Clinton Scenario Meets Liberal Guilt

RealClearPolitics
By Peter Brown

Any realistic scenario in which Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton wins the Democratic presidential nomination assumes that the party bosses will have both the will and the power to stop Sen. Barack Obama's nomination.

But there is one good reason why they might not try, even if she is able to string together a series of primary and caucus victories: Call it liberal guilt, or call it fear of reprisal from the party's powerful black base.

Either way, it is very difficult to see the Democratic Party bosses of the 21st century -- we call them superdelegates -- overruling a (slight) majority of their constituents and blocking the nomination of the first African-American major-party presidential nominee.

If the superdelegates go along with the votes of their constituents and ratify the verdict for the candidate with the most delegates in the primaries and caucuses, then simple math says Obama will win the nomination.

Even Clinton's own supporters agree that, given the party's rule that allocates delegates based on a candidate's percentage of the popular vote, it is virtually impossible for Clinton to have more elected delegates when the process ends in June.

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