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It's Pointless, But Still Worth Arguing About

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By DANIEL RUTH

The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 20, 2008

This was so ... so ... oh, so Democratesque - undertaking an exercise that has no meaning and still managing to turn it into a hissy fit.

By now, you may have noticed that Hillary Rodham Clinton has become the hustings equivalent of "Monty Python and the Holy Grail's" insipid Black Knight, who continues to insist after both arms and legs have been cut off that "it's just a flesh wound!"

To be sure, the New York senator has fought the good fight in attempting to win her party's presidential nomination, which isn't easy when your stump persona is somewhere between "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" and the Angel of Death.

But, now that her "Hubris On The Hustings Tour" is coming to an end, it has become painfully obvious to everyone except, it seems, Hillary Clinton, that she has about as much of a chance of being the Democratic nominee as the Unabomber.
Peace Sign
So considering the only way she might win the nomination would require a giant pterodactyl to fly off with Barack Obama, last weekend provided a swell opportunity for Democrats to come together, sing "Kumbaya" and exchange peace sign buttons.

State Democratic Party officials, whose job is a bit like being in charge of a bunch of third-graders eyeing the last piece of pizza, assembled their fellow travelers to choose the final 40 delegates, whose role will mean essentially nothing at a convention this summer where the state's full delegation will have less clout than a constitutional scholar in the Bush administration.

Considering the bucket of warm spit importance to all of this, is it little wonder an argument broke out?

Because the Florida Legislature moved its primary date to January on the theory the nation's fourth-largest state ought to have more juice in selecting a presidential candidate than a suburb of Canada, the clipboard of condo association presidents of the Democratic National Committee stripped Florida of its delegates to the national convention this summer.

Electoral Apartheid

Thus this weekend's exercise was designed to compile a list of delegates should reason prevail and the DNC decides not to impose a form of ballot box apartheid on a perfectly valid election, which occurred in January, giving Hillary Clinton a victory.

In the run-up to Saturday's meeting to select meaningless delegates, the Obama camp cried foul, arguing it hadn't been given a fair chance to participate in a meaningless effort to select delegates to be ignored by the DNC.

But that was only because, so the Clinton people retorted, the Obama camp hadn't bothered to needlessly come to Florida to engage in a charade of a campaign no one would recognize.

There's some logic lurking here somewhere.

Thank Gawd, DNC Raccoon Lodge Chairman Howard Dean, who makes Mr. Dithers look like Daniel Patrick Moynihan, was in town last night to demonstrate he is more impotent in solving the delegate problem than Jake Barnes in "The Sun Also Rises."

Not to worry, though. In a bold, statesmanlike move, the DNC has done what it does best - scheduled a meeting for May 31. Ah, progress!

Keyword: Book of Ruth, to read and comment on Daniel Ruth's blog.

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