During a brief statement in Washington on Tuesday, Bernie Sanders outlined four proposals to reform the Democratic Party. Those proposals are as follows, given in the order Sanders presented them.
1. Get new leadership at the Democratic National Committee.
2. Approve "the most progressive platform ever passed" at the Democratic National Convention in July.
3. Enact "real electoral reform" within the Democratic Party.
4. Get rid of superdelegates

But that is why Point No. 4 above is odd. Sanders fleshed out all of these points, of course, and to explain why he wanted to ban superdelegates, he noted that about 400 had pledged to Clinton before voting even began, echoing a common argument that this somehow affected the results of the ensuing contests. There's not really any evidence that it did: Clinton's strength among members of the Democratic establishment was clearly beneficial, and superdelegates overlap with that group, but I'd challenge you to find a significant population of voters in any state who would point to the raw count of superdelegates as having swayed their decision. Did Clinton romp in the South because black voters saw her superdelegate edge? Did she get demolished in New Hampshire because of it?

It is the job of the Democratic Party to gain new members who will then vote for Democratic candidates. To raise money from those members to help run campaigns on behalf of those candidates. In recent years, the number of people who identify with the party has declined; the number of people who identify with the Republican Party has declined slightly faster. In early 2005, there were more Republicans than Democrats and more Democrats than independents, according to Gallup. By January of this year, 26 percent of Americans identified as Republicans and 29 percent as Democrats. Forty-two percent called themselves independents. In other words: The party isn't getting its job done. (It's not getting the job done in state-level races, either, but that's a different discussion.)

From the standpoint of the party, though, Sanders's proposal would only make the problem worse. Allowing non-Democrats to vote in the Democratic primary might get voters invested in the candidate they support — but it wouldn't get them invested in the party. The party wants to identify people whom it can reliably turn out to vote in important contests; allowing people to vote in Democratic primaries without being Democrats doesn't help them with that identification. What's more, it doesn't build loyalty to the ticket. Democrats tend to vote for Democrats. Independents votes for ... whomever. (Although in practice they vote for the party with which they privately align themselves, outside of the pesky gaze of Wasserman Schultz.)

It's not weird to suggest that more people should get to vote in elections. It's somewhat weird to suggest that the party has a duty to let non-members help pick its nominee. It's very weird to suggest that the Democratic Party would want to intentionally weaken itself