The flip side to, "Why didn't Obama's team just give Clinton the 4 extra delegates?" is, "Why is Clinton's camp so hard over something that won't make the slightest difference in the race?"  Four delegates - at 50% voting power no less - is trivial.  That's not the real argument though, and compromising about that won't stop the complaining.  Why are those two votes so important?  It's all about the delegate slate.

What was Ickes constant debating point during the arguments?  Fair reflection.  Over and over again it was stated that it wouldn't be consistent with fair reflection to assign the undecided delegates to Obama.  If, as the other committee member stated, it was effectively moot, that undecided delegates would effectively become Obama delegates, why fight that so hard?  There are two reasons for this, one obvious and one a little conspiratorial.  

Keeping the delegates as undecided creates more work for Obama.  Even if all 55 of them went to Obama, he'd have to woo them and get them to go on the record as supporting him.  That would mean that instead of this being wrapped up next week, it could take until July for him to reach the magic number.  Moreover, there were strong rumors out of the first selection meeting that Clinton managed to stack the uncommitted delegate slate with her own supporters.  Research on Demcomwatch has gone a way towards reducing that fear, but it definitely exists in the Obama camp.  Why else were there the frequent questions about changing the delegate slate if they wanted to?

OK, there were issues with the delegates.  Why not just make the count 73 Clinton, 55 Obama and not worry about the extra 4 delegates?  There actually is a reason to do so.  One of the Clinton camp's last remaining arguments is the popular vote one.  Never mind that nowhere in any rule does the popular vote count for anything, and yes it's stupid to mix caucus states, closed primary states and open primary states into a bowl and pretend that they're equal.  It's just a way of talking about the nomination process that makes your case look better.  In order to Clinton to have a lead in this count that includes the caucus states, Michigan has to be included, giving 0 votes to Obama.  Changing the delegate count sends the message that the Democratic Party does not consider Michigan to be a valid contest, and according to Chuck Todd, people are "cautioned" not to count Michigan's popular vote totals.

That's what this fight is about.  It's about extending the primary season and raising legitimacy questions about the nominee.  No one is going to accept an argument about that though, so they have to make the case about losing four delegates.  If I'm Obama, I let the case be made for a few days and if it keeps going after he gets to 2119, publicly offer to have two of his superdelegates vote for her.  I don't care much about two votes and I don't think Obama does either.  What we do care about is having the nomination process be over so we can focus on McCain.  That's what this argument is really about.