Media Balance

As Brad DeLong and umpteen others have said, the “on the one hand, on the other hand” style of reporting is a crock. It’s a lazy man’s version of unbiased reporting, giving equal time to spin, crackpottery and facts. Now, some interesting evidence as to how this happens in the NYT. The Times has a “story”:http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/02/politics/campaign/02cnd-elec.html?ex=1257138000&en=b5c959211463d899&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland today about how the current race is too close to call. However, for a few minutes this morning, they had the wrong version of the story up on their website – they’d posted the raw version, with all the editors’ comments included. A good friend spotted it in time, and sent it to me – I enclose it below the fold. The smoking gun (I’ve bolded the editor’s comments):

bq. Bush supporters were also out. The driver of a Greyhound bus stopped his vehicle on a Philadelphia street, got out and ripped down a campaign poster for John Kerry.we cant let this stand as emblematic of Bush supporters. either get some quotes from bush supporters or leave it out

Needless to say, this intriguing little incident was cut from the final version of the article.

At the End, Race Between Kerry and Bush Is Too Close to Call
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
and MARIA NEWMAN

Published: November 2, 2004

In schools and firehouses and community centers across the
country, Americans streamed into polling stations today to
vote for the next president of the United States, choosing
between men with very different visions of the future in a race
whose outcome experts said was too close to predict.

By flipping a mechanical lever and tapping a computer
screenno paper anywhere?, voters will finally register just how
successful each candidate was in selling his agenda on
national security, the economy and other issues at the
forefront of eight months of grinding campaigning.

Trying to sway the undecided voters in key areas, Senator John
Kerry, the Democratic nominee, and President Bush, the
Republican, spent Monday shuttling to events in Ohio and
Florida and several other states considered crucial to the
outcome. Mr. Bush ended Monday at his ranch in Crawford,
Tex., where he spent the night and voted at a local firehouse
this morning.

“We’ll see what the people say,” Mr. Bush said after casting his
vote, speaking to reporters with his wife, Laura, at his side.
“Now is the time for the people to express their will.”

Mr. Kerry was to vote in Boston.

In the last few weeks, both sides competed furiously for votes,
with a flurry of campaign advertisements that were spun out
over the airwaves, tapping into concerns over terrorism, the
economy and the war in Iraq.

Voter turnout was expected to be very large, perhaps
surpassing the 105 million that voted in the 2000right?
election. That turnout represented 51 percent of the voting-
age population. This year, Curtis Gans, director of the
nonpartisan Committee for the Study of the American
Electorate, told The Associated Press that he expected a
turnout of 118 million to 121 million, or 58 percent to 60
percent of the electorate.

Indeed, early turnout appeared steady, with lines forming at
polling stations well before they opened. Even in the driving
rain and while it was still dark, eager voters waited outside of
the North Rosedale Park Community Center on the east side of
Detroit.

Oretha Pettiway, 49, a principal at a special education school,
held a folder over her head to shield herself from the rain. She
waited to cast her ballot for Mr. Kerry, attracted by his health
care agenda. “I just think we need a new direction,” she said.

In North Philadelphia, Valerie Morman, 42, a legal secretary,
walked to her polling place at St. Malachy School. “The last
time I voted,” she said, “was about 20 years ago,” adding that
she intended to vote for Senator John Kerry.

“I stayed home because I haven’t felt like it counted,” she
explained of her attitude toward previous elections. “I have
had a change of heart, and I think there are hundreds of
thousands of others like me.”

Bush supporters were also out. The driver of a Greyhound bus
stopped his vehicle on a Philadelphia street, got out and
ripped down a campaign poster for John Kerry.we cant let this
stand as emblematic of Bush supporters. either get some
quotes from bush supporters or leave it out

When the counting begins in one state after another, a
spotlight will be shone on a brave new world of post-2000
presidential voting, showing the consequences of changes put
into place four years ago that may mark a turning point in the
way Americans choose their leaders.

Two of the biggest changes since 2000 are that more people
are registered to vote now — as many as 15 million more in
the entire country by some counts — and both parties and
their supporters have worked harder and are spending more
money than ever before to get those voters to the polls.

And perhaps the biggest concerns involved potential voting
fraud and attempts to suppress voting rights. Never before
have Americans been so skeptical about the integrity of the
voting process, analysts say.can we source this somehow, to
polls, experts or somebody? otherwise, it sounds like the
writers are just expressing an opinion

Elections officials have said that charges of voter intimidation
and voter fraud have been more prevalent this year than any in
recent memory, a sentiment that almost certainly can be
traced to the disputed election four years ago, when Mr. Bush
prevailed after numerous court challenges in the decisive State
of Florida and, ultimately, a decision by the Supreme Court.

n North Philadelphia, Valerie Morman, 42, a legal secretary,
walked to her polling place at St. Malachy School. “The last
time I voted,” she said, “was about 20 years ago,” adding that
she intended to vote for Senator John Kerry.

“I stayed home because I haven’t felt like it counted,” she
explained of her attitude toward previous elections. “I have
had a change of heart, and I think there are hundreds of
thousands of others like me.”

