Democrats are not only failing to tame the bitter, out-of-control campaign exchanges between would-be presidents Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, they're also confused on what to do about Michigan and Florida.

Those two states disobeyed the Democratic National Committee's rule not to move their primary election ahead of Super Tuesday on Feb. 5. When they did, the DNC stripped them of their delegates. Hence, as matters stand now, neither of those critically important states -- with a total of about 350 delegates -- will be represented at the party's national convention in August.

This has Clinton upset, because she won most of the delegates in both states and they would be a big boon to her nomination chances if she could get them seated at the convention. For the same reason, Obama doesn't want them seated.

Never mind that Clinton agreed to the DNC rule back when she thought she would roll to the nomination without significant opposition. Now she's decided she needs the Florida and Michigan delegates after all.

The DNC, of course, is frantically seeking a solution to the conundrum. The best plan would be to hold do-over primaries sometime next summer before the convention. The problem is primaries are expensive -- they cost millions of dollars -- and the DNC says it can't afford to pay for them.

The two states, understandably, don't want to pay for them, either. Taxpayers, at least those who are not Democrats, have no desire to bail the party out of a mess of its own making. Florida House Democrats are opposed to any kind of redo.

And this raises another issue: If Democrats can't even run their primaries without going broke and making a mess of everything, why should voters think they could run the country any better?