January 29, 2008 05:08 AM UTC

"I did not have campaigning relations with that state"

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• by: Go Blue

What pledge? Clinton Appears in Florida

Hillary Clinton has decided to rewrite the rules of the race for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.

Like other candidates, she pledged not to campaign in Florida after the state jumped ahead on the schedule of caucuses and primaries set by the Democratic National Committee. She had to make that pledge if she hoped to compete in the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses and the first-in-the-nation New Hampshire primary, as Iowa and New Hampshire zealously guard their starting status on the political calendar.

But Iowa and New Hampshire are history and, after a landslide loss in South Carolina on Saturday, Clinton needs a win.

So she has begun appearing in Florida in anticipation of Tuesday’s Democratic primary there.

Clinton’s move insults not just the voters in Iowa and New Hampshire who trusted her pledge but also the voters of all the states that respected the DNC’s outline for the nominating process. Effectively, she is saying to Democrats in states that will participate in February 5th’s “Super Tuesday” primaries and caucuses and in the two dozen states that have scheduled later votes: You may follow the rules if you please, but I write the rules as I please.

That’s the raw political reality of Clinton’s move, even if she is spinning it as an embrace of participatory democracy.