The American Spectator

The Spectacle Blog

The continuing roar from PUMAs -- the disgruntled Hillary Clinton supporters who have announced a Washington conference next month -- has caused several Democrats to try to get the PUMAs to STFU.

The latest to attempt taming the PUMAs is former Democratic National Committee chairman Don Fowler. In an e-mail to Clintonistas published by TPM, Fowler said:

I must confess a bit of fatigue and irritation with people who continue to carp, complain, and criticize the results of the primary and lay down conditions for their support. . . .
It is time to act in a mature and resourceful fashion. It's time to put the primaries behind us. It's time to support Barack Obama without conditions or demands.

This produced a backlash, with one PUMA replying:

How can you possibly say that Barack Obama won and Hillary Clinton lost when neither achieved the required amount of pledged delegates to receive the nomination. It's still undecided and won't be until the vote is taken in Denver.. . . [T]he DNC pushed the superdelegates to endorse him. He hasn't won anything.

The point about the delegate count -- in terms of pledged delegates won in caucuses and primaries, Obama is still more than 300 short of the number needed for the nomination -- is the PUMAs' strongest argument for having Hillary's name in a first ballot roll-call vote in Denver.

Because of the super-delegates, Obama would win that vote, but the DNC and Obama HQ apparently feel that such a vote would highlight the division in the party. They want their guy nominated by unanimous acclamation, and seem to view opposition as disloyalty.

topics:
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton