Results of DNC-RBC Cmte.

The Democratic National Committee's Rules and By-laws Committee, after vigorous debate, basically voted to seat the Michigan and Florida delegations with 1/2 vote per delegate (pledged and super).

According to the findings, Clinton will gain 87 pledged delegates and Obama will gain 63 and Edwards will gain 6.5 (from Florida). If one assumes Edwards' delegates will shift to Obama based on Edwards' endorsement of Obama, Obama will gain a total of 69.5, not including the handful of super delegate from each state that have already endorsed him but had also been excluded from the total.

Before the new math on MI and FL, Obama had 1985 total delegates with 2026 needed to win. After the new math, something like 2105 delegates will be needed to win. Today's events give Obama just under 2055, meaning that he will carry the nomination by Tuesday's contest in Montana and South Dakota with an assist from Puerto Rico – even without securing another superdelegate endorsement before then.

I suspect the Obama campaign prefers to win the nomination as a result of an electoral contest rather than on a superdelegate's endorsement. So look forward to an awesome speech Tuesday night!

Interestingly the vote to seat the Michigan delegation, perhaps the most contentious challenge of the two as Obama's name wasn't on the ballot there and which was pushed by the Clinton campaign, won 19-8 with no abstentions out of 30.

The Clinton campaign sought to block the motion to seat the Michigan delegate, ironically, because it wanted to have the delegates given their full vote at the convention. But only 8 Clinton supporters voted that way, meaning that 5 Clinton endorsers sought to avoid a divisive and contentious outcome.

Only 8 members of the committee have endorsed Obama.

Another point of information: the proposal to seat the Michigan delegation with one-half vote each came from a joint proposal made by both Obama and Clinton supporters in the Michigan Democratic Party.

Despite the heated contest over the past year or so, the Michigan Democratic Party showed maturity and a strong inclination to unite around the nominee and the campaign to defeat John McCain in the fall.

But the process of the Democratic Party and heated discussions should not obscure the fact that this week, Barack Obama is going to win the nomination of the Democratic Party. It is an historic moment in our country's life, and the beginning of a new journey toward victory for the people and the working class in November.

[Update 1] Huffington Post has a similar total count with even fuzzier math, but you get the point.

Kucinich Campaign Needs Your Help

For all those people who blame the big media and the Democratic Party leadership for holding Rep. Dennis Kucinich back and not letting him get his message out, this is the perfect opportunity to make a difference. Rep. Kucinich was kept out of the latest Iowa debate because he did not have staff in Iowa by a certain deadline. Now that may seem like an arbitrary rule, but the plain fact is that if you don't have people staffing your campaign somewhere, it suggests you don't really have a lot of support, so why should you be in a debate? So to everyone in the northeast who thinks that is just plain wrong, check out the following from the Kucinich for President Campaign:

We need volunteers in New Hampshire

Working on a presidential campaign is always exciting; whether working locally or traveling to another state.

We're asking people from all walks of life to come together in New Hampshire and help the volunteers already working here to elect Dennis Kucinich as the next President of the United States. We need you.

This is even more exciting because Dennis will be in New Hampshire with you, meeting people in town halls, going door to door to introduce himself, asking voters to take part in the First in the Nation Primary and reminding people a vote for principles is always a vote that counts, and making his presence known at polling stations across the state.

There are lots of jobs that need to be done, some of this work you may already be doing, some of it may be new and we have experienced leaders in the field who welcome your presence. To all those who can come to New Hampshire we'll provide lodging.

Your presence can make a difference in New Hampshire and news of that difference will spread across the nation on January 9th, 2008 and make a difference for the entire nation!

To find out more, or to sign up now please contact:
Amanda Harrow at 603-792-0053 or amanda.harrow@kucinich.us

Strength through Peace
Kucinich for President Campaign