Pundits Blow Debate Analysis (Again)

[DeepModem Mom]

Editor&Publisher: Pundits Blow Debate Analysis (Again)
By Greg Mitchell

The funniest, and most revealing, moment in Howard Kurtz's lengthy debate wrapup at The Washington Post today comes about halfway through it. After hailing Palin's performance and quoting numerous mainstream pundits attesting to same, all to suggest that she succeeded in stopping the bleeding, Kurtz dryly posts the following WITHOUT comment:

CNN's insta-poll: Biden, 51 to 36.

CBS survey of uncommitted: Biden, 46 to 21.

Of course, he could have gone on, cited many other polls, and dove into the numbers that showed little if any movement for Palin in the key measure of, by the way, is she actually ready to be president? How about this one, from CBS: "On the question of the candidates' qualifications to assume the presidency, 87 percent of those polled said Biden is qualified and 42 percent said Palin is qualified."

I wrote here last week on the same phenomenon after the McCain-Obama debate, which the vast majority of mainstream pundits declared "even" -- but polls showed an easy win for Obama....

Yet the mainstream outlets wonder why so many have lost respect for their judgment. The voters, as revealed by the polls, are apparently not buying "aw shucks, wink, you betcha" as enough of a qualification for the presidency. Yet for many in the punditocracy that's just enough. Or as one put it, the story of the night was "The Wink."...

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003870173

[Bucky]

1. So sad. But true.

I think they just assumed because she spoke with confidence, the rubes in flyover country would be fooled by her lack of facts and hollow snarkery. I was myself getting frustrated with Biden for not puncturing her balloon.

But Biden was smart and I was dumb. People are not fooled by mere confidence and poise. Big majorities saw through the empty rah-rah "cut taxes" mantra that Republicans have spewed for two generations. People don't need Biden to explain to them she's playing go fish with a 40 card deck. Viewers got it. It's not that there's just no there there, there's no care there, either.

She flopped, even if the pundits don't acknowledge it yet. They will by the end of next week.

[Greyskye]

2. The pundits think that their audience is stupid

And in a sense, they are correct. We don't turn the TV off fast enough when they start bloviating.