“There is no such thing as a pledged delegate,” Clinton said at a news conference in California, where she has been fundraising.
...
Pledged delegates are “misnomer. The whole point is for delegates, however they are chosen, to really ask themselves who would be the best president and who would be our best nominee against Senator McCain,” Clinton said. “And I think that process goes all the way to the convention.”
Well, it turns out that Senator Clinton was right.
Prince George's County Executive Jack Johnson, who'd been chosen as a Maryland pledged party leader and elected official delegate for Hillary Clinton, has decided he will vote for Barack Obama instead.
"I cannot in good conscience go to the convention and not support Barack," Johnson said in an interview. "She ran a great campaign, but she fell short of the line."
This is Johnson's second change of heart in the race. He had allowed his name to be listed as a supporter by the Obama campaign in December.
Now, I'm guessing that the 79% of the vote that Obama got in Prince George's County (66% black; granted, he did pretty well in the white DC suburbs as well, and didn't lose a single precinct in the city itself) helped push Executive Johnson to change his vote.
Still, it's pretty ironic that Hillary's "no such thing as a pledged delegate" is hurting her instead of Barack.
But yeah, I don't like this. Obama will win the pledged delegates as pledged delegates. He doesn't need this.
