Northbayist on Woolsey!

February 25, 2008

First of all I would love to welcome Northbayist, a new blogger on the North Bay. It is always nice to have more in the neighborhood. Keeps things interesting. It turns out that Northbayist has an answer to my question as to whether Woolsey will vote with her constituents or with Clinton. This is what Northbayist had to say:

“The short answer is: NO. Woolsey since the beginning of her tenure in Congress has never been afraid to take an unpopular stand, or go against the will of her Constituents. That’s precisely why the NorthBay continues to send her to Congress with overwhelming percentages. Most of the time, she is re-elected with the highest percentage of any other member of Congress in California.”

I have to agree with you there — Woolsey is very popular. She really did beat Joe Nation 63 to 36 percent. It will be interesting though how this will continue as this process goes along.

“Furthermore, the 6th Congressional District is allocating an equal number of delegates to Obama and Clinton. While the vote in the 6th did go for Obama, it wasn’t overwhelming enough that he took more delegates than her under the California rules.”

Obama got 54.89% to Hillary Clinton’s 38.53% in Marin County. In Sonoma County it was a bit closer with Obama getting 47.5% and Clinton 43.9%. Out of a total of 139, 322 voters, a total of 76,096 voters went for Obama and 65,226 voters went for Clinton. 54.6% went for Obama and 46.8% went for Clinton. While it may only be a win of 7.8 district-wide and only 3.6 difference in Sonoma county, Obama won by 16.36 in Marin County. A double-digit win of 16.36 is usually considered overwhelming. Marin resident and constituent I am wondering who it is she represents in this matter. What factors are going into her decision?

“Also, to address Maven’s larger point which is should a superdelegate vote with their consitutents rather than their minds. Again, the short answer is NO. Where were all the anti-superdelegates people when the Democratic National Committee put the nomination process in place some years back? Now that delegates actually matter, many want to change the rules mid stream.”

It is my understanding that all superdelegates are simply “unpledged party leaders and elected official delegates”. According to the California Democratic Party, there are “66 Superdelegates [35 females, 31 males], 32 Democratic National Committee (DNC) Members, 33 Congressional Members and 1 Former DNC Chair (Chuck Manatt). Actually, there are 36 Democrats in Congress (34 House, plus Boxer and Feinstein) but four of our Congressional Members are on the DNC and are counted as DNC Members.” There also 48 Pledged Party Leaders /Elected Officials or PLEOs. A PLEO is a registered Democrat from the categories below, who is committed to a candidate (who receives at least 15% of the statewide vote). If Candidate A receives 50% of the statewide vote, then Candidate A gets 24 PLEO delegates. PLEOs are confirmed by a vote of the 241 district-level delegates at the May 18, 2008 statewide meeting. [File 2/11/08 through 4/23/08]

PLEO Categories [in order]:
– big-city mayors (population 250,000 or more) and statewide elected officials
– state legislative leaders and state legislators
– other state, county and local elected officials
– California Democratic Party leaders

As far as I can tell Lynn Woolsey is one of the 66 unpledged party leaders and elected officials who are free to pick any democratic candidate for president. I am not interested in “changing the rules in mid-stream” especially since this is an historically rare election and you shouldn’t make rules to a rare occurrence. What I am interested in whether Lynn Woolsey’s mind is with her constituents’ wishes and concerns. I think as constituents we would want to know why Woolsey will choose Clinton instead of Obama, who her constituents prefer. Much of Woolsey’s support comes from the fact we love her anti-war stand, and a lot of us voted for Obama because Clinton voted for the War. I know this Obama supporter finds supporting Clinton difficult due to her vote and unwillingness to admit her vote was wrong. We know that Lynn Woolsey said this about her support for Hillary Clinton,

““Hillary Clinton is the candidate with the strength and experience to bring about the change that California families need,” said Rep. Woolsey. “I trust Hillary to end the war in Iraq, bring our troops home quickly and safely, and regain our nation’s standing around the world.”

What if Woolsey’s constituents believe that Obama is the best candidate to bring Iraq to an end and make the right judgments the first time. I acknowledge that Lynn Woolsey has the right to support who she wants and can reserve the right to go against her constituents if she wants to. How will this make her constituents feel when the next election rolls around? That remains to be seen.

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Category Posted in Hillary Clinton, Lynn Woolsey, Marin Politics, Obama, california politics

Comments to “Northbayist on Woolsey!”

Jerry said:

February 26th, 2008 at 2:21 pm

The only issue I see is Obama’s going to win without the Superdelegates. Just maybe how she’d vote is a moot point.

The Maven said:

February 26th, 2008 at 2:37 pm

I don’t think I am alone in the hope that this thing can be resolved on March 4th without Super Delegates. Wouldn’t it be cool if all the Super Delegates can just relax knowing the decision is not on their shoulders?

Then again, many of us were hoping that February 5th was going to resolve this race. It has been a crazy Primary, so who knows if this will get to the Super Delegates or not? Just in case this does happen I want to make sure that Northbay voters are heard.