Super Delegates: Who Are They?

At caucuses around the country delegates are busy choosing the candidates and the Democratic race is so close that, ultimately, the Democratic nomination could be decided by the Super Delegates. Who are these “Super Delegates”? They are the democratic members of the House and Senate and various other affiliated democratic VIPs. In other words: the nomination will be chosen by the likes of Nancy “Impeachment is Off the Table” Pelosi and Harry “Give the Telecoms Immunity” Reid and the rest of the complicit House and Congress, and unlike pledged delegates secured through a primary or a caucus, Super Delegates can vote for whomever they choose, and they are not required to vote for the candidate they endorse, they can be swayed and influenced by any number of factors, and they are not required to vote in any representational fashion.

As Katrina vanden Heuvel from The Nation states in her article entitled, “The Tyranny of the Super Delegates”: “”the Democratic Party uses an antiquated and anti-democratic nominating system that includes 842 “super-delegates” – un-pledged party leaders not chosen by the voters, free to support the candidate of their choice, and who comprise more than forty percent of the delegates needed to win the nomination.” http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut?bid=7&pid=266130

Thus, whatever people think they are deciding through the primaries and caucuses could once again be undermined by the unprecedented powers of the elite, in other words, the Democratic Party establishment and “VIPs” within it under this nominating system. It is they who will choose the candidate, not the people of the United States.  

More info:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080210/ap_on_el_pr/superdelegates 

http://demconwatch.blogspot.com/2008/01/superdelegates-who-havent-endorsed.html

http://demconwatch.blogspot.com/2008/01/superdelegate-list.html