There is a little reported story out of the Democratic National Convention where two Sanders delegates have been barred from attending the event. The problem was not their credentials or their conduct. State Sen. Tim Ashe (right below) and Ken Dean are men and the DNC ruled that there were simply too many of that kind in the delegation. Vermont was ordered to replace them with women, any women, so long as the delegation was equal. Ashe and Dean have filed challenges for good reason.
Coupled with a growing controversy over the determined effort of the Democrats not to release a list of donors to the media, this is hardly a good story to trigger days before the opening of convention. The national party appears to be imposing a quota system on delegates based on gender despite the fact that such delegates can claim that they are qualified through the democratic process. After all Dean and Ashe were elected as delegates on June 11. Then, on July 5, the state party was ordered to remove them due to their gender deficiency.
Of course, the infamous superdelegates remain untouchable. It is just those elected by the people that can be negated solely on the basis for their gender. Notably, eight of 10 Vermont superdelegates are men.
The Democratic party leadership appears to be moving away from the fight against gender discrimination in guaranteeing equal opportunity to the fight for gender equality with the use of quotas to force gender balance. Ironically, it was Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in United States v. Virginia (1996) who warned that “Today’s skeptical scrutiny of official action denying rights or opportunities based on sex responds to volumes of history.” Not only are these delegates saying that they are being denied position due to their gender, but the DNC is negating the choice of Vermont voters — male and female. There is such a thing as individual achievement and choice. The Vermont voters are allowed to select people on the basis for their individual merits rather than categorical exclusions based on race, gender, religion, or other immutable characteristics.
This point was made by the Supreme Court in University of California v. Bakke (1978):
[R]ace, like gender and illegitimacy, . . . is an immutable characteristic which its possessors are powerless to escape or set aside. While a classification is not per se invalid because it divides classes on the basis of an immutable characteristic, see supra at 355-356, it is nevertheless true that such divisions are contrary to our deep belief that “legal burdens should bear some relationship to individual responsibility or wrongdoing,” . . . and that advancement sanctioned, sponsored, or approved by the State should ideally be based on individual merit or achievement, or at the least on factors within the control of an individual.
Those concerns are heightened in my view when alleged gender discrimination negates the results of a democratic process like delegate selection.
What do you think?
The Secretary of State has no troops so how did she personally kill all these people. Now, I know some of you think that she killed Vince Foster with her bare hands but she has never been a commander of troops.
SWM and RandyJet
Actually we Progressives DO care deeply. We focus on facts and issues and do not expend our energy keeping our heads in the sand as the Demoncrats who support HRC do.
Sqeek, I am going to make a bumper sticker “I don’t care how many people she’s killed”
slohrss29
re: “Putin may be a oligarch, but whose troops are on whose doorstep? Whose troops are most everywhere around the world?”
Spot on! Even George Kennen, the architect of containment during the Cold War was appalled when NATO started moving into Eastern Europe.
@autumn
You said, “One told me she hates the Donald so she will vote for HRC – mind you this is a person who never watches/reads the news because it’s “too depressing” I told her I dislike Donald as well, but unlike HRC he hasn’t killed thousands of people. Her response was classic: “I don’t care how many people she has killed I am voting for her”
You’re not talking about swm are you??? Because I swear that sure sounds just like her. But OTOH, that sounds like most Democrats and Liberals I know.
🙂
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
randyjet, They don’t care, Most are Trumpians who are pretending to be be sympathetic to bernie in hopes that they can peel off a few votes.
Randyjet, Clinton’s actions stand for themselves. History will not shine kindly on her. Neither will it on W, who I vehemently protested many times on this blog. I am not partisan and do not play the team card to not support Clinton. As I said, her actions speak for themselves and she needs to be held accountable. If that is the case, maybe the Democratic party would have a future.
David Burge @iowahawkblog
Welcome to 2016
0
Days Since Last Massacre
I don’t want to win in the Democratic party. That’s my point. Time to abandon that method of thinking altogether.
I noticed that NOT ONE poster replied to the FACTS of why this substitution is NOT against the rules OR a lack of democracy. How about this prof? I hope this answers your question, though in the negative. Then we have the spectacle again of fact free hatred of Hillary. It is a mark of degeneration of the kind of people we have here that there is no respect for law, facts, or evidence. Just GET the one you hate. Incredible.
randyjet – I notice you did not cite the rule that required this change or allowed the DNC to make the change. As for going after Hillary, you need to see the Drudge Report today on how the DNC was in the tank for Hillary.
