The best quote of this week for me was an excerpt lifted from an editorial in The Wall Street Journal on the disastrous Democratic primary vote count in Iowa:
“The college of cardinals at least lets the world know with white or black smoke how the vote for pope is going. Here the party that waxes sanctimonious about election security couldn’t secure its own election from itself. Here the party that has spent three years questioning the legitimacy of the 2016 election will see the legitimacy of its own custom-designed process questioned. Here the party that promises technocratic management of American health care, energy and finance proved less able to tally votes even than the ancient Athenians.”
And so this major embarrassment does remind people of the typical incompetence of government management of complicated systems. Think about the U. S. Postal Service. But I predict that this debacle will have lasting and serious credibility consequences for the Democrats far beyond the Iowa primary results, most significantly in widening the rift between the progressive and so-called moderate wings of the party and deepening the long standing animosity between the Democratic National Committee and the Bernie Sanders organization, all of which will be to Trump’s benefit. Hillary, call your office.
