The audacity of lost hope

That's the only way to characterize the position taken by Clinton's advocates, most notably Harold Ickes, at the DNC rules committee today. The Clinton position re Michigan is Clinton take all, Obama take zero, and all delegates seated--this despite the attempts of Michigan Democrats to come up with a solution that would be fair to all.

Update I: All's well that end's well. A reasonable compromise instead of Clinton's dishonest scheme to grab delegates in two states lucky to have their primaries count at all. I think the threat to take it to the credentials committee in July is an empty one. Clinton will have about two supporters left by then, while the rest of the party will be well into the campaign against McCain.

Update II (Sunday June 1): Lest there be any doubt about who was behind Icke's attitude, from today's New York Times:

The deal prompted one of her chief advisers, Harold Ickes, a member of the rules committee himself, to declare that Mrs. Clinton’s fight may not be over, even though Mr. Obama’s advisers say he is only days away from gaining enough delegates to claim the nomination.

“Mrs. Clinton has instructed me to reserve her rights to take this to the credentials committee,” Mr. Ickes said before the final vote, raising the specter of a fight until that committee meets. His words drew cheers from Clinton supporters, including many who yelled, “Denver! Denver! Denver!” — implying that the fight could go all the way to the convention in that city.

Mr. Ickes said the outcome for Michigan was a hijacking of voters’ intent because it assigned delegates to Mr. Obama even though he did not win them as his name was not on the ballot.

Mrs. Clinton was in touch with Mr. Ickes throughout the day, aides said, and she instructed him to conclude his remarks with that message to the party. It remained an open question, though, how much leverage Mrs. Clinton would have after the primaries concluded on Tuesday.

Update III: Marc Cooper's blog post on the DNC rules committee meeting hits many nails on many heads. The nut graffs:

Listening to the howling and pleading from Clinton surrogates and other sundry opportunists and operatives that seating these delegations was a civil rights issue is about as convincing as interpreting one of Uncle Jun's addresses to the Pipefitters Union as some sort of workers' manifesto.

Who's kidding who? The original DNC decision to authorize only four states to vote early was a blatant act of pandering to Iowa, NH, Nevada and South Carolina. The leap-frogging ahead of Fla and Michigan -- heartily suppported by each state's Democratic officials in defiance of the DNC-- was a blatant act of pandering to local constituencies. The ratification of the decision to punish both states by the Clinton and Obama campaigns was a further act of pandering to Iowa and New Hampshire. The decision to reconsider the just punishment and come up with today's compromise was a blatant act of pandering to Florida and Michigan. The notion of legitimacy attached to either one of those "elections," one in which Clinton had no opponent on the ballot and the other in which all candidates vowed not to campaign, insults the intelligence and panders to political morons.

The battle cry of "Den-ver! Den-ver!" by Hillary supporters in the wake of Saturday's decision is nothing short of a sort of collective psychosis. The same die-hard Democrats who spent the last eight years blaming Ralph Nader for the deficiencies of their own party have now embarked on a similar campaign to spoil the candidacy of the eventual and certain nominee -- Barack Obama.