the Political parties each get to hold their own elections in the states, however two states violated party rules and their votes (delegates – that received votes) are in contention – last I heard their results will only count half of other delegates.

Each state has it’s own rules re: how the parties state delegates will be elected – some use an election by the party voters in the state and other states use an old form known as a caucus to determine the delegates selected. Honestly to list the exact rules and procedures for them all would require an encyclopedic text – this is because each state has it’s own system and own way of selecting delegates (and how many delegates represent the state) – this is supposed to be controlled by the national party, but is only controlled partially since several states have traditions that continue from the age of Jefferson in some cases. Now multiply everything I just said above times 2 – that’s because the Democrats system is very different from the Republican system in each state and at the national level. So you should try to learn just the system in your state to get a better idea of how your primary or caucus (depending on your state) works – for your party – - – by the way if you don’t like the two parties – there are additional primaries for the minor parties like Green or American Independant, American Socialist, etc. etc. – not that they amount to a hill of beans.

Oh and superdelegates are party officials that are considered to be important leaders of the party – ex-presidents, governors, members of Congress, state legislature, etc. etc. (the party decides who these people are 2 years before the voting convention at another convention.

Bottom line – each state has delegates (based on population of the state as to how much weight each state gives at the party convention) that go to the party convention held in the summer – voting occurs by all the delegates – if there is no consensus (often due to a third candidate) then they have speeches and try to convince each other to change their vote – then they vote until a candidate for their party is selected.

After the two major conventions select the party candidates – they campaign against each other for the November General Election – where people vote for (not delegates) but electors – (the popular vote once again does not hold the day necessarily) – the electors for each state are considered all or nothing – meaning a state that is 51% for one party gives 100% of their electoral votes to that party candidate

yep – pretty much sucks – I think almost everyone agrees that it sucks – but good luck changing it – the party itself is in charge of the rules and the Constitution never even mentions the word elections – therefore there is no precedent to fight in a court.
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AP gov’t teacher – 10 years

Superdelegates are party leaders who have a vote in addition to the vote they cast as private citizens. I think there’s about 800 or so of them. They can vote any way they chose. Some vote because of their own preference regardless of their state’s results (example–Robert Byrd of WV has endorsed Obama). Others vote in accordance with their state vote. These people were given this power to make sense of the popular vote at the end of the nomination process.

In the Republican party, when a candidate wins a state, he is awarded all of the republican delegates from that state. The other candidates get none from that state. The delegates are still proportional to the population, and whoever gets the most votes wins the Republican nomination.
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