[Perlstein]

To: Perlstein Juanita Broaddrick accused Bill Clinton of raping her. Do you believe her? ---- Not sure. I certainly don't trust Bill Clinton. But I certainly don't know enough about Broaddrick to trust her. And I certainly don't trust many of her allies. I'll have to remain agnostic. Did you believe Bush when he said in 2000 that most of the money from his tax cut would go to the bottom half of the income distribution?

[alisasny]

Clearly Perlstein needs your master list of women abused by one BJClinton.... his email is a few posts above : )

[68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub]

If you recall the media tried to give FL to Gore in 2000
VNS was a private consortium owned by
ABC News, The Associated Press, CBS News, CNN, Fox News, and NBC.
4 of the 5 of the networks and cable newsrooms
(only ABC waited till both time zones closed)
"announced" Gore had won
BEFORE the 2nd time zone in FL had closed.
This cost President Bush votes in the FL panhandle.

I was at a friends house and the State of FL election website results showed President Bush was winning

In fact, the networks which called Florida for Gore did so early in the evening—before polls had even closed in the Florida panhandle, which is part of the Central Time Zone. NBC called Florida for Gore at 7:49:40 p.m., Eastern Time. This was 10 minutes before polls closed in the Florida panhandle. Thirty seconds later, CBS called Florida for Gore. And at 7:52 p.m., Fox called Florida for Gore. Moore never lets the audience know that Fox was among the networks which made the error of calling Florida for Gore prematurely. Then at 8:02 p.m., ABC called Florida for Gore. Only ABC had waited until the Florida polls were closed.

About an hour before the polls closed in panhandle Florida,
the networks called the U.S. Senate race in favor of the Democratic candidate.

The premature calls may have cost Bush thousands of votes from the conservative panhandle, as discouraged last-minute voters heard that their state had already been decided;
some last-minute voters on their way to the polling place turned around and went home. Other voters who were waiting in line left the polling place. In Florida, as elsewhere, voters who have arrived at the polling place before closing time often end up voting after closing time, because of long lines. The conventional wisdom of politics is that supporters of the losing candidate are most likely to give up on voting when they hear that their side has already lost. Thus, on election night 1980, when incumbent President Jimmy Carter gave a concession speech while polls were still open on the west coast, the early concession was blamed for costing the Democrats several Congressional seats in the West, such as that of 20-year incumbent James Corman. The fact that all the networks had declared Reagan a landslide winner while west coast voting was still in progress was also blamed for Democratic losses in the West; Congress even held hearings about prohibiting the disclosure of exit polls before voting had ended in the any of the 48 contiguous states.

Even if the premature television calls affected all potential voters equally, the effect was to reduce Republican votes significantly, because the Florida panhandle is a Republican stronghold. Most of Central Time Zone Florida is in the 1st Congressional District, which is known as the "Redneck Riviera." In that district, Bob Dole beat Bill Clinton by 69,000 votes in 1996, even though Clinton won the state by 300,000 votes.

So depress overall turnout in the panhandle,
and you will necessarily depress more Republican than Democratic votes.

A 2001 study by John Lott suggested that the early calls cost Bush at least 7,500 votes,
and perhaps many more.

At 10:00 p.m., which network took the lead in retracting the premature Florida win for Gore?
The first retracting network was CBS, not Fox.

Over four hours later, at 2:16 a.m., Fox projected Bush as the Florida winner,
as did all the other networks by 2:20 a.m.

At 3:59 a.m., CBS took the lead in retracting the Florida call for Bush. All the other networks, including Fox, followed the CBS lead within eight minutes. That the networks arrived at similar conclusions within a short period of time is not surprising, since they were all using the same data from the Voter News Service. (Linda Mason, Kathleen Francovic & Kathleen Hall Jamieson, “CBS News Coverage of Election Night 2000: Investigation, Analysis, Recommendations” (CBS News, Jan. 2001), pp. 12-25.)

The big 5 media TV and Cable newsrooms are the real threat to the 2004 election.

