Will superdelegates decide who gets the Democratic nomination?

The Democratic party uses a rather un-democratic method in choosing their nominees.  Besides the normal delegates that are elected by the people in the various primaries and caucuses, there are also "superdelegates" that are seated automatically at the Democratic convention, based upon their current or former status in the party.  These superdelegates are free to support any candidate they like, regardless of whom the state they represent voted for, or who has the most regular convention delegates.

With Hillary Clinton's recent wins suggest that if she wins several of the remaining states, she might be able to keep Barack Obama from reaching the 2025 delegates needed to win.  If that's the case, the decision will be made at the convention, and the votes of those superdelgates will decide the race.

This brings up an ironic possible scenario: if Barack Obama wins the popular vote (and therefore has more elected delegates), but Hillary Clinton has more total delegates due to the support of many of the superdelegates, Clinton would win the Democratic nomination.  Sound familiar?  That's because we've spent the last 7+ years hearing the Democrats whine about Bush "stealing the Presidency" when he beat Al Gore by a small margin in the Electoral College, but not the popular vote.

If that indeed occurs, it will have a huge impact on the Democratic party.  The same people that feel cheated by the 2000 Presidential Election will be just as angry with Clinton as they were with Bush-- but this time around they'll have more people to blame: the superdelegates.  Since these superdelegates are mostly party big shots, this could easily cause a huge division within the party.  With the far-left already dominating most of the current Democratic power-base, such an incident could easily cause a civil war within the party that would likely end with the party splitting apart.

If you ask me, that's probably a good thing.  Of course any rift in the Democratic party will help the Republicans.  But more importantly, a split in the Democratic party could cause the far-left to seperate from the more moderate liberal Democrats.  Perhaps then the far-left can simply adopt a more appropriate party name: Communists.  I hear the hammer & sickle logo is still available, and works well on bumper stickers.

Many have suggested that the superdelegates will honor the results of the popular vote regardless of who they might personally support.  But let's face it, the rules allow them to vote their conscience, and my guess is that many of them will.  I'm not sure if it will be enough to give Hillary the nomination, but to be honest, I'm not sure that matters.  Even if Obama wins, if he only wins by a small margin, much of the damage will have been done.  They'll be talk of revising the nomination rules for the next election, and that will put the party higher-ups (who would want to protect their superdelegate status) against the lower-ranking members, who will likely support removing the idea of superdelegates completely.  This disagreement might not rip the party in two, but it will certainly cause damage nonetheless.

Regardless of the outcome of the superdelegate votes, one thing is clear: while Clinton and Obama are busy arguing over the rules vs the people, McCain will be working hard to be ready for whoever comes out on top.