What is meaningless to a self-styled politico who has the privilege of treating politics as a game is not meaningless to the people, the citizens, who, as good citizens, in good faith, take part in the democratic process. Moreover, declaring an already disenfranchised part of the country meaningless because it bolsters your candidate’s numbers just so happens to be contrary to the rhetorical platform that your candidate espouses.
Words mean things.
UPDATE: Meaningless, wasted:
They came, they saw, they spoke. Typical behavior for politicians during a primary season. Except this is no ordinary primary. We have two candidates who are down to the wire fighting for the nomination of their party. Every vote counts. And so they come “down here” to do their thing. But don’t expect to see them around here ever again, win or loose. You see Puerto Rico is a living breathing reminder of some ugly realities. To confront the realities of “down here” you need to face some ugly realities. Behind the singing and the dancing, around the corner from the tourist traps lies the face of the Hunted Land. To look upon us is to look at Mexico, Guatemala, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Colombia, Panama, Korea, Vietnam and so many other places. It is to look at the face of empire by proxy.
But Obama would be much better off spending time in Montana.
If I thought that Obama would win 80-20 in the Puerto Rico primary, it would still be meaningless; if I thought that having him plow money into Puerto Rico could turn a 60-40 defeat into a 40-60 victory, it would still be… meaningless.
The Democratic nomination is decided. Puerto Rico does not have electoral votes. As such, Puerto Rico cannot affect the determination of either nominee or general election victor. Any money spent in Puerto Rico is, consequently, wasted.
With what part of this do you disagree?
Really, really astonishingly stupid strategy from someone who teaches political science; given that Latin@s are the fastest-growing segment of the electorate, and that Puerto Ricans in particular are US citizens who happen to do a lot of traveling back and forth from the mainland and a lot of them are most likely registered to vote in states Obama has to win, not to mention the fact that Latin@s have not been going for Obama in the primary and that McCain is well-respected among Latin@s (in part because he’s not completely insane on the issue of immigration).
Jesus, it’s like they don’t realize that there’s a general election. Or, for that matter, that being ahead in pledged delegates doesn’t mean the race is over.
At least Obama seems to get that 2 million potential voters in Puerto Rico are nothing to be sneezed at. Even if he still pooh-poohs the idea of Florida and Michigan being seated.
The Democrats can fuck anything up, can’t they?
The assertion that attention focused on Puerto Rican voters is “wasted” because of your pinpoint focus on campaign financing and, for fuck’s sake, the electoral college. Any other disagreements can be found directly in the original post, specifically the parts about good faith, citizenry, and the right to vote. Democratic process and all that.
zuzu,
So your claim is this; it would be better for Obama to spend money in Puerto Rico than in trying to get the message out to Latinos who, you know, can vote? And I’m really unclear on how, precisely, concern for the general election leads to a concentration on a territory which cannot, after all, contribute to the general election. Indeed, an education in political science rather tends to give one the ability to distinguish between the general election and the primary. It also leads me to note, as I pointed out in the post, that five of the six states representing the largest concentration of Puerto Ricans in the United States will almost certainly be won by Obama, and the other is almost certain to be won by McCain.
Lauren,
Perhaps you misunderstand my point; at no time do I assert that Puerto Ricans should have no right to vote. Indeed, the question of Puerto Rican voting rights is quite distinct from the strategic question of how much money Obama should spend there. Moreover, in all of the paean to citizenship (which I do appreciate) there is nary a response to my central point; why should the Obama campaign bother spending a dime in Puerto Rico, or a minute?
Rob, perhaps you have forgotten that simply being ahead in pledged delegates is not enough to clinch the nomination. Perhaps you’ve also forgotten that while Puerto Rico does not get an electoral vote, they do send delegates to the convention.
Perhaps you also have forgotten that Spanish-language media broadcasts within the entire United States, including to those Latino voters who, in your terminology, “you know, can vote?”
Of course, I’m sure you were perfectly consistent in your dismissal of *all* of the contests that Obama won where the voters weren’t going to have an Electoral College vote, right? I’m sure you found the votes in Guam, USVI, Americans Abroad, etc., equally “meaningless,” right? You’re willing to simply subtract *those* delegates from Obama’s total, right?
