By today’s standards, it is a little odd. It shows a small face peeping out of a sunflower. The candidate was Alf Landon, governor of the Sunflower State of Kansas. He was a Republican, and at this point in the presidential campaign of 1936, was leading in the polls.
Leading by far more than Barack Obama is currently leading John McCain. On election day, Landon easily won Maine and Vermont. And that was all. He lost every other state in the union.
His defeat remains the biggest blowout in modern Electoral College history. Later, the pollsters of the day scratched their heads. How could they have been so wrong? The answer had to do with their methodology. They conducted their polls by using the telephone directory. Indeed, most people who had private telephones then did vote Republican. But this was during the Great Depression. The people who the pollsters couldn’t reach were overwhelmingly in favor of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Even in the Sunflower state.
I wore that button to remind the audience -- and myself -- that you never can tell. Indeed, one pollster told me he thought the polls could be wrong this year. And wrong, once again, because of people with telephones. Many of these surveys don’t include people who, like all the thirty-year-olds I know, only have cell phones.
Young voters with cell phones seem to be overwhelmingly for Obama. If they actually vote, this may be a very one-sided race indeed. However, there are many more races on the ballot than the presidential one. What mystifies me is how most voters make up their minds in some of these contests. How does your average person know which candidate for probate judge is best?
I can tell you how most voters will make up their mind in the race for justice of the Michigan Supreme Court, where the EPIC-MRA polls shows a dead heat between Diane Hathaway and Cliff Taylor.
They will likely vote for Taylor, because it says right on the ballot that he is already a supreme court justice. That’s why incumbent judges almost never lose. After all, we’ve all grown up watching TV commercials, and the first thing a patriotic young kid learns is that you are never supposed to select Brand X.
But I can also tell you that on Tuesday night, somewhere, in some race, the pollsters will be proven dead wrong.
And whomever loses might think of this. Old Alf Landon didn’t get bitter when he lost. He went back to Kansas, lived a long and happy life and got to see his daughter elected to the United States Senate.
When he died, he was a hundred years old. In the end, the final victory may be all about living well.
Views expressed in the essay by Jack Lessenberry are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Michigan Radio, its management or the station licensee, The University of Michigan.
It seems that Michigan Radio's response to the number of complaints about Jack Lessenberry's editorializing is to conclude all future Lessenberry essays this way:
"Views expressed in the essay by Jack Lessenberry are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Michigan Radio, its management or the station licensee, The University of Michigan."
That's the simple and largely unproductive response. I sort of knew, that when you title something an "Essay," (that is how the Lessenberry editorials run on this webiste) that it is the opinion of the writer. "Senior News Analyst" Jack Lessenberry.
The larger question remains, and it is still unanswered by Michigan Radio. The question is, "What is a Senior News Analyst?" Are there any "Junior News Analysts"? (Of course not.)What does a "News Analyst" do? What does Michigan Radio propose to do about providing balanced political coverage? Do "News Analysts" have any role to play in providing politically balanced coverage?
This is not a problem unique to Michigan Radio, since NPR News also has a small group of "Senior News Analysts." But for all of public radio news, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that public radio news is programming by, and for, liberal elites. It might be smart programming, if indeed the strategy is designed to fulfill the kind of liberal echo-chamber desired by many of the donors and station members. But it ought to be anathema to fair-minded critics who won't accept a premise of public radio being something like an 'equal and opposing force' to conservative talk radio. That's the job of Air America, not public radio. There is no fairness doctrine in American commercial broadcasting anymore. Good riddance to that bad rubbish.
But public radio does have an obligation to adhere to an internal fairness doctrine. Does one partisan "senior News Analyst" fulfill that public role?
The views expressed in this comment are my own, and very much reflect my own opinion. Having been a long-time listener, and former donor to WUOM, I'm certain that my views do not necessarily reflect those of Michigan Radio, its management or the station licensee, The University of Michigan.
Posted by: Anonymous | October 31, 2008 at 06:15 PM
Anonymous,
You have no credibilty in here because you are an intellectual coward who does not use your legal name...
Youa re in essence are a hypocrite and a poser..Please take off the mask and join the public discourse, I think you bring some considerable value to the market square but your cowardice makes me ignore your talking points..
Your posts as such have zero substance and value unlike you I am not an intellectual coward and my views reflect exactly who I am and not the underdeveloped views of Jack's or yours or any others...
Make a difference not in the margins but in the main...
Posted by: Thrasher | November 01, 2008 at 06:43 PM
You folks are funny.
Thank you for that, Jack.
Posted by: David | November 02, 2008 at 07:16 PM