The Democratic party’s undemocratic superdelegate system

Today the state of Wisconsin holds its primary elections which, on the Republican side, has 42 delegates up for grabs in a ‘winner-take-all’ system (actually, the winner of each of the state’s eight Congressional district gets 3 delegates, while the winner of the whole state gets 18) while the Democrats have 86 delegates to be elected on a proportional basis, plus 10 superdelegates. Both primaries are open. The total number of possible Democratic delegates is 4,763 of which 4,051 are elected and 712 are superdelegates (there is a slight disagreement about the exact number). Hillary Clinton has won 1,243 of the elected delegates so far while Sanders has won 980. But Clinton has a huge lead among the unelected superdelegates, 469 to 31. The strength of the campaign of Bernie Sanders on the Democratic side has prompted closer scrutiny of their entire superdelegate system.
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Important Supreme Court ruling on voting rights

The US Supreme Court issued an important unanimous 8-0 ruling today in a case involving voting rights. States are required to draw electoral districts that have roughly equal numbers of people. The question is whether the ‘people’ who count should be every resident (even those who cannot vote) or just eligible voters. The former has been the universal practice, since the argument has been that government serves everyone, voters and non-voters alike.
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The latest massive leak: The Panama Papers

News reports are emerging of the massive leak of documents (2.6 terabytes in size) from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca that provided off shore tax havens for wealthy people. The leak was originally given to a German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. An anonymous person approached the newspaper and said that he would provide them this massive trove of documents. The source did not want anything in return, financial or otherwise, but demanded that it all be done over encrypted channels because of the danger to his/her life, and that s/he would leave it up to them to decide what should be published. The manner of the leak is remarkably similar to that of Edward Snowden and it seems clear that the new leaker had followed his example.
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Paying people to create faux ‘grass roots’ support for Israeli policies

The increasing support for the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement has caused great concern with the Israeli government and they have resorted to something called ‘hasbara’, where people receive training in propaganda on how to derail discussions that they think are critical of Israeli policies. Jonathan Cook explains what hasbara involves and why it will not work.
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Using public restrooms while transgender

For most of us, using a public restroom is something to which we give little thought, except perhaps for a fleeting concern about cleanliness. But Nico Lang of Rolling Stone says that a survey found that “nearly 70 percent of trans people had experienced negative interactions in public facilities — from dirty looks to snide comments to physical violence.”
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More on guns at the RNC convention

Although the petition to allow guns into the RNC convention center has been denied by the US Secret Service, that has not ended the matter because the question arises as to what happens outside the Quicken Loans Arena that are after all public spaces where Ohio’s laws allow people to carry weapons openly or concealed. The city government and security services are grappling with this question and expect to issue guidelines by June.
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