Florida and Michigan, Resolved.

With architect of the DNC rules turned Clinton apparachik Harold Ickes playing dead-ender to the hilt, the Rules & Bylaws Committee decides to seat Michigan and Florida as half-delegates. (However irate the stark raving Clintonites, even the former President has suggested recently — in private — that this compromise made the most sense.) For those keeping score, this makes the new delegate threshold 2118, which, if all goes well, puts Obama in striking range to end the primary season officially on Tuesday night (in Montana and South Dakota.)

Helping him pass the threshold, of course, will be the superdelegates, who have continued their trend toward Obama during my moving week. Since the last update, according to DemConWatch, Obama has picked up fifteen supers to Clinton’s four, and word is the rest of the “undecideds” are just waiting for the word to break for our nominee. At long last, it’s over, folks.

Stepping Back for the Big Picture.

With a six-week lull between now and the next contest, during which I hope to spend more time focusing on Harold Ickes than on Harold Ickes (sorry, dissertation humor), now’s a good chance to buck Mark Penn and refocus on the macrotrends in the primary race right now:

For one, superdelegates are clearly trending towards Obama. “Among the 313 of 796 superdelegates who are members of Congress or governors, Clinton has commitments from 103 and Obama is backed by 96, according to lists supplied by the campaigns. Fifty-three of Obama’s endorsements have come since he won the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, compared with 12 who have aligned with Clinton since then…[Since Ohio/Texas] the Illinois senator has won backing from nine superdelegates and Clinton one, according to the campaigns and interviews.” (Speaking of which, he picked up another one today in Wisconsin’s Melissa Schroeder. As you probably know, you can keep track of the supers over at DemConWatch.)

For another, whatever sound and fury Mark Penn tries to kick up about Pennsylvania and electability, it’s a tale told by an idiot, signifying nothing. In the most recent general election poll of the state, Obama still does better than Clinton against McCain there (although, thanks to all the recent negative press, McCain has moved ahead of both since this poll.) To his credit, Clinton supporter and Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, off-message once again, today conceded Obama can take PA over McCain. (And in any case, as Michael Dukakis can tell you, past primary performance is often not a valid predictor of future outcomes.)

Otherwise, Obama is up in the daily trackers, although those tend to be volatile. Most importantly, obviously, Sen. Obama enjoys a sizable, if not insurmountable, lead in pledged delegates, votes, and states, so we’re in very good shape, despite what ever sad butchering of reality emanates from Camp Clinton these days. So keep your chin up, y’all. If you got money, donate. If you got time, phonebank, write your supers, and/or get the message out. Let’s press this thing home.

By the way, while looking for a good Penn-Microtrends link above, I found this NYT book review that begins with an anecdote about the TV show Numb3rs: “‘There’s no way the bad guys can win,’ my son assures me each time we watch the show together. ‘They can’t do the math, Dad.’” Truer words have never been spoken.

The Clinton Spin gets Even Dumber.

As the Clinton campaign begins pulling out all the stops in Wisconsin, Mark Penn, he of the “impressionable elites” and “insignificant states,” offers up another doozy: “Winning Democratic primaries is not a qualification or a sign of who can win the general election. If it were, every nominee would win because every nominee wins Democratic primaries.” So…winning primaries is not a good way to pick a candidate now. Can we still get Mike Gravel as our standard-bearer, then?

For his part, Clinton adviser and superdelegate Harold Ickes (son of the prominent progressive and New Dealer) at least conceded the importance of winning, although he too is putting his faith on a bailout by the supers (and/or a successful joint pincer movement with McCain.) According to him, the campaign will go until June, whereupon supers will flock to Clinton. “‘At or about – certainly, shortly after – the seventh of June, Hillary’s going to nail down this nomination,’ Ickes said. ‘She’s going to have a majority of the delegates.’” Sorry, not bloody likely. (About that June 7 match-up, tho, Sen. Obama recently picked up the endorsement of Puerto Rico Governor Anibal Acevedo-Vila, so even that final Clinton firewall looks to be suffering from a few cracks.)

