“This was not surprising, as it’s a meeting of party insiders and everyone’s name is read aloud describing their vote. If you want to get ahead in the party and a favored incumbent is standing there watching your vote, guess where you’re going to go. A lot of people switched from “no endorsement” in the pre-endorsement conference (Harman did not attend that) to Harman.”; thanks for the update David but as I’ve said before, this just shows the inherent corruption WITHIN the ‘party’.

AFAIC, this shows EXACTLY why the mantra of ‘working from within’ is fallacious.

And why is this? “A substantial amount of the more progressive Northern California delegation didn’t even make it to Los Angeles,”

Because it’s a boring primary election year with no big intra-party fights.

For those of us who previously sought to become convention delegates, only to be overrun by a local machine, it’s frustrating that those who won didn’t bother to attend the convention at all.

I’d ask her why she wants to turn American citizens into terrorists and take away our civil liberties with the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act.

I was a delegate and I voted for Marcy

check out this daily show clip about Harman as it is more powerful than me whining about the reason we all need to help fight this scourge
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-april-28-2009/your-government-not-at-work—jane-harman-scandal

Call me naive, but the Winograd supporters are whining because the process, that they participated in, did not go in their favor. Had Winograd stopped the Harman endorsement, they would have shouted with glee that the process worked. I was at the convention and I read Winograd’s materials and Harman’s. Winograd attacked Harman’s record with innuendo and no proof. Harman provided the rankings she received from respected Progressive organizations — and they were all extremely high. Some might disagree with Harman over some issues — but overall — she has voted with Progressives most of the time. Let’s go beat some Republicans.

Clearly, none of you were at the convention! Marcy and Jane went into Saturdays re-vote of the pre endorsement vote for the 36 CD where Marcy got 13.7% of the vote. She got the petition to force a statewide floor vote. She got her signatures but only after 2 of her petitioners where detained by hotel security for assult with a sign and triping a delgate who refused to sign the petition. Of the 1986 delegates that attened the convention 904 were from Norther California, Marcy only won SF and SLO, Jane Harman won every other county in the state. At the end of the day, after four votes over two months, Jane Harman won every single one of the votes. My favorite statement from the podium today at the convention was “Marcy next time you are up for a vote make sure you are F***ing organized for the vote”

Here’s some coverage of the Middle East debate between Winograd and Harman that took place at this convention:

Jane Harman and Marcy Winograd managed to squeeze in a debate of sorts before a couple hundred Progressive Caucus delegates at the Democratic Convention. Marcy herself brought up Israel in order to distance herself from Harman. I never thought I’d hear a candidate talk about brutal occupation, lack of water, unnecessary continuous deaths and lack of democracy. Harman in response called Marcy an extremist who wants to get rid of Israel, and Marcy shot back with a democratic state from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River. This got a standing ovation. And, Harman stood up and said she did not go to the caucus to debate and strode out. Unbelievable. We collected enough signatures to get Marcy’s signature to the floor of the convention, whereupon the vote was done in a strange but legal way with party workers counting the people holding up cards, and of course Harman won. When we called for a recorded vote, John Burton, the party chair, snarled something or other about Marcy should organize better. Clearly Marcy won the standing vote (we all waved our delegate badges) but we had not done our homework to jump at the mike and call for a recorded vote. Doesn’t matter, the point will not be lost on the lobby.

@politixx, if the Winograd forces had been able to defeat the party establishment, they would have celebrated a win despite the process, which is clearly geared to help incumbents regardless of whether they’re relics from a different era, or no longer representative of their constituents, as is the case with Harman. “Most of the time” votes with the progressives isn’t good enough when you can do better and still hold the seat; frankly, 80% rating for the AFL-CIO isn’t all that great in liberal parts of SoCal. And “most of the time” for Harman didn’t include her votes on war, going along to get along on illegal wiretapping, bankruptcy protection for consumers and homeowners that she disdained, and her general support for the military-industrial complex.

@fieldhack (aptly named). What happened in the hotel lobby was security decided that a public (hotel lobby) space housing a political convention suddenly was off limits to petition circulators — how nuts is that?

It’s not surprising that Harman “won” the local caucus, since she and her fellow hacks controlled most of the delegates who vote there. Those hacks probably made up the margin she won on the floor, too. Bucking the establishment is not an easy task, but Chairman Burton’s rudeness and clearly dismissive approach to the rules providing for an (inadequate) outlet to cure the very problem confronted in this case — an incumbent willfully out of touch with her constituents and caring not a whit because she has gobs of money — was uncalled for and an embarrassment to the party. Even VP and LA County Chair Eric Bauman had to admit that Winograd, a “personal friend” of his, was a “great Democrat”. She has worked very hard to make this party better, and to make it succeed in the conventional sense, so Burton’s mistreatment of her was a disgrace.