Indeed, an education in political science rather tends to give one the ability to distinguish between the general election and the primary.
Funny how it doesn’t seem to give one the ability to grasp the rather obvious point that declaring entire contests “meaningless” because your candidate is likely to lose them, particularly when those contests are the only chance that a disenfranchised group will have to participate in the outcome, is just ever-so-slightly counterproductive to getting people who share certain characteristics with those disenfranchised people to not forget to vote in November.
But, you know, its what I would expect from Yoo.
BTW, Rob, why are you so concerned about Obama’s spending habits all of a sudden? He was spending like a drunken sailor in Pennsylvania and Indiana, for all the good it did him. Is he running out of money?
zuzu,
If the Puerto Rico primary had taken place in March, before the Democratic nomination was for all intents and purposes decided, then Puerto Rico’s election would have been quite consequential. If, like Montana, attention paid to local interests and the purchase of local advertising would matter in the general election, then action in Puerto Rico might be consequential.
Neither of these situations hold. On whether the primary contest is over we appear to live in different realities; if I believed that the contests was not decided, then I wouldn’t think that time and money spent there (by either Clinton or Obama) was wasted. But since I do believe that the primary is over, I do think that the time and effort is a waste.
On the question of the larger impact of campaigning directly in Puerto Rico and spending money in the Puerto Rico media market, I’d like to see evidence that such effort will have an impact on the voting behavior of the Latino market as a whole. As you can guess, I’m pretty skeptical of this argument; since Spanish language media broadcasts within the entire United States, Obama would almost certainly be better advised to spend money on national, rather than PR focused, advertising. I would be quite surprised if many in the Latino community list “and the candidate paid attention to Puerto Rican concerns” as a priority for the general election. And on whether political campaigns need money to operate, I can only say again that we appear to live in different realities.
Finally, I would hope that you would credit me with just a bit of sincerity. Yes, I have moved into the Obama, but no, the arguments I make are not dictated by the political necessity of the Obama campaign. But then you can believe me when I say I would give the same analysis of the Puerto Rican voting situation were Clinton the candidate with the commanding lead, or you can’t.
Finally, I would hope that you would credit me with just a bit of sincerity.
Frankly, after the way you compared me to John Yoo in great detail because I asked you what rules Clinton was breaking, and you accused me of having no respect for the process even though you refused to learn about what the actual process was, I cannot credit you with any sincerity. Nor can I credit you with what you accuse me of lacking.
Campaigns need money to operate, but the line on the Obama campaign has long been that it’s a cash cow. What are you worried about? Doesn’t he have a near-bottomless supply of new donors?
I find it interesting as a Puerto Rican and as the writer quoted above how people talk about “Latinos” or whether or not we are “meaningless”. So let me get set down sone facts:
I am not a LATINO, I am a Puerto Rican, born and raised. Latinos are second generation (or further) immigrants from the rest of the Americas (two continents, remeber that), who have adopted this name in order to consolidate political power and create a share sense of identity in the United States. To use it in the context of Puerto Rican history and culture is to rob us of these things.
We should not be meaningless. That is at the heart of my post. We should not be U.S. citizens, we should not be able to vote in American elections, we should in no way be tied to the U.S. unless it is by treaty freely and fairly negotiated between sovereign states. Colonies (we are not a “territory” we area colony) are by definitions not sovereign states and therefore have no say in their futures.
U.S. citizenship is meaningless when you are a second class citizen (and I invite all of yo to read up on the Spanish-American war and the subsequent 100 years of American dominion on the island). Just ask Jose Padilla. Wait you can’t, he was tortured to insanity.
The irony is that we (Puerto Rico) would not even be on the media map (which somehow brings chuckles to the lips of people like Olbermann and Mathews, and I like Olbermann!) if it where not for this long drawn out Democratic campaign. Otherwise nobody would bother.
I regret not seen Obama while he was here (I doubt I could have secured a ticket) because if I had I would have ask to “Let my people go!”. If he didn’t understand the question or for that matter anyone here understand what I am talking about, then the rest is truly meaningless.
The Democrats can fuck anything up, can’t they?
Truer words were never spoken.