Democrats in difficult spot as they struggle for unity

How not to send a unity message: File into the City of Brotherly Love and spend the first day of the Democratic National Convention booing each other.

By 6 p.m. Monday, Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Center was clearly divided between the winning Hillary Clinton delegates and the losing, but not giving up, Bernie Sanders delegates.

Because of superdelegate support, Clinton had, early on, realistically sewn up the nomination. Sanders was always fighting an almost- impossible battle.

So when he lost, Sanders switched to battle against superdelegates, who are so super because of their position in the party — such as members of the congressional delegation or members of each state’s Democratic Party hierarchy. They get a vote in deciding who will be the presidential nominee.

Democrats created a superdelegate system to prevent the presidential party nomination from being hijacked by a radical or fringe candidate, such as what happened to the Republican Party this year.

Business and reality- show tycoon Donald Trump sprang to life as a politician after an abortive attempt to convince voters that President Barack Obama was born in Africa, not Hawaii, and was not legally qualified to be president. Although the argument was wholesale nonsense, he was able to gain traction and eventually the GOP nomination.

At the Democratic convention, largely unknown Maine state Rep. Diane Russell, a staunch Sanders supporter, gave a fiery 12-minute speech, mostly about the need to reform the national Democratic Party’s superdelegate structure. But she neatly switched the speech into a blistering call for unity.

“It may get messy but, ladies and gentlemen, this is what democracy looks like,” Russell shouted to the crowd, as she went on to urge them to support Sanders, but vote to make Clinton president.

Having or not having superdelegates in the party rules is a small issue compared to having the convention cast in terms of unity and not chaos.

“Maine State Rep. Diane Russell, a Bernie supporter, kinda killed it just now. She did a lot to unify the room. Well done!” tweeted the Clinton campaign.

Bart Dame, a Hawaii Democratic delegate and a Sanders supporter, texted back to my query about the convention, saying, “Diane Russell is giving the best unity speech of the night, so far.”

Apparently the search for unity has yet to find Hawaii’s U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, who is both a Sanders supporter and attending the convention as a superdelegate because of her congressional post.

Gabbard is continuing the attack on the superdelegate system, but has yet to give a full-on endorsement of Clinton.

In the fall, it will be a lack of unity, not a surplus of superdelegates, that damages the Democrats’ chances of keeping the White House.

Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.