Superdelegates: Nonsense

Superdelegates are anathema to a real democratic process, aren’t they?

I’ve never really been as in tune with the nomination process as I am this year (mainly because I’m young), and the more I consider it the more I see the democratic convention as an elitist event branded with safeguards to ensure officeholders and party officials get their choice over the democratic populace.

I’ll be the first to admit that I never really knew what a superdelegate was until sometime around last year when I was brushing up on the presidential nomination process. Superdelegates are Democratic delegates (Party Democrats) to a presidential nomination process not held accountable or bound by party primaries or caucuses. They were first appointed during the transition of the control of the party nomination process from party officials to the primary and caucus process. superdelegates. Superdelegates to the Democratic Convention include all Democratic members of the United States Congress, various additional elected officials, as well as members of the DNC. The purported reason for the superdelegate institution is to preserve arbiter discretion to those who had been playing vital roles in the party before the election year.

A candidate is required to secure a simple majority of the available delegates to the Democratic Convention. A Democratic candidate is required 2,025 of the 4,049 available delegates to win the Party nomination. Superdelegates comprise of approximately 1/5 or 19.6% of all available delegates. So, as you can see, the superdelegates do indeed make a significant impact on the entire nomination process.

So why? Especially in a Party nomination process the people should be have the prerogative. I am somewhat abashed as to why the Democratic Party preserves the superdelegate option. It seems relatively sensible and democratically rationale that Democratic voters, alone, choose their candidate. The superdelegate option is the preservation of an arcane and undemocratic aspect of the Democratic nomination process.

The current superdelegate/total count is as follows:

Clinton: 159/183
Obama: 53/78
Edwards: 43/52