In the Pandora’s Box of ills unleashed by the recent (or more accurately,
present) election, the largest of all the problems has been all but
undiscussed. That is, of course, because the largest problem was caused by
the media, and far be it from the media to intensely study the repercussions
of their egregious errors on election night.
They have abased themselves in an almost flippant series of mea culpas,
declaring that they have omelets on their faces, etc., but the problem is
much more serious than they have admitted. If anyone except themselves had
committed so heinous an act, with such serious consequences, we would never
hear the end of it.
First of all, we know that the declaration of Florida going to Gore - long
before polls had closed in other parts of the country - had a serious effect
on voter turnout. With Florida in the Democratic camp, according to the
media pundits, there was no way Bush could win.
After the damage was done, the media had the temerity to dismiss their
errors with laughing claims of embarrassment. It was no laughing matter.
The people who failed to vote due to this premature declaration then left
the issue of the popular vote up for grabs, with the Gore camp proudly
proclaming popular vote victory. Balderdash! If people thought for one
minute that the popular vote was to be counted in the long run, the results
would have been quite different.
Since the media had discussed the popular, as opposed to the electoral, vote
for months before the election, in minute detail, they had more or less said
that people in New York, California, and several less important states
needn’t even bother to vote unless they were Democrats. They didn’t even
wait until the election to call those states for Gore.
We all know that Governor Bush won the election. The Democrats simply do
not care. But the real issue here is, do we let the media elect our
presidents? That is what they seemed to be trying to do this time. This is
a very dangerous precedent.
The media has already come down pretty solidly on the side of electoral
college abolishment in favor of the popular vote. This is because the media
has a history of being extremely liberal and most of them would love nothing
better than for the entire country to be run by the huge political machines
of the Northeast, the industrial Midwest, and the West Coast.
The electoral college was established to balance the voice of less populous
states in what was created to be a republic. Twentieth century politics
have all but destroyed that entire concept. The issue of states rights -
which really is written into the Constitution, unlike many other
“Constitutional” concepts which have been created by the courts - has fallen
into the voracious maw of a Godzilla-like federal government. Each
individual state is supposed to have the power of its statehood, and all
powers not expressly given to the federal government are reserved to the
states. That has, of course, become a joke. The electoral college is one
of the last few vestiges with which smaller states can have some tiny voice
in the running of this country.
If the media has its way, fewer than a dozen states will exercise the power
of decision making for the entire country. Some people really don’t care,
but most are just not savvy about the process. Most Americans still would
like to see their states have some voice.
I propose that in the next election, media coverage of national elections
not begin until the last polls have closed. That would be a problem for the
media because it would mess up “prime time” for them. Is prime time more
important than elections? Is it good policy to “declare” a state for a
candidate before the votes are counted? We could cover all the local and
state elections as they are counted, but I’d rather wait for next day
coverage for election results than have the absurd situation we have at this
moment. The power of the media is too great, and they have long since
sacrificed balanced reporting in the name of entertainment value. If there
is no drama, they will create it. We need to stop this before it destroys
the very democratic nature of our electoral process.