My Fellow Villagers: (part the first)

[rubinpdf]

The election is over. The race has been called by our media.I ask all those that do not support Number One to stay at home this Tuesday. There is no need for you to vote. We have already won. Coming out may just make the day a big free for all... and nobody wants that

Comments

[rubinpdf]

While this post uses a bit of hyperbole, it is possible that many McCain Voters will be dissuaded from voting due to the fact that much of the media is jubilantly saying it's all but over.
Remember that in 2000, Florida was called for Al Gore nearly a half hour before all the polls in Florida closed. The polls that were still open were in the largely Republican area of the Florida panhandle. We know that some people in line to vote left the polling area once they heard the news that Gore won the state... and that made the vote in the state closer than it should have been.
Is it possible that someone somewhere in the media hopes this is the case in 2008 as well. Certainly not out of the realm of possibilities.

Am I say that the media as a whole is attempting this? No. The media as a whole largely ends up in the me-too category. Once someone else in the media comes up with a line of reasoning, nearly all will begin to echo the same talking points (For example - take use of the word gravitas to describe selection of Dick Chaney as VP

[rbandrews]

But it's okay when you guys do it?

You've probably seen this, but this place seems to have pretty awesome coverage of polls and whatnot, and not a lot of editorial. Mostly it's just graphs.

[rubinpdf]

That's like comparing apples and oranges. At the point (after 2:00 in the morning) that Florida was called for Bush, the voting had closed for more than 5 hours. When the networks called the state for Gore, it was a full "70 minutes before the polls closed in the largely-Republican Florida panhandle".

Unless there were mysterious ballot boxes "found" stuffed with votes from voters voting after 2:30 in the morning, the call for Bush did not affect the outcome in the slightest.

[rbandrews]

Actually, you're right, it is like apples and oranges.

One was pretty obviously a joke, done a week beforehand, in a small regional left-wing newspaper.

The other in all seriousness, by a national news organization that portrays itself as "fair and balanced".

And since the election was decided by the supreme court instead of those ballots, I guess we'll never know whether it affected the outcome.

[rubinpdf]

And since the election was decided by the supreme court instead of those ballots...

We do know. According to Wikipedia:
In the aftermath of the election, the first independent recount was conducted by The Miami Herald and USA Today. Counting only "undervotes" (when the vote is not detected by machine), and not considering "overvotes" (when a ballot ends up with more than one indication of a vote, for example both a punch-out and hand-written name, even if both indicating the same candidate)[36] Bush would have won in all legally requested recount scenarios. (that means in all methods requested by Al Gore legal team)

The Supreme Court only stepped in because the Florida Supreme Court demanded that several counties recount ballots differently than the rest of the state. It was deemed unconstitutional because it the votes would be unequally counted across the state - with no set standard as to what a valid vote was.

In addition Wikipedia states:
A survey estimate by John McLaughlin & Associates put the number of voters who did not