Were the caucuses unfair? Oh yes.

Obots still pretend that their candidate won the nomination fairly, even though Hillary received the larger number of primary votes. An excellent study by Peniel Cronin makes some troubling observations about the caucus system: See the pdf files available here. Remember, Obama did well in the caucus states -- the primary states went to Hillary.

Primaries have a much, much higher rate of participation. They are state-run and thus have far greater transparency. They can accommodate the disabled, the elderly, and those serving in the military. Caucuses are open to gaming because they cater to relatively small numbers of activists.

Three states -- Texas, Nebraska, and Washington -- have both caucuses and primaries, and in all three states, Hillary did much better in the primaries than in the caucuses. For example:

Nebraska: On February 9, Nebraska held a caucus and only 3.04% of the 1.3 million eligible voters participated. Those 38,571 caucus-goers chose Obama over Clinton 68% to 32% and he won 16 of the 24 pledged delegates. In stark contrast, on May 13th, Nebraska held a primary where nearly 94,000 voters [7.5% of eligible voters] chose Obama by 49.4% to 46.6% ,– only 2.8% instead of the 36% vote-spread recorded in the caucus. If delegates were allocated on the results of the primary instead of the caucus, Obama and Clinton would have received 12 pledged delegates each.

The caucus system badly needs reform. What will Howard Dean do about the situation? Nothing. Why would a burglar favor the installation of surveillance cameras?