Will it be wet in terms of water? https://t.co/yrFs5S2aXz
— George Conway🌻 (@gtconway3d) November 8, 2022
Charlatans use a number of tricks to make it sound like they are reading your mind or contacting the dead or finding the lost car keys, when what they are doing is asking leading questions and listening carefully for responses. We all know how that works.
Expect the same tonight if you're watching election returns (I won't be). The "numbers guy" will hit you with a blizzard of data which must be true because: numbers! But as the night goes on it will become apparent even the numbers guy is making vague and glittering statements of generalities which will be true under any circumstances, carefully filligreed with "and that's what we expected...." as new vote totals are announced. That phrase will never actually be used until vote counts show a solid trend for one candidate or the other, and if that shifts it will always be because of "those votes that came in from...." that they were waiting for.
They used to be bolder about this, but after 2000 and the vote forecasts that "canceled" California, they have learned to be more circumspect. Which in practice means they've learned to hew closer to the charlatan style so that anything they say during election coverage will be correct.
We experts also know that if more people turn out to vote against a candidate than turn out FOR that candidate, that candidate will lose, So...it all comes down to turn-off. https://t.co/btJGNt0iJ9
— Jeff Greenfield (@greenfield64) November 8, 2022
And in some states the mail-in ballots won't be opened until election night, and tallying them can take time. Which is a Republican thing, so the "tardiness" of the count can allow for cries of "fraud!" and tie back into "mail ballots are inherently vulnerable!"
I can remember going to bed not knowing who the President would be, and I don't mean just 2000. The press is complicit in this because they race each other to announce the "winner" without a final tally. When that backfired when national broadcasters announced the POTUS winner and voters in California said "fuck it!" and went back home (this in the days before early voting was widespread). The TV stations agreed not to do that again, but now they rely on AP to make the godlike pronouncement of who won.
Which didn't work out well in 2000, either. But still, 22 years later, we insist we can count the votes before they are cast and declare the winner before the vote counts are official. Pundits yesterday telling us "no one knows what's going to happen" are today confidently predicting what's going to happen. And we wonder why people are so prone to conspiracy theories about elections.
I just can't imagine why that is.
Angelenos: earthquakes, fires, riots? LOL nbd
— NotElonMuskHat (@Popehat) November 8, 2022
Also Angelenos: moderate rain? pic.twitter.com/F2va3T30xV
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