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The Press Is Excitable – Not Curious – About a Garbage Poll

Brad Slager
Brad Slager  |  Nov 04, 2024
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Legalized Press-titution – VARIOUS OUTLETS

  • Well, this meets our confirmation bias threshold, that's for certain.

This weekend saw paroxysms of glee in the media when some random poll came out and defied most other results, historical norms, and common sense. Now, there is a common term for when a poll falls beyond the parameters seen by most others – "outlier."

The Iowa Democrat was touting the latest results from the Selzer Poll showing Iowa has Harris ahead by 3 percent. While the media mavens were racing around and high-fiving each other, few stepped back to analyze the results – mostly because the metrics were not provided.

Other polls that sampled based on the electorate and likely voters had Trump with a slight lead, while Selzer was displaying a swing of over 18 percentage points over the span of months, which is a bit more than an anomaly. Worse yet, as Selzer sat in with Mark Halperin to discuss the specifics of her results, she sounded baffled and unaware.

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DNC PR Firm – NBC / "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE"

  • So that thing you said you would not do and ended up doing has to be fixed? 

Some time ago, the production of "Saturday Night Live" announced the show would not be offering up the chance for the presidential candidates to appear in skits on the broadcast – and then, in an 11th-hour announcement, it was declared that Kamala Harris would appear in a segment on the last show before the election. (Like portions of her campaign platform, she stole a prior skit Trump performed years back with Jimmy Fallon.) 

Well, it turned out the rash decision to have her on meant that NBC ran afoul of the FCC requirement of equal time when granting promotional airtime to candidates. This led to the network needing to grant two slots of broadcast time to Trump, and he supplied a taped entry to be played following the NASCAR race and following the Sunday night NFL game.

Reporting on the Mirror – POLITICO

  • Can we water this down a bit, some of the desperation is getting really powerful to take.

In the newest dose of contrived controversy in the press – hot on the coattails of Trump supposedly wanting Liz Cheney on a firing squad – comes this hysteria from his recent rally. Trump was noting the recent attempts made on his life, pointing out the plexiglass he now stands behind, and he was getting the attention to this detail to the assembled press. He was highlighting the fact that they should appreciate the risk he endures, as they are positioned in a way that would have them placed in the line of fire:

'All we really have over here is the fake news, right? And to get me somebody would have to shoot through the fake news,' Trump said. 'And I don't mind that so much.'

Now, as inartful as that may be, what he was referring to is that the press was in the line of fire should a shooting take place. That would mean they would be equally endangered while speaking about another potential attempt on his life. The one thing you cannot say is that he was somehow threatening the press.

Oh, wait – you can say that if you are a reporter for POLITICO:

Donald Trump said Sunday that he wouldn't 'mind' if someone had to 'shoot through the fake news' to get to him, a further escalation of his violent rhetoric.

Two things the press loves – twisting Trump's words to demonize the man, and making stories about themselves – all rolled into one report. Well done, Lisa Kashinsky and Andrew Howard!

Pathological Media Amnesia – WASHINGTON POST

  • Still awaiting your principled stand there, Jenny.

It was over a week ago when the Los Angeles Times announced the paper would not endorse a candidate, and Jennifer Rubin applauded those who quit that paper and then asked who else was stepping away in noble opposition. It was over a week and one day less ago when Rubin's own newspaper did the very same thing and made no endorsement, yet while a number of her cohorts resigned in principled outrage we have yet to see Ms. Rubin tender her walking papers.

Legalized Press-titution – CNN

  • Are we not doing that journalism ethics thing any longer?

It has been astounding to watch as the press in general has abandoned all pretense of even-handed coverage of the news this election and just goes with naked partisanship. It was bad going into the summer, but it seems as if they all recognized what a hopeless cause Kamala Harris would be and just pushed all their chips in and hoped the public would buy their bluff.

Case in point – here is Kasie Hunt delivering her assessment of the election ahead of voting day, and it does not take any effort to see just where her preferences are coming to rest.

Presentation Paradox – MEDIA MATTERS

  • Did nobody in the basement recognize the contradiction here?

Yes, yes – we know it is Media Matters, and it is about as unbalanced as the ledger showing the national debt. Still, though, one would expect possibly someone there to have a glimmer of common sense to see the inherent issue of these two opposing stories.

In the MMFA newsletter (subscribed for amusement and never actually linked through), they presented these two entries together. One wails about those on the right supposedly wanting to silence media figures. The other wails that there was a failed effort to silence right-leaning media figures.

Don't ever change, gang!