Indomitable Hillary Wins Popular Vote But Only if Michigan is Counted
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Hillary Clinton
They'll be arguing about this for generations, but final vote totals from the Democratic primary elections show that Sen. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote nationally but only by counting Michigan's votes.
Mrs. Clinton "won" Michigan's primary on Jan. 15 by 328,309 but her name was the only one on the ballot. Both Sen. Barack Obama and former Sen. John Edwards had their names removed from the Michigan ballot. Dennis Kucinich was the only other Democratic candidate listed.
Without the Michigan votes, Sen. Barack Obama won the popular vote by a margin of 41,622, or 0.1 percent, with a count of 17,535,458 to Clinton's 17,493,836.
By calculating the Michigan vote for "uncommitted," Sen. Clinton's "victory" margin is reduced to 48,519, according to Real Clear Politics.com.
The University of Michigan election reporting service said the "uncommitted" vote was "generally thought to be votes for Edwards and Obama." The national Democratic Party decided on May 31 to seat Michigan's full delegation but award only 1/2 vote apiece due to early primary with 54 percent for Clinton and 46 percent for Obama.
The Democratic National Committee penalized Michigan for holding an early primary and awarded Clinton 69 pledged delegates, or 34.5 pledged votes, and Obama 59 pledged delegates, or 29.5 pledged votes.
Statewide Democratic results, according to the New York Times, were: Clinton 328,309, or 55.2 percent; Uncommitted 238,168, or 40.1 percent; Kucinich, 21,715, 3.7 percent; Christoper J. Dodd, 3,845, 0.6 percent; Mike Gravel, 2,361, 0.4 percent.
Republican results were: Mitt Romney, 338,316, 38.9 percent; John McCain, 257,985, 29.7 percent; Mike Huckabee, 139,764, 16.1 percent; Ron Paul, 54,475, 6.3 percent; Fred Thompson, 32,159, 3.7 percent; Rudolph Giuliani, 24,725, 2.8 percent; Uncommitted, 18,118, 2.1 percent; Duncan Hunter, 2,819, 0.3 percent; Tom Tancredo, 457, 0.1 percent.
Romney was awarded 23 Michigan delegates, McCain 6 and Huckabee 1 after the national party penalized the state half its delegates for the early primary violation.
Tri-County vote results for the Democrats: Bay County: Clinton, 67 percent; Uncommitted, 29 percent; Kucinich, 2 percent; Midland County: Clinton, 56 percent; Uncommitted, 40 percent; Kucinich, 3 percent; Saginaw County, Clinton, 60 percent; Uncommitted, 36 percent; Kucinich, 2 percent.
On the Republican side, Bay County supported Mitt Romney by 43 percent to 27 percent for John McCain and 14 percent for Mike Huckabee; Midland County gave Romney 36 percent, McCain 32 percent and Huckabee 19 percent; In Saginaw County, Romney took 43 percent, McCain 27 percent and Huckabee 16 percent.
We will all remember the farce perpetrated on the public by even holding a Michigan primary, and then the twisted logic that was applied to vote totals afterward.
"Who knows how many Democrats who might have voted for Sen. Obama stayed home, or how many voted in the Republican primary?" queried a local political observer.
The Michigan vote, conducted at great cost to the taxpayers, was a big waste of time and confused the national picture as well, the observer opined.
Winners of previous Presidential primary elections in Michigan, for the Democrats, 2000 Al Gore, 1992, Bill Clinton, 1988 Jesse Jackson; Republicans, 2000 John McCain, 1996 Bob Dole, 1988 George Bush Sr.
Michigan political leaders should take pains to ensure that such a ridiculous primary never occurs again.
There are several plans in the works to correct the process, but no clear proposal has emerged with support enough to move ahead.
A joint Democrat/Republican proposal was floated to divide states into regions and hold inter-regional primaries based on a lottery.
A bill calling for an interregional lottery for presidential primary was introduced by U.S. Rep. Sander Levin, Detroit Democrat, into U.S. Congress on March 14, 2007. Companion bill is S. 2024, introduced by Senator Bill Nelso, Democrat of Florida on September 6, 2007.
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