The AP Announcing Clinton's "Victory" Was an Embarrassment to Journalism and U.S. Politics

[The Sushi Bandit]

How one man can throw an election...
[link:https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2016/06/the-ap-announcing-clintons-victory-was-an-embarras.html|

[geek tragedy]

1. they jumped the gun by 24 hours but it didn't change the outcome nt

[Chasstev365]

5. So that makes it OK

[jack_krass]

9. You can guess that, but we'll never know. I happen to think that many

Bernie supporters were disheartened by the AP pronoumcement and stayed home.

I also think HRC and her campaign orchastrated this

[LanternWaste]

13. What specifically leads you to believe this?

"I also think HRC and her campaign orchastrated (sic) this..."

What specifically leads you to believe this?

[jack_krass]

22. Call it a gut feeling

[democrattotheend]

17. The ultimate outcome, no

But it probably depressed turnout in the last 6 states. Turnout in California was down 32% from 2008.

I don't think the AP did Hillary any favors either. Before all the fighting kicked into gear after the announcement, several Hillary supporters on here expressed disappointment. If they had done it in 2008 I know I would have been pissed.

[geek tragedy]

18. I think they're still counting votes in Cali

Also hard to compare Cali 2016 to Cali 2008--Obama/Clinton was a much bigger draw for voters than Clinton/Sanders and Cali was on Super Tuesday, so it was dead certain to make a difference that year).

I suspect it depressed turnout in rough proportion to how the actual voting went--of course there's no way to prove or disprove it, but the Clinton people were pissed that it was going to depress their turnout.

[democrattotheend]

19. Like I said, they didn't do Hillary any favors

It sucks for both candidates and their supporters.

[reformist2]

21. It probably helped Hillary avoid an embarrassing loss in California, but we'll never really know.

[Demsrule86]

26. They went when they had the numbers as they always do...no one cared when it happened with Trump.

Much ado about nothing.

[highprincipleswork]

27. Obviously you don't know that, do you?

[choie]

28. Yeah it just happened to be

the 24 hours before a definitive primary..

[geek tragedy]

30. California was never going to be decide the race nt

[randome]

2. How many times during the Primary did they take a poll of superdelegates and report it?

They did nothing different than usual. You're simply looking for excuses. Anything other than accept the fact that voters prefer Clinton.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Stop looking for heroes. BE one.[/center][/font][hr]

[TwilightZone]

3. The AP can count to 2383. They did so, and reported the results.

It's not any more complicated than that, regardless of how you try to make it so.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

4. Paste magazine, sounds legit.

[The Sushi Bandit]

23. Just read the story!

that is the important thing!

[Baitball Blogger]

6. The seams are showing.

[still_one]

7. There are a lot of thing journalist should be embarrassed of, and yes it was unfortunate that AP

decided to not wait until after Tuesday for several reasons.

[Fumesucker]

8. They are both far, far beyond embarrassment at this point

[apnu]

10. AP threw it? What crap.

Polling showed Hillary up by 10 in CA going into last weekend. AP came out on Monday. Most Californians made up their minds before the AP article. Polling showed Hillary way up in NJ. The AP, while odd and early, didn't impact things. Maybe someone at the AP wanted to, but even if that's true, they failed. The AP is a distraction for those who are gullible for conspiracies.

[onenote]

11. The author of the article defeats his own argument

On the one hand, it admits that "Sure, Hillary has more votes, and yes, she was going to win eventually." He also acknowledges "we’ve known" Hillary Clinton would be the presumptive nominee "for a long time."

Those admissions completely undercut his argument that one person "manufactured" Clinton's win or that reporting she had actually reached the threshold everyone had known "for a long time" that she would reach wasn't newsworthy.

Plus, if as he admits, Clinton was going to win eventually and it was long known that she would be the "presumptive nominee" how does acknowledging it when it happens change much of anything. If it was known on Sunday, or Saturday or the week before that she was going to be the presumptive nominee, wouldn't that knowledge alone be dampening turnout? Wouldn't the fact that Clinton won handily in two races over the weekend had something to do with it? Should the press not have reported those results because it might "dampen" turnout?

What if on Saturday night, after the win the VI put Clinton closer to the nomination, AP had reported 40 new SD commitments, putting her over 2383? Would that have been journalistically wrong to do?

No. Journalists go out, gather information and report it. That's what they do. If anything, the fact that the press didn't sit on the information that they had is more consistent with the notions of an independent press than one that tries to manipulate a story by sitting on information.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

12. As a Clinton supporter

I cringed a bit when I got that news alert on Monday evening. That being said (as other people have pointed out), it didn't change the outcome nor was it out of touch with reality. However, it would have been better for them to wait until after last night to pull the trigger IMHO.

[Blue_Tires]

14. So a bunch of folks supposedly read an AP piece and decided not to vote?

That's their problem, not mine...

Sanders was dead in the water -- You know it, and I know it...

[BobbyDrake]

24. A news article should not affect whether or not someone votes, unless that someone wasn't motivated

in the first place. These excuses just get more and more outlandish over time, especially since they only exist as a crutch to avoid acknowledging that the losing candidate lost. As long as they can point to conspiracies and theories about why Sanders lost, instead of the basic fact of "he won less votes than his opponent," we'll have to listen to these rationalizations.

[Brickbat]

15. In other news, media outlets are mad that another media outlet beat them on an angle.

[bigwillq]

16. They were doing their job, maybe a few hours early, but

It didn't change the end result.

Hillary Clinton was going to be the DEM nominee with or without the "call".

[floppyboo]

20. Stephen Ohlemacher - the boy who called Wolf

and no one cared when the wolf showed up. and the moral of the story is... never cry wolf or the bubbles in the champagne will have all popped. or is that pooped? you do know that bubbles are yeast farts? just in case you needed to know. Hey, I'm a mom and share trivia whenever I can. Keeps learning fun!

[Demsrule86]

25. Right but of course it was ok with Trump

You all are obsessed with Bernie.

[Hoyt]

29. It's not like it was a secret. Christ, anyone who can read or count knew it was over, although

some dreamers couldn't handle the truth. As far as it might have caused some to stay home, chances are they were Clinton voters if but by a few percentage points.

[Barack_America]

31. K&R. It was disgraceful journalism.