Rev. Danny Fisher

MoveOn.org produced an important petition today regarding the decision facing the superdelegates at this year’s Democratic National Convention.

For the uninitiated, “superdelegates” (an informal term), like other delegates, are supporters who attend their party’s national convention and cast a vote for that party’s presidential nominee. Unlike other delegates, though, superdelegates are not selected through primary or caucus, but seated based on their status as a “state party chair, retired politician, or Democratic insider.” Superdelegates attend the convention “unpledged” to a particular candidate; in other words, they have not announced support for any of the candidates. This year, in total, superdelegates represent about 20% of the total number of delegates to the Democratic National Convention.

[It follows, then, that] the superdelegates are under lots of pressure right now to come out for one candidate or the other. We urgently need to encourage them to let the voters decide between [Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama]–and then to support the will of the people.

Our friends over at MoveOn.org have put together a petition to urge the superdelegates to do just that. Sign their petition to the superdelegates and make sure they respect the will of the people.

To add your name to MoveOn.org’s petition, sign here.

In the email about this petition that I received from TrueMajority.org, Online Organizer Ben Kroetz writes:

For the record, TrueMajority.org, the online project of USAction, is not supporting any candidate, Republican or Democrat, but does support the democratic process.

[...]

The superdelegates could ignore the will of the voters and pick whichever nominee they want, embroiling the entire convention in an ugly fight.

Superdelegates aren’t used to hearing from concerned voters. If enough of us sign this petition, we can urge them to side with whichever candidate–Clinton or Obama–has the most support from voters.

This is about democracy, pure and simple. Whoever you support, we can all agree the Democratic nominee should be decided by Democratic voters.

Check. Sign the petition. This is a particularly important issue in a country where democracy seems to erode a little bit more with each passing day.