The chair of the Democratic National Committee, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, has had her thumb on the scale for Hillary Clinton, like the rest of the party establishment.  When Hillary thought she was a shoo-in, they limited the number of debates and scheduled them in time slots where no one was watching.  Now that Sanders is giving her a hard run, miraculously, new debates have been scheduled for prime time.

Then there is the Democratic Party’s use of superdelegates, party office holders, and insiders, designed specifically to keep top-down control of the nomination process, so that even a 22-point landslide in New Hampshire for Sanders yielded the same number of delegates as Hillary got. 

Prior to the Democratic presidential debate in Milwaukee last night, CNN’s Jake Tapper had the audacity to ask the DNC chair about this.  The expression on Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s face is priceless when Tapper asks her to explain to “voters new to the process” who might feel “this is all rigged” because of the superdelegates.

Tre Goins-Phillips of TheBlaze summarizes the evasive yet unintentionally revealing answer:

The DNC chairwoman explained to Tapper that the unpledged delegates, or the superdelegates, are a completely separate category from the pledged delegates, which Clinton and Sanders were competing for in the Granite State.

So far, so good.  But then:

“Unpledged delegates exist, really, to make sure that party leaders and elected officials don’t have to be in a position where they are running against grassroots activists,” Wasserman Shultz said, adding that the Democratic Party “highlights inclusiveness and diversity at our convention” and wants to give activists “every opportunity” to participate, which she says it what the superdelegates are for.

Wait a minute!  If grassroots activists turn out for a candidate the way they did for Sanders, the superdelegates nullify the resulting margin of victory.  I guess by saying they “don’t have to be in a position where they are running against grassroots activists,” DWS means they don’t even have to go to the voters to get their way.

Thanks for explaining.  This is what happens in a battle of wits with an unarmed party.