DNC Rules and The Real Disenfranchised in Michigan and Florida
As the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee meeting goes on and on and on about the Michigan and Florida delegation issue, Josh Marshall at TPM makes an excellent point: "The Clinton campaign argues that if the delegates from these non-sanctioned primaries are not seated hundreds of thousand of voters in Florida and Michigan will be disenfranchised.
"What doesn't get mentioned, however, is this: it was widely reported and understood in both Florida and Michigan that the results of these primaries would not be counted. And based on that knowledge, large numbers of voters in both states simply didn't participate.
"If the DNC were now to turn around and decide to make these contests count after all, these non-participating voters would be disenfranchised no less than the people who did turn out would be if the DNC sticks to the rules and doesn't seat any of the delegates. The simple fact is that large numbers of people, acting on accurate knowledge and in good faith, decided that there wasn't a real primary being held in their state on the day in question and on that basis decided not to participate.
"Now, the question is, How can we really know how many people didn't show up because they were told it wasn't a real election? There is of course no way to arrive at a direct answer, at least no practical one. But this post by Eric Kleefeld, which builds on a statistical analysis by Gregory P. Nini and Glenn Hurowitz, makes a very strong case that as many as one million voters in Florida and probably more than a half million voters in Michigan did not vote who otherwise would have if they had not believed that the results would not be counted."
"What doesn't get mentioned, however, is this: it was widely reported and understood in both Florida and Michigan that the results of these primaries would not be counted. And based on that knowledge, large numbers of voters in both states simply didn't participate.
"If the DNC were now to turn around and decide to make these contests count after all, these non-participating voters would be disenfranchised no less than the people who did turn out would be if the DNC sticks to the rules and doesn't seat any of the delegates. The simple fact is that large numbers of people, acting on accurate knowledge and in good faith, decided that there wasn't a real primary being held in their state on the day in question and on that basis decided not to participate.
"Now, the question is, How can we really know how many people didn't show up because they were told it wasn't a real election? There is of course no way to arrive at a direct answer, at least no practical one. But this post by Eric Kleefeld, which builds on a statistical analysis by Gregory P. Nini and Glenn Hurowitz, makes a very strong case that as many as one million voters in Florida and probably more than a half million voters in Michigan did not vote who otherwise would have if they had not believed that the results would not be counted."
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