First, just an fyi. The link you gave seems to be incorrect. It returns “page not found.”

I don’t know how the FEC rules may (or may not) apply in the situation you articulate, but it is reasonable to assume theoretically it may apply under some law that prohibits “rigging” elections. I know they exist, but without reading the specific statute, I can’t begin to guess what standard or criteria must be met to qualify for violating the law.

The current problem with enforcing any FEC regulations today is that in order for the Commission to take any action or make any ruling the commission must have enough commissioners present to constitute a quorum. Since four of the six seats on the commission are vacant, they can’t call a quorum, consequently, everything sits in limbo. This is the sole reason why McCain is still floating along in spite of violating campaign finance laws that could put him in prison for five years.

Bush has demanded that Congress approve all four of his nominees as a group, rather than individually, which is the way it should be done. Rightfully so, Congress has refused to consider any “wholesale” approval of nominees. One of Bush’s nominee’s is very controversial, but I can’t remember who it is at the moment.

Getting to the specifics of the point you raised, I imagine it would be very hard to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that all the purported Dumbbaugh votes were in fact violating the law. I’m certain probable cause would not be met since Dumbaugh did not speak directly to the voter(s). The voters could easily assert they decided to vote for Clinton or whomever, and accordingly they executed their right to choose. Dumbaugh making requests over the radio for people to vote for Clinton is not any different from a legitimate campaign ad for Clinton. Now, it proves the people who did his bidding are about as dumb as brick, but…that’s about it.

I think, if it gets down to literally counting votes, the party is going to be in a world of hurt — more than any vote-count decision will ameliorate. But, if they do, they will have to come up with some method of accounting for people who voted in caucuses, which will not be transparently accurate to voters and will set off another kerfuffle.

I did not put this in my post because I can’t remember the precise specifics of the research and it was going to be way too time-consuming to dig it up. Anyway, I did hear a pundit talking about a very reputable professor (Boston College maybe?) that had actually developed an algorithm for determining how many people voted in caucuses.

Summarizing, based on his research and calculations, he concluded if caucus participants were included in the “overall” or “popular” vote, Obama would have a net lead of about 2 million votes over Clinton. That 2 mill may not be correct, but it is reasonably close.

I do remember them stating, in effect, if the calculated votes were applied, it would push Obama well past any threshold that Clinton could possibly meet, much less surpass. And that included “worst case scenarios” (advantage Clinton) for whatever votes could be garnered in the states where primaries had not been held yet (PA, NC, etc.)

At this point, I really don’t think Clinton is giving popular vote, or anything remotely related, a second thought. I believe her strategy is to try to convince super-delegates and pledged delegates that Obama cannot be elected in the general. She is trying everything possible to destroy him personally — it’s the only option she has left.

All the other options defy the laws of mathematics and probability. So, there is no realistic basis for her campaign to expend time and money on those efforts. Now, that’s not what she or her campaign will say publicly, because they are playing serious mind-games with the citizenry. The key is not allowing Clinton to win her psychological warfare, which will not be easy because the media just sucks it all up. And unfortunately, that influences people, and is a big, but separate problem, which I discussed in this post.

- - David

Now, that this is public knowledge, isn’t there technical and ethical justification to render these nul and void, since Hillary didn’t “win” them fair & square?

Not only would this take Obama’s popular vote lead up to 1,084,308, once the 257,000 was deducted from Clinton’s total, a margin she could never catch up to, but it would alter the outcome of that much discussed BIG state, Texas.
When 119,000 votes are deducted from Clinton’s 1,459,814, she’s left with 1,340,814 votes. Well, Obama won a total of 1,358,785 votes in the Texas Primary - with the illegal votes anulled, Obama would be the winner of both the Texas Primary & Caucus. Then Hillary would have to stop saying he can’t win the big states, because her win in Texas is a fake.

Right or wrong?

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/03/17/