What happens in Vegas | Nothing could be finer.

Ethanol and granite, meet poker and palmettos. After months of wrangling, the Dems announce that Nevada and South Carolina will be pushed forward into Iowa/New Hampshire territory come the 2008 primaries. “Harold Ickes — a committee member and confidante of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y., a potential 2008 candidate — spoke in opposition to a Palmetto State primary out of concern that it would be a walkover for former senator John Edwards (N.C.) should he choose to run.” (Interestingly enough, this article also notes that Rep. Jim Clyburn, the congressman from my hometown of Florence, SC, is now the third-ranking Dem in the House. Nicely done.)

Hiram to the DLC.

A word of warning from today’s archival research (re: photocopying binge): “The trouble with the Democrats in California is, first, they have no organization, and secondly, they wish, just as apparently as the Democrats in the East wish in this campaign, to be with exactly the same people with whom the Republicans have been sleeping for many years in the past. Apparently they don’t realize that there is no place for them with those who have been directing our politics, but nevertheless they covet the unique and often disgraceful position we occupy.” — Hiram Johnson, in a letter to Harold Ickes, September 1, 1928.

Swearingen to Progressivism in Two.

“Seth Bullock

Deadwood, S.D.
August 25, 1920 [Almost a year after Bullock’s death]

Dear Sir:

After careful consideration I have come to the conclusion that it is my duty as a believer in the progressive principles it was my privilege to fight for under the leadership of Theodore Roosevelt, as well as my duty as a citizen, to support the democratic national ticket in this campaign. I have prepared a statement giving some of my reasons for reaching this decision, a copy of which statement I enclose. If you are sufficiently interested to read this and write me, how you, personally, react in the present situation I will be obliged to you.

Sincerely yours,
Harold Ickes“

Ah, the archives are great fun.

Voice of Harold.

Are the Clinton 2008 team taking their toys and going home? With financial backing from George Soros, Clinton lieutenant Harold Ickes announces he’s kicking off a private Dem-data mining firm, which will amass information on left-leaning voters and, theoretically, sell it to interest groups and campaigns that get the Clinton stamp of approval. “Officials at the Democratic National Committee think that creating a modern database is their job, and they say that a competing for-profit entity could divert energy and money that should instead be invested with the national party. Ickes and others involved in the effort acknowledge that their activities are in part a vote of no confidence that the DNC under Chairman Howard Dean is ready to compete with Republicans on the technological front.“

Well, I’d like to know more about the supposed deficiencies of the DNC’s voter outreach system, but this sounds like a troubling development all around. A house divided against itself cannot stand, particularly one as divided as the Democrats these days. (And, given how lackluster many Dems feel about a prospective Clinton candidacy anyway, a seeming attempt to put her own 2008 prospects before the good of the party is, to my mind, probably going to redound badly.)

Open War.

With the Social Security fight looming on the horizon, Dems and the GOP clash over ethics in the House and both abortion and the minimum wage in the Senate. (Salon‘s Tim Grieve exposed the fraudulence of the Santorum “alternative” minimum wage plan yesterday.) Speaking of Social Security, several prominent Dems — including James Carville, Stan Greenberg, and Harold Ickes — advise our side to produce an alternative reform plan to Dubya’s private accounts, and soon.

Dean-N-C.

With the exit (Stage Right) of Martin Frost and multiple endorsements (including that of Clinton consigliere Harold Ickes), it now seems to most observers that Howard Dean has the DNC chair in the bag. (For their part, the GOP were already relentlessly on message: Said Rich Bond, “I think it’s a scream.“) While I’ll admit that I can’t speak knowledgably about all of the candidates’ positions, to my mind Dean seems like a great choice for the post, one that will stir enthusiasm among the grass roots and move the party where it needs to go: towards an independent and progressive message that doesn’t reek of Republican-lite, and a take-no-prisoners feistiness in every political race across the country. So, congrats to the Governor and his supporters — now, the real work begins…