The Clinton Rules

Quick, what do Aristotle, Immanuel Kant, John Rawls, Lon Fuller, and Herbert Wechsler have in common?

Even in death, none of them can believe that Paul Krugman wrote an entire column about "venom" and "bitterness" in the Democratic primary without once mentioning the Clinton campaign's after-the-fact declaration that the Michigan and Florida delegates should count.

Aristotle rejected "ad hoc" reasoning in systems; Kant held out universality (the rules should apply to every actor regardless of situation) as the first formulation of the categorical imperative; Rawls' original position holds that laws are just when a group would have agreed upon them prior to gaining knowledge of each individual's situation; Fuller argued that retroactive legislation and unstable legislation both violate the internal morality of law; Wechsler defined a principled decision as one that transcends the result achieved and applied to both parties equally.

Clinton's response: "I believe our nominee will need the enthusiastic support of Democrats in these states to win the general election, and so I will ask my Democratic convention delegates to support seating the delegations from Florida and Michigan." Take that, veil of ignorance! But see Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson on superdelegates: "There is a role for superdelegates in our party, as per rules of our party. These are not rules we set; they predate Bill Clinton. We are going to play under the rules we are given." Uh, what?

Hey, do you think this insane duplicity could be a source of "bitterness" and "venom"? Alas, Krugman offers this disclaimer: "I won’t try for fake evenhandedness here." One question for Krugman (and the Clinton camp): why bother to include the word "fake"?