THE LIBERAL MEDIA'S COVERAGE OF ELECTION 2004
... My view of the election coverage of NBC, CBS, MSNBC, ABC, CNN, AND CBS

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Back to NBC ... 3:30AM in the morning ... Tom Brokaw was talking to Brian Williams & Tim Russert. As usual, Russert was being professional. But, you could see the regret in Brokaw's eyes as he was explaining to his TV audience why NBC had moved Ohio to Bush's column. He said their analyst believed that Ohio belonged to Bush and that Bush's count was at 269 ... one short of the 270 needed. He then proceeded to add (several times) ... "No one can blame the Kerry Campaign for refuting Ohio." Oh? And why is that? Then, Brokaw stressed ... "we do not decide elections here". Well gee, the goal in the past has always been to be the first to report who won. Hmmm, I guess things have changed! Referring back to the 2000 debacle, Brokaw had an out.

They started talking about reports that the Democratic jets were being readied in Boston to transport a bevy of lawyers to Ohio. Their eyes were wide with excitement and the anticipation of the impending legal battle for the Presidency.

Then final stats began to roll in on Nevada, New Mexico, and Iowa ... all showing that they should be moved into the Bush column. Doing so would put Bush over 270 ... so, in essence, they would be calling the election for Bush.

But, Brokaw refused ... saying "we won't be calling any more States tonight ... we need to sort this out".

Um, sort what out?

I mean, let's look at the facts ... They called Ohio for Bush ... and, three other states seem to be in the Bush column as well ... perhaps there were questions about Iowa and New Mexico ... but, the stats on Nevada was quite clear.

Indeed, it appeared quite clear that Bush had been re-elected. All that is left is to project that Bush has won the election.

But, even though the hard numbers are out there for all to see, the media refused to call it for Bush. Yes, you could see the sparkle in their eye when Kerry refused to concede. They would contribute to the efforts of the Kerry campaign in the one way they could ... by not projecting a winner and creating a sense of onus on the Kerry campaign to provide the burden of proof.
Stunning indeed.

What is additionally intriguing is the media's lack of ability to recognize bad data. Even after the media became bewildered at the inaccuracy of the exit poll data related to the numbers of votes they showed for Kerry and Bush, they still reported on other data contained in the exit polls ... such as, what "voters are thinking".

CNN continued to have little breakaways to a newscaster telling viewers what voters thought state-by-state throughout the evening. Reports on subjects such as what viewers thought about the war, the economy, etc.

One would think that after the data has been proven to be inaccurate that they would stop reporting the data. But, did they?

HELL NO!

They still flapped their gums about what voters thought about the war and other issues well into the wee hours of the morning ... sounding as if the data was as accurate as could be. After all, they needed to fill the airwaves with something ... and, who cares if the data is inaccurate.
At one point, after their 15 minute discussion about the inaccurate exit poll data on how voters voted, they even went directly to a newscaster who reported on more data ... data gained through the same exit interviews!

To a logical pragmatist such as myself, those types of things just confuse the hell out of me.

But, obviously, for the liberal media, it makes sense ...

... somehow.