FL and MI Have Already Been Penalized

By moving up their primaries, Florida and Michigan forfeited the most valuable coin in the nominating process: influence.

The scuttlebutt about the upcoming DNC rules meeting is that Florida and Michigan delegations' vote will be halved. This would be fine if that penalty had been specified in advance, as is the case with the Republicans. But the DNC laid a trap for itself because seating of any FL and MI delegates amounts to "changing the rules in the middle of the game." Seating the delegations at half strength just leaves an opening for Clinton to appeal and stretch out the process.

The solution is clear: seat both delegations at full strength according to the only data available, the primary results. Allocate the 55 Michigan "uncommitted" to Obama as the only Clinton opponent still running. This takes the issue off the table completely and would cut into Obama's delegate lead (now just short of 200) only temporarily because next Wednesday the superdelegate floodgates will open for Obama and this will all be over.

You might argue there should be a penalty for breaking the rules. There should, and it's already been paid. Keep in mind the reason FL and MI defiantly moved their primaries up: they thought, like most, that the nomination would be decided in early February and they wanted some clout in determining the nominee. Since they'll be seated only after the issue is decided, they'll have no influence. They'll have official votes at the convention, but they'll be window dressing.

Yes, there's plenty of room for reform of this process, and one very useful step would be to adopt the Republican rule. It's one of the few of their policies that's made sense.

UPDATE: Seems that opinion is opposed so far, but that's OK. The main problem is that disqualifying two states completely is, as a practical and political matter, unenforceable. I read a story recently where the party secretary, who'll call the roll of states and the convention, said something to the effect of "What am I going to do, say 'Michigan--oops, never mind.'" It's true that HRC and her people agreed to the rules in advance. It's equally true that the DNC has dug itself into a hole with a draconian and impractical penalty. Reasonable people can disagree (and here they have!), but unfortunately we're at the point where the solutions differ only because some are less bad than others.

Keep in mind also this imbroglio came about in part because of the insanely disproportionate role of Iowa and New Hampshire. Until someone finds a way to crack that, we'll go through this again.

Having said that, most of us can agree that we hope this will be over soon-very soon.

UPDATE 2: The key is how Clinton reacts to whatever comes out of the Saturday meeting. Unless I'm wrong (and I hope I am), she will fight anything less than full seating of the delegation, keeping the party divided for critical weeks. The question has come down to "Is this worth losing the election over?"