When the counting begins in one state after another, a
spotlight will be shone on a brave new world of post-2000
presidential voting, showing the consequences of changes put
into place four years ago that may mark a turning point in the
way Americans choose their leaders.

Two of the biggest changes since 2000 are that more people
are registered to vote now – as many as 15 million more in the
entire country by some counts – and both parties and their
supporters have worked harder and are spending more money
than ever before to get those voters to the polls.

And perhaps the biggest concerns involved potential voting
fraud and attempts to suppress voting rights. Never before
have Americans been so skeptical about the integrity of the
voting process, analysts say.

Elections officials have said that charges of voter intimidation
and voter fraud have been more prevalent this year than any in
recent memory, a sentiment that almost certainly can be
traced to the disputed election four years ago, when Mr. Bush
prevailed after numerous court challenges in the decisive State
of Florida and, ultimately, a decision by the Supreme Court.

In Broward County, Fla., this morning, a group of men set up a
canopy under a tree in a parking lot outside a voter precinct in
a union building, enticing voters with an unlikely breakfast of
fried chicken, mashed potatoes, sodas, toast and jam. Many
ate while in line and listened to loud blues music.

“It was really easy,” said Darnell Medina, 52, after voting at the
longshoremen union’s building. “It’s self-explanatory, but I
understand not everybody can follow directions.”

“I personally haven’t heard of any voter harassment, but the
day is still young,” he added.

In a 2-to-1 decision, the United States Court of Appeals for
the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati, granted stays effectively
overturning two federal district court decisions that had
barred partisan challengers for polling places in Ohio. Justice
John Paul Stevens of the United States Supreme Court let that
decision stand, effectively ending the court dispute.

Polls over the last three weeks have shown the race
excruciatingly tight. Most weekend polling had Mr. Bush and
Mr. Kerry within a hair’s breadth, separated by no more than 1,
2 or 3 percentage points. In some of the key states, the polls
differ over which man leads. A third candidate, Ralph Nader,
who many Democrats blamed for siphoning votes away from
the Democratic nominee in 2000, Al Gore, has generally been
attracting only 1 to 2 percent support in opinion surveys and
is not even on the ballot in some states.

Gathering the last-minute, undecided voters into their fold
was a major goal of the candidates’ final throes of
campaigning in one of the most bitterly fought elections in
United States history.

Just days before the election, new security fears were stoked
with the appearance of Osama Bin Laden on a videotape
broadcast by an Arab news channel. Mr. Bush said the new
appearance by Mr. bin Laden demonstrated how crucial a time
this was in the fight against terrorism, and that his own
leadership capabilities were needed to win the fight. Mr. Kerry
and his aides said it emphasized a failure on Mr. Bush’s part to
stop the threat of the Al Qaeda leader.

The appearance of the bin Laden tape shifted the focus last
week from reports of missing explosives from an unsecured
warehouse in Iraq.

Millions of voters have already cast their ballots in the election
in early voting that was introduced in several states to alleviate
election-day problems or holdups. Some experts predicted
that a fifth of voters all over the country will have already cast
their ballots, in the 31 states that allow some form of early
voting or absentee voting. In West Palm Beach, Fla., voters
waited in line up to four hours on Monday waiting to cast their
ballots, a testament, some analysts said, of the determination
by voters to make their votes count this time around.

n 2000, 13 states allowed early voting. This year, 23 states
offered early balloting and in addition, laws governing
absentee voting have become less stringent in many states,
letting people obtain absentee ballots almost unconditionally
and often, as in Wisconsin, to cast them on the spot. That
amounts to a form of early voting and raises the total to 31
states.

This year, the campaigns devoted millions of dollars to pay
people to register others to vote, and to persuade those
people to actually cast a ballot, even offering them rides to
voting places.

The Washington Post reported on Monday that Mr. Bush’s
campaign had budgeted about $125 million, about three times
as much as in 2000, for voter mobilization. Mr. Kerry’s
operation, run out of the party headquarters, will spend nearly
$60 million, The Post said, double what the Democrats spent
four years ago.

Outside groups are spending additional funds. One of them,
America Coming Together, a pro-Kerry organization, could
spend $100 million to 125 million, The Post said.

As The New York Times reported on Monday, never in the
history of American presidential campaigns will so many
people be called, visited, handed literature and cajoled to vote
than in the final hours of this race.

And the team with the better turnout is almost certain to win
the race, strategists say.

A poll by MTV and Center for Information and Research on
Civic Learning and Engagement said that this year, young
people were showing the highest interest in the presidential
election since 1992.

William Galston, director of the center at the University of
Maryland, told The Omaha World-Herald in Nebraska that
nonpartisan voter-mobilization groups spent as much as $40
million this year to register young people.

One of the most successful groups, Rock the Vote, a
nonpartisan group founded in 1990 to fight censorship in
music and later expanded to promote young voting, has
recorded 1.371 million new registrations of 18- to 30-year-
olds nationwide, a spokesman Jay Strell, said.

Howard Altman contributed reporting from Philadelphia, Maria
Herrera from Florida and Jeremy W. Peters from Detroit.