From the New York Times today:
- On the eve of the New Jersey and California primaries, an Associated Press survey of superdelegates indicated that Hillary Clinton had clinched the Democratic nomination.
- Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont said earlier Monday that he wanted to “assess where we are after tomorrow before we make statements based on speculation.”
It should be noted that this is how Trump clinched his nomination, too. The AP surveyed the appropriate delegates, asked them where they stood, and declared Trump the winner.
All this before all the voters have had their say. Annoying as hell. Next thing you know we won’t have elections at all. We’ll just skip voting altogether and let the news services declare the winner for us.
(Rats. I planned to post this while Hillary still thought tomorrow’s California’s primary was critical.)
The media would really like to run the world. Trouble is they stand a damned good chance of doing so!
They’re well on their way to buying and/or promoting their choice of candidates. All that remains now is for them to agree on who should be president … and the race will be all but over.
We’re suckers.
I’ve always thought the people got to vote before winners were declared. Looks like the corporations and the media have decided it’s their job. This time next week AP will probably be telling us who our new president is. It’s disgusting. And infuriating. Think of all the people who might not bother voting today because they heard Hillary had already won the nomination.
Electing either the Dem nominee, or the Republican nominee guarantees that lobbyist will write the laws and donate funds to insure their passage into law. Which is despicable.
And which has been the case for decades.
But then –
The first logical thing to do after you realize you’ve dug yourself into a hole… is to stop digging.
The media don’t decide who candidates will be, the parties do. Once the votes of a majority of delegates are determined, the primary process is over. This is not a general election where premature announcements of winners that could be incorrect might affect the outcome by influencing voters in the pacific time zone to participate or not.
I understand. The current elections are to choose delegates (not candidates) to the national conventions. The media could sway the way today’s voters vote. Sanders would love to win all those California delegates, for example. But will Californians bother to vote if the AP has already determined (by polling already-elected delegates) that Clinton is the winner (ie, has enough delegates to win the nomination)? (See today’s post for further discussion.)
Grinched
LOL. Yep, the whole darned election.