OMG, get this: Terry McAuliffe on Michigan's delegates

So you already know what my opinion is about Michigan's delegates: they shouldn't be seated. Not only did the state violate DNC rules by moving up their primary, but Obama, Edwards, and several other candidates removed their names from the ballot in deference to an agreement that all the candidates signed to not campaign in the state.

This morning I read Ezra Klein's blog and learned what Terry McAuliffe, now Hillary's campaign finance manager, told Michigan's Senator Carl Levin four years ago when Levin suggested that Michigan would move it's primary up before the date specified by the DNC rules: "I will not let you break the nominating process for one state."

You can read the full story in McAuliffe's own book, What a Party! Here's an excerpt:

"I'm going outside the primary window," [Michigan Sen. Carl Levin] told me definitively.

"If I allow you to do that, the whole system collapses," I said. "We will have chaos. I let you make your case to the DNC, and we voted unanimously and you lost."

He kept insisting that they were going to move up Michigan on their own, even though if they did that, they would lose half their delegates. By that point Carl and I were leaning toward each other over a table in the middle of the room, shouting and dropping the occasional expletive.

"You won't deny us seats at the convention," he said.

"Carl, take it to the bank," I said. "They will not get a credential. The closest they'll get to Boston will be watching it on television. I will not let you break this entire nominating process for one state. The rules are the rules. If you want to call my bluff, Carl, you go ahead and do it."

We glared at each other some more, but there was nothing much left to say. I was holding all the cards and Levin knew it.

You can read it in the book yourself, and you don't even have to buy it: just go to Amazon's online preview of the book and search for Michigan (just type "Michigan" in the Search inside this book box on the left side of the webpage). Then click on the link to page 341.

Similarly, Harold Ickes, a top Hillary staffer, argues for seating Michigan but voted to strip them of their delegates when he was on the DNC committee dealing with the problem.

If this isn't the height of self-serving hypocrisy, I don't know what is.