Posted on 10/30/2004 12:07:13 AM PDT by GLDNGUN
I was just watching Wolf Blitzed on CNN yakking away about CNN's wondrous, marvelous, stupendous, scintillating, extraordinary wall-to-wall election night coverage. They even have a screen for each state! Goody! Now if they only knew what they were talking about. Wolf pointed to the Florida screen and talked about polls closing there at 8 PM Eastern time. This is the BIG mistake they made in 2000 that cost Bush who knows how many votes in the western most part of the state. In the Florida panhandle, conservative GOP country, polls are open an hour later due to time zone difference. In 2000, the networks called the state for Florida at 8PM and said "THE POLLS IN FLORIDA ARE CLOSED. WE CAN NOW CALL THE STATE FOR GORE". The only problem was that BOTH of these claims were outright lies. As we know, BUSH won a close race, and the polls were still open in the Panhandle. Many said they got home from work, turned the TV on, heard the news (the media surely wouldn't lie, would they?), and stayed home.
Didn't CNN and Wolf Blitzed and the media learn ANYTHING from the Florida fiasco? THE POLLS DON'T CLOSE AT 8 PM IN ALL OF FLORIDA, WOLF! Wake up!
Excuse me while I fire off a little e-mail to CNN...
Wolfie is blitzered again....
I suppose my question would be: "Are Floriduh Panhandle People still that stupid?"
That wasn't a mistake! And tghey were saddened when it didn't toss Floriduh to Goreghoul.
You've made just a small error. Florida's polls close at 7 p.m., so Wolf is right. It will be 8 p.m. EST (in the Eastern Time Zone) when the election in Florida is officially over.
I've lived in the Western part of the U.S. all my life and have always thought they shouldn't call ANY state until the polls close in Calif, Seattle, etc. Maybe even Honolulu! It's only fair. Motivation to vote diminishes when it seems it's all over in the major national race.
Nope.
Blitzer is right, YOU'RE wrong.
The Polls in most of Florida close at 7PM Eastern Time.
The Polls in the Panhandle close at 8PM Eastern Time.
Well I always voted. But many didn't when the race seemed over. And yes, it does affect the individiual state races. That has been a reality for years.
I agree!! I've always thought it should be that way. Having lived in CA most of my life .. I felt cheated because - even though I voted anyway - I was sure a lot of people didn't bother.
Bonnie
Well, sure, if one candidate's already gotten the necessary number to win already... yes, I see your point. I was thinking about when that event hadn't yet been reached. In the present case, I hope no Bush voter does that, because the size of the popular vote will be impressive if everybody has their say, I'm thinking.
BonnieG
Did you bother to read any of the replies?
Blitzer was correct. He gave the Panhandle closing time as the time the polls close in Florida.
Great way to seem like morons is for a bunch of FReepers to e-mail Blitzer slamming him for correctly giving the closing time of the Florida polls. The original poster of this thread had no idea what he was talking about. Just knee-jerk bashing without taking 2 seconds to look up the actual Panhandle closing time.
Considering all the opportunities for early voting in most states, I can't see why there can't be a nationwide poll closing time. If the states in the Pacific time zone delayed switching from Daylight savings time to standard time till the Sunday after the presidential election, there would only be a two hour difference between the time on the east and west coasts on election day.
A uniform closing time would prevent the media manipulations design to suppress or increase voting in the west. Considering I already voted on the first day of early voting in Texas, an early closing time would not bother me.
Surely they could *WAIT* 24 hrs. It's not as if the President-elect takes over at next dawn after Election Day. Why the rush to judgment?
Well, if Blitzed said it right, then I stand corrected. It was just the way he stated it, he made it sound as if the polls all close at the same time, and I knew that wasn't right. Still, he should make it clear the polls close at differnt times. Saying all the polls are open an hour later than most really are is even worse than saying the polls close an hour sooner than they really do in one section of the state. If he continues to say "polls in Florida close at 8PM" how many people will go out to vote at 7:30 only to find out the polls all over the state, except for the Panhandle, have been closed for half an hour?
And all the people outside of the Panhandle who try to vote at 7:30 because they heard "the polls close at 8PM" will find out what?
Gore didn't lose the election in Florida.
He lost it in Tennessee.
You are right -- he misspoke -- but now I think you've nailed down exactly what was wrong.
CNN is hoping to squash the republican panhandle vote. Again.
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