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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (175726)	8/29/2001 2:12:55 PM
From: jlallen	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

No it doesn't: Don't Know by Pat Piper In a move that defines "chutzpah," NBC ran a promo on Meet the Press the Sunday after Election Day telling viewers with nothing better to do on a Sunday morning that more people watched Tom Brokaw on election night than anywhere else. And more people watched Today the following morning to understand what happened the night before. The point to be made was everyone should know if you seek clarity about a confusing presidential election, there's only one place to go. Oh boy! The promo didn't mention the fact NBC, like every other news organization election night announced Florida was Gore territory at 8 PM only to announce two hours later that Gore wasn't going to win Florida. Six hours later we were told the entire election was going to George Bush because he had won Florida's 25 electoral votes. Then, if anyone bothered to stay up, we were told nobody really had a clue about what was going on in Florida. We still don't as a matter of fact. That's the key -- Fact. In an industry that prides itself on telling you the story because it knows the story and it has checked the story and it has edited and reviewed the story, the words we needed to hear on election night were "I don't know." More fact is in that monosyllabic trio than anywhere else when talk turns to "who won?" I'm certain the night of November 7 in America will be the topic of journalism classes for years to come. And this is healthy. If cable outlets and networks are going to use exit polling models to be able to tell us who won ten seconds after the polls close, then they should understand it's still a guess because the only facts are to be found in the actual vote count-if the vote count is accurate that is. Don't get me started. There's another issue. If a network wants to boast to the world about it's election coverage, why would anyone with a pulse consider the programming of Decision 2000 (or whatever slogan is being used) as something about which to be proud, much less boastful? Is it to attract advertisers? Are you kidding me? If NBC had been right at 2:17a.m. when it said George Bush was the next president of the United States, would that have sent buyers from ad agencies into the streets to get thirty seconds of Meet the Press? By that time the audience was political science majors and junkies and that ain't the material that's going to buy a new Tundra or toothpaste or open an account with Charles Schwab. And if NBC had an ad to run on Meet the Press you can be darn sure it wouldn't have wasted its time, and my time and your time, with a promo spinning positive on a mistake. Election night was good television and radio. We just didn't know. The post-election will never be as good as what we all heard and saw on November 7th. I'm getting real tired of Al Gore and George Bush pointing fingers at each other for dragging out the recount. These two guys should take a deep breath, meet together in front of the cameras, smile, shake hands and say we want to just recount all of Florida because we want to know who won. That simple gesture would speak volumes about each candidate's view of this incredible situation. Will it happen? Of course not. We can only hope, however, that when one of them runs for re-election, the TV news anchors for Decision 2004 or whatever the title is, will have the ability to look at the camera when they don't have the facts and say "I don't know." Those words, my friends, would make me want to buy an ad. The comments of veteran newsman and former Executive Producer of The Larry King Show. Pat Piper's latest book , "Anything Goes! What I've learned from Pundits, Politicians and Presidents" is written with Larry King. Pat's direct email is: ppipere@aol.com