Putin may be a oligarch, but whose troops are on whose doorstep? Whose troops are most everywhere around the world? I know liberals don’t like Putin because he has said mean things to his own minorities. It’s really none of our business. His problem is that he is helping stop the Saudi pipeline from going through Syria. Sauds scheduled Assad to go a long time ago. Quit blindly swallowing the mainstream press. You’re only towing the line. And picking a hot war wish Russia won’t be another evening of just watching TV either. These are the people who are willing to give up the lives of their constituents because they are cheap compared to the born-of-luxury ideals. The “well…, let them eat cake” crowd. And they underestimate how we are targeted by the Chinese. They will soon be in charge, sooner or later, through a variety of ways. We’ll see how well lofty liberal ideals are accepted then.
Autumn, we are in the days of “what’s right is the thing I want.” I see this all the time. Sorry to go full sidebar here, but people do not seem to have a moral/ethical compass (I know that’s sounding a little trite nowadays…) to steer them anymore. Morality is what needs to be done to make sure I am momentarily satisfied. It is very sad to hear your friend say that, and I guess that’s what I am not seeing in the blank faces of friends who I tell the same thing too. They just aren’t saying it.
By law the delegates are Bernie delegates. If you want to win, educate yourselves. Hillary lost in 2008 because Obama was able to out maneuver her because his campaign knew the rules better.
Trump is the candidate that praises Putin and Russia. Must be an oligarch thing.
Sex should not be used to replace other very personal objectives. I agree with BOB’s post, I SMELL A RAT HERE! And I am a woman. I believe what Bernie Sanders meant with his comment is that the DNC should have representation from all the groups that make our population. Besides if DWS wants more women she could replace some of the other men delegates, not Bernie’s.
Good call bulldog. Sounded like quite the show. Almost SCTV-worthy! And that’s the point? Wouldn’t a little up front honesty and, you know, not stomping on the whole process to get your planned candidate through? Just goes to show you what you get with these groups. I always vote independent. Tried to vote for Obama because I was moved by his “hope propaganda.” My finger was obviously more rational than my brain, so I voted independent. Al… don’t you know Hollywood when you hear it? Once again, that is all crazy talk until proven otherwise. (and it seems like there was a boatload of crazies there… love Guiliani, he’s always a good time, too bad people think he is credible). Meanwhile, people are dying right now by the thousands directly attributable to Hillary. Libya, Syria, Ukraine, and more on the way. It’s reality, not talk.
slohrss29
I have far too many Hilbot friends – I bombard them daily with facts to no avail. Like Sisyphus however I continue my “mission”
One told me she hates the Donald so she will vote for HRC – mind you this is a person who never watches/reads the news because it’s “too depressing” I told her I dislike Donald as well, but unlike HRC he hasn’t killed thousands of people. Her response was classic: “I don’t care how many people she has killed I am voting for her”
I find the elites and academics of the Liberal Far Left follow a very troubling trend of defending racism, gender discrimination, ageism, chauvinism, lying, and lawlessness as long as it’s “their guys” doing it. They also show an inexplicable admiration for socialist totalitarian societies, which have quite poor individual human rights and environmental records, and are a nihilistic existence for its citizens.
At some point, people must stop and examine their judgement without political glasses. Research the outcomes of their policies. Make informed, rather than blindly loyal, decisions.
Extremism ruins everything it touches, and politics is no exception. The Democratic Party is not immune to losing its way. The more power our government accumulates, the more corrupt and unaccountable it will become. We see global examples of this experiment daily. We see daily examples of the Far Left eroding our individual rights and engaging in behavior it would find anathema in the Right.
Enough. Let’s fix this.
I was at George Washington Univ. Law School library today and just got back home. I sat in an enclave which was within hearing distance of three Trump protegees discussing strategy for January 22nd of 2017. They want to announce a Muslim undocumented migrant round up and lock them up in camps modeled on the Japanese internment camps of WWII. They were reading the Korematusu decision and discussing the parameters. They are going to have a new military force independent of the immigration or other armed service types who will do the round ups all across America. The plan is going to be called Day One. You heard this from me folks. It is real.
Al Reardon – it is about time someone did something about illegals. This may be the tipping point for my voting for Trump. Thanks for the update.
So, after the republicans stage a convention that featured, among other things, Dr. Ben making references to lucifer, CC doing a bizarre impersonation of a prosecutor from the Inquisition, an audience that was one breath away from saying “Off with her head” , Rudy Giuliani totally off his meds, exploiting a poor veteran who became increasingly unhinged during his speech, an entire day lying about plagiarism, then finally admitting it, etc, etc, topped off by the increasingly deranged Trump giving a Nixonian speech that made Nixon look positively statemanlike, the Democrats fail to realize the gift they have just been given and they do something THIS stupid. And they still have a week to go.
I must have needed a reminder about why I have voted third party for the past twenty years.