Once the great white Hope, now he wants to be the kingmaker:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/28/howard-dean-obama-or-clin_n_98916.html

""We want the voters to have their say. That's over on June 3," Dean said in an interview on ABC's "Good Morning America."

Dean also said that while the party rules say Democratic superdelegates can wait until the party's August 25 convention to make up their minds, that would be too late to unify the party and defeat the presumptive Republican nominee, John McCain.

"We really can't have a divided convention. If we do it's going to be very hard to heal the party afterwards," Dean said. "So we'll know who the nominee is and that'll give us an extra 2 1/2 months to get our party together, heal the wounds of having a very closely divided race and take on Senator McCain.""

Mind you, in most countries any election is usually over in less than 6 weeks. Looks like Dean wants to eat his cake and also keep it. You either play by the rules (thus going into the convention without a clear candidate, after all that's what conventions are for) or try to be strategic and force an early decission.

It looks like he won't get either and there will be a major divide between the 2 sides of the Dems...

""Either of these candidates, if it's time for them to go, they'll know it and they will go," Dean said. "They don't need any pushing from me. You know when to get in and you know when to get out. That's just part of the deal.""

Hm, and I thought there is such a thing as party playbook, and the rules are supposed to be followed, silly me...

"Dean said that "none of the so-called party elders I talked to" think the contest should go until the convention. "I agree with that," Dean said."

There you have it folks, the real rulers of the country, the party elders.

Sad, isn't it, that no one cares to play by the rules that are set. Sad, also, that those who wish to play by the rules have to pretend that they're not attached to "silly" things like RULES.

This party is DOOMED.

here is a very good analysis of the situation from a Digger:

"I watched the meet the press interview Dean, the thing to take out of this, and I've been saying this to all of the "Obama or Noone" group is that he said at least four times the most important person in all of this will be whoever LOOSES the primary. He recognizes how split the Dems are right now by the fact that the looser will still have 49% of the vote. So the looser will be the one that has to jump forward and bring all of their supporters to the other candidate. That will be a challenge.

The other point he made is that whoever looses that person has to think it was fair. Now if Obama looses because of the super delegates, thats the way the system is setup. But I think that will only happen if Clinton is FAR ahead of Obama to beat McCain which is doubtful. If that happens he will feel ripped off, but I'm guessing he will swallow his pride, realizing that he is young and can easily run again. Its the Obama supporters that worries party insiders like McCain because they will feel so slighted they won't vote. The same goes for Clinton, if something fair to both sides isnt resolved in Florida and Michigan then Clinton and her supporters will feel they were treated unfairly, but I still think she will stand up and support Obama 100%. Like Dean or not, after loosing to Kerry in a bitter fight he went on to campaign hard for him. I think both Clinton and Obama will do the same, sure behind the scenes the looser will be fuming, but in public they will put on a happy face and HOPEFULLY convert their supporters to the other side.

So bash Clinton all you like, but without just about ALL of her supporters rallying behind Obama he cannot win."