizens finally will have toiled long enough to fund local, state and federal spending.

Investors Business Daily finds a key part of the problem is right here at home.

As President Bush traveled to Saudi Arabia to ask the House of Saud to open the oil spigots a bit wider, Congress showed once again how clueless it is when it comes to energy policy.

Underscoring its failure to grasp the nature of our current problems, the Senate Appropriations Committee on Friday refused to end its moratorium on oil shale development in Colorado.

“If we are really serious about reducing pain at the pump,” Colorado’s senior senator, Republican Wayne Allard, said, “this is a vote that would make a difference in people’s lives.” He’s right.

But the shale proposal went down to defeat with Allard and 13 other Republican members in favor and 15 Democrats opposed. Once again, Democrats were on the wrong side, opting to keep oil in the ground and punish you with higher prices as a result.

This was no minor thing. Estimates put the amount of oil locked in shale in both Canada and the U.S. at more than 1 trillion barrels. Pulling out even a tenth of that would quadruple our current reserves.

This is the same Congress that refuses to allow drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which holds up to 20 billion barrels of crude, or offshore, where another 30 billion await.

Meanwhile, Brazil — which recently made a major oil discovery almost in sight of Rio’s beaches — announced that it has leased 80% of the world’s deep-sea offshore oil rigs. In other words, Brazil unlike the U.S., isn’t dithering as prices soar. It’s drilling. …

The U.S. uses about 21 million barrels of oil a day. But only 8 million come from our own sources. That leaves a 13-million-barrel-a-day deficit that, at $126 a barrel, will cost us $600 billion to plug this year. That’s more than two-thirds of our total trade deficit.

Congress could reduce much of our oil shortfall by drilling for more on our own territory. This would lower prices and increase security. Yet, Congress seems dead set on doing the opposite.

With its failure to tap the vast supplies in ANWR and offshore, its passage of costly global-warming legislation and now its refusal to exploit our massive resources of oil shale, Congress has set us on a path to less energy, higher prices and weakened national security.

Susan Estrich reads some of the handwriting on the democrat party’s wall, then tries to be optimistic anyway.

It is a thought that sends shivers down the backs of Democrats, a name that brings to mind memories of an election lost that might have been won, against a war hero once referred to in headlines as a “wimp” who won not so much by his own strengths but because of the skill of his operatives in painting his lesser-known opponent as an out of touch “liberal” who refused to salute the flag or admit his mistakes, not to mention his supposedly unpatriotic wife.

Could Obama be another Dukakis?

It isn’t just die-hard Clinton supporters who are pointing out the similarities. Even some Obama backers who believe that the nomination fight is over see the possible parallels, and are determined to avoid them, or at least try.

Democrats want felons to vote and don’t want anyone asking for IDs. The latter objectionable practice would prevent fictitious persons and the deceased from exercising their franchise.

Now, Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry identifies one more constituency ideal for democrats: kids!

I do understand that some children are too young to read the ballot or to perform the actual physical act of voting, and that those kids shouldn’t vote directly. I believe that for very small children, their parents should vote in their stead. However, as soon as they can vote, kids should be able to. What age? 16? 15? 14? 7? Actually, I think another age barrier would be just as senseless as the one we have now. Kids should be able to get the vote when they decide they want the vote. A child who is old enough to vote (and who is a better judge of that than himself?) should be able to walk into his friendly neighborhood voting registration office and register for himself.

(There is also the matter of which parent gets the vote. This is a false debate: each country’s law has rules to decide who has parental authority in cases of divorce, etc. Whoever has parental authority should vote for the kids.)

If you base your politics on nothing but crude oversimplifications and appeals to emotion, of course you’d want kids making all the decisions.

Darryl Fears, in a Washington Post blog, quotes Toni Morrison, in a recent Time magazine interview, distancing herself from the Clintons by asserting that people who read her New Yorker description of Bill Clinton as “the first black president” misunderstood her.

People misunderstood that phrase. I was deploring the way in which President Clinton was being treated, vis-à-vis the sex scandal that was surrounding him. I said he was being treated like a black on the street, already guilty, already a perp. I have no idea what his real instincts are, in terms of race.

It’s true that Morrison’s “first black president” comment was occasioned by the necessity for leftists like herself to defend William Jefferson Clinton in the midst of the Monica Lewinsky sex-and-perjury scandal, and Morrison did indeed attempt to depict Mr. Clinton as being railroaded (and, in her own hypertrophied rhetoric, “lynched” and “crucified,” just like a poor black man), but the heart of her comparison, the section quoted time and time again by a nation, half chuckling in agreement, half shaking its head in embarrassed chagrin at the use of these racial stereotypes by a famous black novelist, was:

White skin notwithstanding, this is our first black President. Blacker than any actual black person who could ever be elected in our children’s lifetime. After all, Clinton displays almost every trope of blackness: single-parent household, born poor, working-class, saxophone-playing, McDonald’s-and-junk-food-loving boy from Arkansas.

And, though she didn’t actually write it down, every New Yorker reader read between-the-lines the additionally silently-implied comparison: “sexually promiscuous, predacious, and incapable of self-restraint, can’t keep it in his pants.”

We misunderstood her? I don’t think so.