News Agencies Need to Keep up with the Intelligence of their Audience: Why Michigan Should Not Have Been Called for Romney

SANTORUM SCORES MAJOR UPSET, TAKING 8 OF 14 CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS FROM ROMNEY'S HOME TURF.


(What the headlines should read.)

I’m no brilliant political analyst, but the utter ineptitude of the news media in calling Michigan for Romney surpasses all understanding. Victory in Michigan is not founded on popular vote, but on delegate distribution, according to congressional district. Calling Michigan on the basis of the popular vote is like claiming that the baseball team with the most hits won a game, without regard to runs scored. This is not rocket science, and it is akin to counting electoral votes in the general election. One need only to count the votes in each congressional district to determine delegate distribution. But instead, the news media, despite all their expertise and resources, couldn’t sort this out, and ended up falsely declaring Romney the winner based on the meaningless popular vote.

In fact, when Charles Krauthammer was confronted with this reality, he naively replied that the delegate count would not matter, since any difference between Santorum and Romney would only amount to a couple of delegates out of over a thousand necessary to win the election. True enough, but still those two delegates (probably more like 4 or 5 delegates) are nonetheless infinitely more significant than the 2% margin of victory for Romney in the popular vote. What is 30,000 votes out of the millions that will have been cast come convention time? Besides, no statistician will even care to log this number in any ledger at the convention. But the delegate count will be of supreme importance.

 

The congressional districts were evenly split, with 7 for Santorum, and 7 for Romney: 14 delegates each. By any standard of measurement, if this holds, this means that Michigan is tied. Here’s what the map looks like:

Looks like Michigan is Santorum country to me.

Why does it all matter? Mostly because of bragging rights and momentum. The very fact that this race was close at all makes it a win for Santorum anyway. He was outspent 4-1 (perhaps even 6-1), and this was Romney’s native state, his home turf which should have been an easy victory. Prior to Santorum’s surge, the Romney campaign probably projected that $200 in campaign expenditures and a token rally or two would bag this race. The fact that it was a real squeaker does much to make Santorum an obvious viable alternative to Romney. These facts in themselves make Santorum the real winner here, and should give Santorum a pre-Super Tuesday bounce, including an additional financial boon. But the delegate count legitimizes it as a Santorum win. The news media should at least pretend to understand the facts of this, and announce accordingly.

Also underreported is that Arizona has broken GOP rules about delegate distribution. Since it held its primary prior to GOP rules, not only is it penalized by half its normal delegate count, but it cannot be a winner take all state. The Santorum campaign may very well challenge Arizona's winner-take-all delegate allocation, and if GOP rules are followed, a number of delegates will be stripped from Romney and awarded to Santorum (and the other two candidates).

To add insult to injury, the latest news is that Michigan GOP officials met in a midnight, unpublicized session and changed the rules so that the two at large delegates were both awarded to Romney, instead of evenly divided. News on this can be found here: http://www.redstate.com/erick/2012/03/01/after-the-fact-romneys-supporters-in-michigan-seemingly-rewrite-the-delegate-rules/

Sharp Elbows, Mavericks, and Newsmedia Reporterbots

For the entirety of the campaign, John McCain did his best to pin the label "maverick" to Sarah Palin. However, I venture to guess that the only time you ever heard the term pinned to Sarah was when Sen. McCain said it. I'm pretty sure that the mainstream media resisted the notion of calling her a maverick, although the term fit her reputation perfectly.

In light of this, I find it altogether telling that as soon as Rahm Emmanuel was picked as Pres.-elect Obama's chief of staff, the whole army of mainstream newsmedia reporterbots began to chant the phrase "He has sharp elbows."

One of the great things Rush Limbaugh does is to turn the spot light on mainstream media to show how they are a carbon copy of the Democrat Party. In regard to sharp elbows, Rush did this simply by playing a montage of reporterbots giving their report. He compiled at least 10 if not 20 different reporterbots saying, in quick succession, that Emmanuel has sharp elbows. It is comical to hear this kind of proof that the Democrats put out their little soundbyte about Emmanuel and that the newsmedia do their duty to repeat it verbatim.

I suppose we first noticed this when suddenly all the reporterbots came out saying back in 2000 that George W. lacked "gravitas."

The mainstream newsmedia have squandered their true duty to the American people. As an industry, it needs to wither and die.

