Slate: Joe Miller's Embarrassing Defeat

Politico wanted to call it over, too, because Politico was determined to write the storyline that insurgents (read: Tea Party) went down in flames. First they claimed all insurgents lost, then Scott won in Florida, so Politico changed that to say he was the exception that proved the rule that all insurgents fail.

Mickey Kaus was giving them smack about it all night.

Two days ago, Slate went full-retard.

Mama Grizzly Man

Why the candidate of Sarah Palin and the Tea Party Express is losing in Alaska.
By Alexandra Gutierrez

Posted Monday, Aug. 23, 2010, at 5:54 PM ET

UNALASKA, Alaska—On Tuesday, in her home state, Sarah Palin's favorite will probably get trounced. Joe Miller is widely expected to lose by a large margin to incumbent Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the Republican primary—an embarrassing defeat for the former governor, who has endorsed Miller, but also to Miller's other major backer, the Tea Party Express.

...

Not surprisingly, Steve Wackowski, a campaign spokesman for Murkowski, agrees that backing from Palin and the Tea Party Express is more of a liability for Miller than anything else. "It turns Alaskans off when outside groups from the Lower 48 like this California Tea Party Express come out and try to tell Alaskans how to vote and what they should be doing," says Wackowski. "I'm from here; I grew up here. And whether it's extreme environmentalists telling us that we can't drill in ANWR or that we can't do predator control to manage our game stocks, I think that really rubs Alaskans the wrong way. On Tuesday, you're going to see evidence of that."

Despite the long odds, Miller's team is still feeling optimistic. On Friday Sarah Palin wrote yet another Facebook post extolling his commonsense conservative values, and campaign spokesman Randy DeSoto says internal polls show that the campaign is within one point of Murkowski. The race is "pretty much neck and neck," he says. On Tuesday, we'll find out exactly how close those necks are.

In fairness, there was some polling showing Miller behind. But... This was an article written to describe what the author wished to happen, and what the intended audience joined him in wishing with all their hearts would happen.

Earlier tonight, someone called The Politico's claim of insurgents (again: by that they meant Tea Party favorites) failing so disastrously a case of spin.

I don't even think it's spin. Spin is when you know you're lying. These guys aren't lying.

They're wish-casting. They are not telling you any sort of objective reasonable assessment of likelihood; they are just telling you what their shriveled black hearts wish would happen.

This is 60% of media "horse-race" coverage; it's 40% genuine likelihood-assessment by checking with statisticians and pollsters, and it's 60% just wish-casting. I want Joe Miller to lose because she was endorsed by Sarah Palin and I hate her, so of course that's what I think will happen.

They're not broadcasters, they're wishcasters. They're so partisan they can't even separate this function out from their driving rah-rah impulse.

Tim Lindell.

posted by Ace at 04:16 AM

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