Why Did an Arizona TV Station Say Hobbs Won?
Probably an "Oops," But Definitely an "Ugh"
Thanks to American Thinker for running this piece. You can visit the website at: https://www.americanthinker.com/
On Thursday, shortly after Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake held a news conference excoriating the local press for going heavy with her opponent Katie Hobbs’ ludicrous attempt to tie Lake to a break-in at her campaign, the television station Lake used to work for aired a graphic saying Hobbs won the election with 53% of the vote.
This has led to certain questions.
The station, KSAZ Fox10 in Phoenix, explained that the graphic was only on-air for about 30 seconds, that it was a simple mistake made during a testing effort, and that the graphic was generated by the Associated Press.
Suffice to say Lake was rather miffed by the episode and, considering her appropriately brutal dominance of a press corps she was once a member of, wondered out loud how, um, coincidental the event was.
During her run, Lake has used her skills as ex-local anchor to incredible effect, a fact the local media has not at all taken kindly to – hence the raised eyebrows.
But exactly how did this happen? Here are a few media background nuggets that could have played a role:
Media organizations create a surprising amount of “not yet” news. For example, the obituaries of famous people are pre-written so they are ready to go the instant the person, well, goes. They are filled with “B-material,” like when they got their Nobel Prize, that time they got drunk and threw a drink at Gore Vidal, how many kids they admitted to having, etc.
They are then quickly “topped” with date and time and manner of demise and published. If they are really famous, a follow-up piece usually appears with quotes from family and friends and enemies talking about their time with the person, like “I told her years ago when she got them that those monkeys were bad news, but I never thought they would actually eat her,” and so on.
It is also true that some famous people – authors especially - have, in the past, got ahead of the game and made concerted efforts to influence their own obits while they are still alive, to the point of demanding to edit them and suggesting “go to” people for when the sad day comes.
Another “not yet” item is what is called an “evergreen” story. That is a piece that could, literally, be run anytime; these are usually soft pieces like a chat with the local man who owns 737 commemorative shot glasses and are the kind of thing you will see many, many of over long holiday weekends and other slow news cycles.
Editorials are also common “not yets.” Right at this very moment, “journalists” across the country are writing about the (insert pejorative here) impact a Republican wave will have going forward after Nov. 8. They are also writing about the amazing comeback the Democrats made in the last two weeks to manage to hole on to a tied Senate. Like obituaries, both (and many other) angles are ready to be “topped” with numbers and surprises and sent into the world.
And then there are other types of stories that are essentially written but being held for rather nefarious reasons, like timing the release to have the maximum political impact against an opponent or having something ready to go to make sure the other side doesn’t get any traction in the on-going debate – see here:
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So, back to the Lake situation – yes, the AP has created sample graphics and chryons and such and does need to test them before the election as that night is exceedingly hectic – it’s like when you walk into a wedding and a zillion champagne glasses are already filled and on the table at the entrance to the tent – you know you’ve got that covered (at least until drunken Uncle Desmond shows up and throws the count waaaaay off.)
Not only does the AP do this, government agencies do it as well. Your local Registrar of Voters (or clerk or secretary or whatever) is right now making sure their computer systems work by loading fake results into templates.
But unlike the AP, registrars and any responsible news outlet DON’T USE ACTUAL NUMBERS THAT LOOK LIKE REAL RESULTS. They use asterisks or ampersands or zeroes or, for example, they put a single vote in a precinct if the system input interface requires a number or, worst case scenario, they use larger numbers but make sure every contest is a tie.
They also are very very very careful that, when testing, to, well, not hit “send.” Or they firewall the test. Or they run the whole thing through a beta protocol. Or really worst case scenario they do at 3 in the morning after putting a giant red “TESTING” warning at the top of the website and leave it up for 11 seconds. Or whatever they can do to make sure that what happened in Phoenix never ever happens at all.
It would, though, be rather fascinating to get a gander of the entire national AP “test” list and see exactly how many of the races are “tested” using wishful thinking numbers as was done in the Hobbs/Lake race, because Kari is going to win and it’s not going to be even that close.
If every other race is 53-47 and has the same voter turnout number, then maybe the AP has an excuse – a bad one, but an excuse. If the numbers vary from race to race, though, at the very least the AP staff is almost assuredly projecting their hopes and dreams and wishes and their personal political viewpoint into their work. This, of course, we all know already but it’s always nice to have another chunk of objective fact when people try to claim the media is not biased or manipulative or dismissive or collaborationist.
Or, I could be wrong and the AP is very very up to something very very bad – imagine for a moment if Hobbs does in fact “win” on November 8 by 53% to 47%.
Oh my God.