Some people think the primary election is over in Texas. Some people are wrong. There are still 35 delegates to the national convention up for grabs in the state caucus process that started on primary night, March 4th. That night we elected delegates for Senator Obama and Senator Clinton to the Senate district convention on Saturday, which will elect delegates to the state convention (about 8000 state delegates and alternates).
We called up all the Obama delegates from our precinct to talk strategy, and found out that one of our delegates is now "undecided". We also know that she has been to a state convention before (ie has been active in Democratic politics) and is the sister of a Clinton delegate from our precinct.
It turns out that at the precinct level we are not pledged, but are in fact free to vote our conscience. What that means is that there is nothing wrong with being undecided. What bothers me is the idea that she probably signed up as an Obama delegate with the intention of switching. There's something wrong with that. Our precinct is large enough to elect a state delegate all by itself, and we have a big margin, so her flipping by itself does not endanger our Obama senate-district delegate. But what if there are others?
We've been to several Obama training sessions, rallies, and so forth, and are in several mailing lists, and never has this subject come up. What I'm saying is, there's no way you can say "both sides do this": it's cheating. And it looks like there's nothing we can do about it. The rules seem to be set up to permit this kind of thing.
These shenanigans do seem to fit with the general attitude of the Clinton camp. They believe the nomination is rightfully theirs, justifying all measures fair and foul necessary to obtain it.
The delegates from the Senate district convention are pledged, at least.
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