Clark Supporters Fight Back vs. CNN Travesty

[tameszu]

"Clark leads in Oklahoma" my foot. They called half of the races on exit polls alone and now they refuse to say that Clark won Oklahoma for a freakin' week until the state certifies the vote?!? This is beyond ludicrous--there is no way that a 0.5% margin will be overturned by challenges.

Clark supporters, we need to take Wes Jr.'s example and hit back. We need to win in TN next week and we can't continue to take this kind of disrespect. My letter to CNN follows--please phone or write them now!

---------------------------------

Dear CNN,

I have never been more appalled at election night coverage than I was
at CNN's tonight. Your commentators' endless promotion of the narrative
that it is a race between Kerry and Edwards have caused them to reach
unheard of levels of inaccurate and tendentious reporting. Wolf
Blitzer, Judy Woodruff, and Jeff Greenfield's intimation that Clark's
showing in Oklahoma was "disappointing" whereas Edwards was
"surprisingly strong" doesn't take into account the coverage of the
media itself. Please go back through your archives for the last 6 days
and measure the amount of time you spent covering Edwards as opposed to
Clark. Clark got less coverage than Lieberman, who finished behind
Clark in New Hampshire (along with Edwards, although you wouldn't have
known that, considering the coverage) and Dean, who explicitly
indicated that he wasn't really contesting the Feb. 3 votes.

The hard fact is that despite the massive amount of free media awarded
to Edwards as compared to Clark over the past week, Clark kept it very
close, winning a state and winning delegates in more states than
Edwards (I couldn't help but laugh when Judy Woodruff dismissed Clark's
chances because he had only won delegates in Oklahoma and a "couple
other states"). Actually, in the hard pledged delegate count for the
night, Edwards won 59 delegates (please correct your delegate scorecard
as it doesn't properly reflect each states' primary rules, which assign
only some delegates proportionally over the entire state; some are also
assigned by the amount of vote won per congressional district) in 3
states and Clark won 47 delegates in 4 states. This hardly constitutes
a resounding difference between Edwards and Clark.

Finally, your treatment of Clark winning Oklahoma is completely
unprecedented. The idea that you would call half of the states minutes
after the voting booths closed based on exit polls alone, but "wait for
the state to certify the results" when, after counting all of the
ballots, Clark won Oklahoma by a margin well out of the reach of
spoiled or miscounted ballots (the number of ballots that "swing" as a
result of recounts is typically less than 0.1% and Clark beat Edwards
by 4 times that amount) is mindblogging. No other news network reported
Clark as "leading" Oklahoma--after 100% of the votes were counted, it's
quite clear that he won it, certainly clearly than it was that Kerry
had won Arizona after 5% of the ballots had been counted.

Given the amount of sway that the members of your profession have on
the primary process, from setting expectations to (literally) framing
the debates, the message should be clear: you need an ombudsman or a
public editor in the worst way.

Sincerely,

ET
Yale University
Department of Political Science
124 Prospect Street
New Haven, CT

[D G]

1. I just want to say that letter is incredibly well written!

Excellent work. Give 'em hell. :toast:

[Dookus]

2. sorry...

I don't think it's a travesty. They said at the beginning of the night that the exit polls showed it very close, and they also said they don't call an election with a less than 1% difference.

It appears that Clark won OK slightly. I'm glad for it, but I don't fault CNN for their very reasonable policy.

[tameszu]

3. Name another election where they've said that

They, like every other network, called Florida wrong. They make the rules up as they go along. The idea that they would call elections based off of incredibly unreliable exit polls of ANY margin, but wouldn't call an election in which 100% of the votes had been cast is mindboggling. Election challenges almost never reverse more than 0.01% of the vote, so not calling a race with a spread of 0.5% with 100% of precincts reporting is just astonishing.

[Dookus]

4. I don't know of any other election...

I can't think of any since 2000 that were so close, and if there were some, I don't recall exactly what was said on CNN.

I'm just saying they said early in the evening that that was their policy. It seems an odd thing to lie about.

[Doomsayer13]

7. well, that's the point

the fact that all the networks messed Florida up has led them to enact strict standards for who they do or do not call the election for. Recounts and certification must be done in an election as close as this, and any sort of voting irregularity can tip the scales in one direction or another. Clark will probably stay the winner, but I think it's a bit far reaching to blame CNN for actually following a standard policy. They did this during the 2002 elections with congressional races in Colorado, and the Governor's race in Alabama to name couple.

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

5. unless it's for chimpy

then florida is firmly in his column

you guys have a right to be pissed

[MidwestMomma]

6. Excellent letter

And did you notice how they showed their super secret exit polls that they supposedly NEVER show? Why show them tonight? I know...because the super secret exit polls showed Edwards, Kerry, Clark in that order.

It's pathetic I have to watch CNN for election results cause they are the most tolerable....what a joke!

I will try to compose as eloquent of letter myself tomorrow. Thanks for your support.

[Dookus]

8. LOL..

they showed their exit poll data in order to show how close the race was. I believe there was only a point difference between Edwards and Clark in their exit polls - about the same as the actual results.

Honestly, not calling such close races seems eminently reasonable to me.