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Decisive. Snowy.
Holy fucking snow! So very much snow! This winter is nuts. I really shoulda bought more groceries when I was out yesterday.
Also -- as I suspected, Clinton's "decisive" 22 point win (they called it when 12% of the votes were in and they were at 33% to 55%) ended up at 42%-52%. I said I wanted Obama to get over 40 and be within 10 points. That he achieved that is huge; that the expectations were suddenly so warped in this state proves yet another example (see: New Hampshire) of why ONE POLL does not demonstrate some sort of unstoppable Obamomentum. And also -- CAN WE PLEASE stop adding -mentum to the end of candidates names? Joementum was kinda funny four years ago, even though Lieberman is a dick. Obamomentum (I have also seen "Obamamentum") at least makes a tiny bit of pronunciational sense. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS MITTMENTUM. That is not even close to being a word. Also, the man demonstrably HAS no -mentum of any kind, so I don't ever want to hear it again.
More states that we did not learn a lesson from: Florida 2000. My favorite moment of the coverage yesterday was when the wires called Illinois for Obama with 0% reporting. OK, sure, yes, we all knew he was going to win Illinois -- but at least make SOME attempt to make it look like votes count at all. And then to call California "decisive" (that was the NYT's headline around 1 a.m. -- it's gone now) at 12% of the votes? Something about California that I managed to pick up in the run-up to the vote: the first numbers that come in are the absentee ballots, which there are a gazillion of. This was obviously what was happening, given that when they called it, Edwards was at around 11%. This meant they were mostly counting votes that had come in when Edwards was still in the race -- and Clinton was still up by 20% in every poll. I think we should institute some kind of rule that says the news services have to wait until at least 50% of the vote comes in before they "call" anything. Case in point: Missouri. The networks called it too early, Clinton sent out a press release saying she won it -- and Obama ended up snatching it by a full 10,000 votes. Nice work, guys.
Also -- as I suspected, Clinton's "decisive" 22 point win (they called it when 12% of the votes were in and they were at 33% to 55%) ended up at 42%-52%. I said I wanted Obama to get over 40 and be within 10 points. That he achieved that is huge; that the expectations were suddenly so warped in this state proves yet another example (see: New Hampshire) of why ONE POLL does not demonstrate some sort of unstoppable Obamomentum. And also -- CAN WE PLEASE stop adding -mentum to the end of candidates names? Joementum was kinda funny four years ago, even though Lieberman is a dick. Obamomentum (I have also seen "Obamamentum") at least makes a tiny bit of pronunciational sense. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS MITTMENTUM. That is not even close to being a word. Also, the man demonstrably HAS no -mentum of any kind, so I don't ever want to hear it again.
More states that we did not learn a lesson from: Florida 2000. My favorite moment of the coverage yesterday was when the wires called Illinois for Obama with 0% reporting. OK, sure, yes, we all knew he was going to win Illinois -- but at least make SOME attempt to make it look like votes count at all. And then to call California "decisive" (that was the NYT's headline around 1 a.m. -- it's gone now) at 12% of the votes? Something about California that I managed to pick up in the run-up to the vote: the first numbers that come in are the absentee ballots, which there are a gazillion of. This was obviously what was happening, given that when they called it, Edwards was at around 11%. This meant they were mostly counting votes that had come in when Edwards was still in the race -- and Clinton was still up by 20% in every poll. I think we should institute some kind of rule that says the news services have to wait until at least 50% of the vote comes in before they "call" anything. Case in point: Missouri. The networks called it too early, Clinton sent out a press release saying she won it -- and Obama ended up snatching it by a full 10,000 votes. Nice work, guys.
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