All is Great in Iraq

Yep, I should have blogged this last week when I first thought about it, and in doing so, people may have concluded that I have the gift of prophecy.

But really, anyone could have predicted it. The mainstream news media will be taking a fresh look at Iraq and begin noticing encouraging signs of peace and stability.

This newfound perspective is not precipitated by anything different on the ground. No, what is different is that the news media does not want the public to divert its attention away from Pres.-elect Obama's domestic agenda with constant reports about how bad things are in Baghdad.

Secondly, the press does not want to give the impression that Pres.-elect Obama is doing anything wrong in regard to the war in Iraq.

And so, this week, the mind-numb reporterbots got the message from above to start reporting good things about Iraq. This is seen dramatically in this headline from the Chicago Tribune: "Iraq Bombings Show Progress, Challenges." The opening lines read,

Today's bombings in Iraq which left dozens dead is a stark and horrible reminder that, while violence has dropped significantly there as a result of the U.S. military's surge, that country is still very dangerous.

It's a measure of progress that today's blasts, which killed at least 31 people in Baghdad and more elsewhere, according to the Associated Press, represented the worst day of violence since June (Chicago Tribune).

Come on! In a Bush-era newsreport, the headline would read something like, "Iraq Bombings Show Continued Failure." The report would then go on to give fodder for the Bush-haters. (Thanks, Rush, for calling attention to this article.)

We should now expect to hear a constant stream of good news about little Iraqi girls going to school for the first time, the financial liquidity of the Iraqi government, the competency of the Iraqi police force, and how Sunnis and Shiites have recently developed such endearing love for one another. Why, I'm looking forward to a Katie Couric interview with some Iraqi woman who has just planted a new flower bed outside her apartment.

This phenomenon will not impact newsmedia only. Indeed, the Democrat politicians will start chanting the same mantra. No doubt, marching orders have already been given: there shall be not a single negative word spoken about Iraq.

Ultimately, the Democrats viewed Iraq merely as a tool to regain power. They magnified every bad report and minimized every positive report for the last six years. They were willing to lose the war in order to regain power.

Now that Democrats have regained power, all is well in Iraq.

Who Should Be The Biggest Loser in 2010

The biggest loser needs to be the mainstream media.

The American people usually make good decisions when given the unfiltered facts. In the case of the 2008 election, the media was so committed to an Obama presidency and so opposed to a McCain presidency that Obama could have said, "I hate Jews and will support Hezbollah," and it would never have been reported; or Obama could have said something equally bizarre such as "I will bankrupt the coal industry and the cost of electricity will skyrocket under my administration" and it would not get reported.

(For those of you who get your news solely from the three major American networks, BBC, or the Associated Press--or, more accurately APObama--the last comment was actually aired by the new media on the weekend prior to the election, but the mainstream media was absolutely silent about it.)

Mainstream media has squandered its stewardship of the important, almost sacred trust given to it. All that Americans want from the media is the truth, but mainstream media was determined to keep the truth from interfering with an Obama election. Anything that would threaten an Obama presidency was buried as deeply as possible. Meanwhile, mainstream media scrutinised every possible negative on McCain and Palin.

As flawed as the McCain campaign was, it could have won the election if the media had been honest.

We'll not go into detail at this point. My point is not to demonstrate mainstream media's bias, but rather to call for its destruction.

Rush gleefully points out that Standard and Poor's rated the New York Times' stock as "junk" on the day that it endorsed Obama.

While the LA Times was withholding a video tape of a gala event fetting a Palestinian Terrorist which both Obama and self-professed Pentagon Bomber Bill Ayers were in attendance, its company was laying off 10% of its employees.

Mainstream media as an industry needs to die. As many of us as possible should dig up our news from alternative sources. Mainstream media flexed its muscle and proved that it could deliver a president. The American people need to flex its own muscle and deliver a deathblow to a morally bankrupt news media industry.

The biggest loser in 2010 needs to be mainstream media.

The First Press Conference Question

Here's the first question that ought to be asked at Obama's first presidential press conference but won't:

"Mr. President, when Mr. Biden was asked difficult questions in two radio interviews, and then three newspapers endorsed Sen. McCain, your campaign treated these media outlets as something akin to persona non grata. Should the Washington Press Corps continue its practice in the Bush presidency of asking the toughest possible questions to you, or should we be fearful to do so?"

Instead, we should expect the big questions like, "Was it difficult for you and Mrs. Obama to agree on your puppy's name?"