The race between Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama for the democatic presidential nomination is no where near settled. As a result the democratic party is being forced to come to terms with their own prejudices and "precautions" as it appears likely that "superdelegates" will be the people who actually are the determining factor for the actual selection.
So, what is a superdelegate? Well, in simple terms they are elected and past officials belonging to the democratic party who will cast votes in the nominating convention towards one nominee or another. They are called "super" because they are not elected. The results of the state primaries and caucuses have no effect on their status. They are not obligated by the primary results (unlike elected delegates) to support any particular candidate. In short, in a close contest they are the power brokers.
Some have suggested that these superdelegates should vote along the lines of the primary results of the state where they are from. This sounds high-minded and "democratic"; but obviously, this isn't why the democratic party created superdelegate. If superdelegates were simply supposed to just go along with their states, then what would be the point of their existence in the first place? They weren't created to simply give people nicer name tags and better seats at the convention.
Superdelegates were created with one singular purpose in mind, to ensure that the democratic party hierarchy had a "failsafe," something they could fall back on to maintain control of the process; a trump card. Now, that "trump card" is being exposed for what it is; a means of making sure voters don't actually have the last word when it might run contrary to the party leaders interests.
For instance, let's say a democratic candidate (let's say a "blue dog" democrat, a conservative at several levels who might even be pro-life, but was nonetheless a democrat) squeaked out a primary victory by a narrow edge against a more traditional democratic "progressive" (strange, that was a term used back in the 1900-1920's and didn't always refer to democrats). What do you think the chances are that the superdelegates (who are largely of the liberal side of the party) would do? The party leadership would certainly not be adverse to having them en masse overturn the primary results.
The entire superdelegate system is not dissimilar to the financial arrangements of certain (dying) east coast newspapers, like the New York Times. In their arrangement, the family ownership of the Arthur Ochs Sulzberger allows a zillion shares of "common" stock to be sold and owned by anyone. But, they own, if you will, "super" stock. This stock allows them to actually continue functional control of the company. They can gain the benefits of lots of people's money investing in the Grey[ing] Lady, but lest these stock holders actually try to change things at the paper, the Sulzberger's can trump their decisions with the board of director majority they are allowed to appoint with their super stock.
The superdelegate feature of the democratic party system has been exposed for the world to see. It shows that all of the talk of inclusion, progressivism, and Democratic party principles and other stuff the party would like the general public to see and believe, has a limit.
The problem, of course this year, is that there are two members of the party, pretty much in the same part of the liberal wing (Hillary, the liberal pragmatic wing and Obama, by some accounts, the most liberal voting senator; but who is largely an unknown quantity in terms of governing [he's never actually run anything]).
It appears at this point that the superdelegates will indeed decide who the democratic nominee will be. Two state delegations (Florida and Michigan) are likely not to be allowed to participate in the process of selecting the nominee. And remember, this isn't like Rhode Island and Hawaii being excluded, these are two large and vital states; a presidential candidate who cannot win Michigan and Florida in the general election is not likely to be elected president. If the democratic party disenfranchises two large states from the nominating process, adhering to a silly rule that allows the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary to be vastly more important than they should be, this will be more of a problem come November.
The superdelegate system is going to come into play and it will (and already has) exposed the democratic party leadership to really bad light; it is a PR disaster; and, if exploited properly by Republicans, may allow the GOP to make gains across the board that would make the Truman presidential win in 1948 look predictable by comparison.