We're making fun of the Republicans who really thought they were going to win, but

[Kber]

don't forget the media (and not just FOX) was feeding us all a constant stream of "close race" "analysis".

The media might want to portray themselves as knowing all along that Obama was favored to win, but I only saw stories about Obama's "slight edge" in the last few days before the election.

No one was willing to say Obama was "likely" to win. It was all about the race being too close to call.

So before we let the Republicans walk down that road of shame all by themselves, remember that EVERY major media outlet should be walking in lock step with them for getting it so very wrong.

[patrice]

1. KICK!

[doc03]

2. Maybe it helped us GOTV n/t

[Bake]

11. I'm sure it did!

A huge contingent of DUers (me included) were pretty nervous about it, and I'm damn glad NONE of us took anything for granted, but continued to work right up to the end to get out the vote!



Bake

[doc03]

12. Even though I kept track of Nate Silver's 538 blog, I didn't think

Obama was going to win. The reason was I wasn't outside of the southeastern part of Ohio this summer. I did take a trip to the mountains and went through parts of WV, PA MD and VA and same as in southeastern Ohio it looked like everyone was going to vote Republican. In the election all of those areas did go Republican and the counties in southeastern Ohio that went Obama in 2008 flipped to Romney this year.

[Blue4Texas]

17. I thought president would win but GOP would steal

[Blue4Texas]

18. Because we needed extra votes to offset cheating

[sadbear]

3. They should have listened to Nate.

[brooklynite]

4. Um, it WAS close...

...The popular vote was split 50-48. Yes, the Electoral Vote was a blow-out, but the bottom line was that almost as many people voted against the President as voted for him.

[brush]

5. I dont think the networks didn't know . . .

. . . it wasn't close. They just pushed the "close race" "analysis" for ratings and political ad sales. Notice how early they all called it? They knew what was up, hell, I listened to coverage on satellite radio on the way to a watch party and they had the electoral vote count at 243 for the Pres. and 183 for Romney. When we got to the party CNN TV had it at 72 for Romney and 62 for the President. And they kept up that charade for a while with Romney's count inching up and the President's always behind. Then all of a sudden the big states "allegedly" came in and the President was all of a sudden ahead and they soon called him the winner. My point is, if satellite radio knew two hours earlier that the President was substantially ahead, so did the TV networks but they just lead people on for a longer show and ratings. They didn't call it for the President until 8:30 PST.

[Bake]

20. MAYBE they were secretly for Obama (it "is" the so-called liberal media, after all)

And they knew if they said it was close it would force us to GOTV ...

...

...

NAAAAAAHHHHHH!

They just wanted the ratings.



Bake

[Grammy23]

6. That's exactly right. I screamed so often at my TV that I was hoarse.

If it had not been for sites like Nate Silver's or Sam Wang's at Princeton, I would have been in the fetal position on the night of the Election. As it was, I went to those sites for comfort and rational thinking that kept me from totally losing it. If I had been going by what I heard day in and day out on the media (and NOT just Fox News, since I do not watch that channel) I would have been in despair. As it was, I got a more balanced point of view here and from Nate and Sam. Thank goodness for MATH and some ability to reason.

[PsychProfessor]

7. The big difference is

They never looked for disconfirming information. They have access to the web. I myself searched frequently for any sound evidence that Nate was wrong. There was none. They could have looked for anything that might have provided them a clue. But they didn't. Even if they looked at unskewed polls they could have seen that prior to the unskewing Obama had the ev locked up. They have their own closed minds to blame.

[tomm2thumbs]

8. ironically they did Obama a favor by keeping voters in lines and at the polls

Last edited Fri Nov 9, 2012, 11:50 PM - Edit history (1)

if it was going to be a done-deal, a lot of voters would have stayed home to watch the celebration, thinking it was not necessary to do their part

I'll take 4 months of anxiety for 4 years of Obama ANY day!

Thanks media --- you inadvertently saved our country from Republican scum!!!


Especially thanks to FoxNews... for doing their part!

[Kber]

9. Like the way you think!

[Blue4Texas]

19. Yes, Nate's model was based on DEMs showing up

[DemocratSinceBirth]

10. This

Alan Houston
November 5, 2012 at 10:58 pm
Although statistical models provide evidence that President Obama has a 90% to 98% chance of winning, I am very pleased that the mass media and TV reports that the election is a tie, and it could go either way.

I saw some 80 year old black ladies wait four hours in line to early vote in Houston, Texas (Harris County limits the number of voting machines in black neighborhoods, the wait in wealthy white neighborhoods is 15 minutes to 30 minutes).

Other black voters in Houston were forced to stand in line until 1 a.m., others were told they would be “killed by a bomb” if they did not leave the polling station. These folks were in line because “the election is a tie”.

I did not have the heart to tell them that the President has zero chance of getting the electoral votes from Texas. I am hoping Obama supporters in Ohio are willing to stand in line three hours, or stay in line until 1 a.m., and refuse to run when tea party members stage a fake bombing of the polling center. If Democrats in Ohio believe that the election is a tie, they will vote, and if every Democrat in Ohio votes, the President will win another four year term.

http://votamatic.org/final-estimates-tomorrow-morning/#comments
9

[Scuba]

13. I seem to recall a bunch of talking heads telling us Romney would win in a landslide...

... and a bunch more saying it was "neck-and-neck".


I don't recall ANYONE saying Barack would be re-elected in a landslide.

[Gargoyle22]

14. It's pretty frightening that it apparently never occurred to Romney that he might lose

I thought hard edged analysis was supposed to be his forte? God we dodged a bullet on Tuesday. Romney is nuts.

[sammytko]

16. I agree. He really thought he was going to win. Can't fake that kind of devastation.

They looked bad.

[brush]

21. They sure did

They thought Rove would pull it off again as he did in '04.

[yashoo]

15. One of the networks, I don't know which one...

Must have had something about Obama being solidly ahead. My mother, a low-information-but-easily-worried lifelong Democrat, told me Monday morning that she was relaxed because the TV was saying Obama would win easily. I know I certainly didn't see that, but apparently it was out there somewhere.