..."Early on Tuesday, November 7th 2000, TV stations and various media based in Florida reported that Gore has won Florida which was a big surprise for everyone because of strong republican support. Bush's brother Jeb is governor there and Florida usually gives support to the Republicans. Some of them questioned that and during the night CNN showed 52% Bush's lead over 46% for Gore. It is almost impossible to believe that media could have been that blind and biased to report Gore's victory."...

[Peach]

I haven't read the entire thread and gather you haven't been responding very often but I'll throw this out there anyway.

#1. Don't you think it's hypocritical of Kerry to espouse the UN and France and Germany now as terribly important considering that in 1997 he was on Crossfire and said that Clinton would show leadership if he dealt with Iraq regardless of the UN Security Council, France or Germany?

#2. Don't you think it's terribly hypocritical of Kerry to vote FOR the war in Iraq and then refuse to fund it?

#3. Don't you think it's terribly hypocritical of Kerry to say in the days following 9/11 that we would deal with the problems as we found them in the WOT and if we had to, would do so alone, regardless of the international community?

#4. Don't you think it's terribly hypocritical of Kerry to have said repeatedly during the 90's that Iraq posed a danger to the world and to the United States directly but now seems to think we should not have dealt with that danger?

#5. Don't you think it's terribly hypocritical of Kerry to say that Bush hasn't done a good job when he, Kerry, has been absent for the majority of Intelligence briefings and hearings in the last 8 years?

#6. Don't you think it's terribly hypocritical of Kerry to say he will be strong on national defense when he has voted repeatedly to slash both defense and intelligence budgets for the last 20 years?

[Dr Snide]

Did you believe Bush when he said in 2000 that most of the money from his tax cut would go to the bottom half of the income distribution?

Since the bottom half of income distribution don't pay any income taxes I guess it would be hard to give them a tax cut. However, since the total tax burden of the richest 1% has grown since 2000 I find it hard to say the rich are paying less in taxes.

I have to go but just want to say I am glad you did this and truly hope to hear from you again. Thank you for your time

[Tribune7]

Not sure. I certainly don't trust Bill Clinton. But I certainly don't know enough about Broaddrick to trust her. And I certainly don't trust many of her allies. I'll have to remain agnostic.

Here is one of the many problems I have with the left. The allegation was made public shortly before the impeachment vote. The left generally ignored it. Stories in the LA Times -- almost every major daily actually -- were spiked and there was little network coverage. Nobody from NOW or any left-leaning interest group came to Ms. Broaddrick's defense.

This was a serious charge, it seemed to me pretty important that all Americans come to an understanding as to whether it was merited especially when the problem could have been addressed via Clinton's removal.

Now, I could see someone expressed doubt about Ms. Broaddrick if she popped up in a vaccuum -- a la Anita Hill, irony intended -- but she was part of a long list of women whom had made complaints about Clinton. And remember in every he said/she said in which Clinton was involved and was resolved, Clinton was found to have been lying through his teeth.

It seems to be the duty of a journalist to take arms (figuratively) against a thug. Clinton is one. Where was the outrage expressed at his speaking at the DNC?

Now, you say you don't trust Ms. Broaddrick's allies. You know they include Lisa Myers, perhaps the only establishment journalist of any stature who reported honestly on the accusation.

Did you believe Bush when he said in 2000 that most of the money from his tax cut would go to the bottom half of the income distribution?

OK, I asked a question about a credible rape charge against a promienent Dem & you respond with a presumed gotcha concerning Dubya from a political campaign as though there is some moral equivilancy. I don't recall him saying that in the campaign so I can't address the claim specifically or consider the context in which he said it.

Now, accepting that he did say that as you describe, yes I believe Bush believed it when he said the most of the money from the tax cut would go to the bottom half. It would be in keeping with the Laffer Curve and supply side economics.

I appreciate your visit to FR & hope you're not getting to hammered.

[WOSG]

"To: Perlstein Juanita Broaddrick accused Bill Clinton of raping her. Do you believe her? ---- Not sure. I certainly don't trust Bill Clinton. But I certainly don't know enough about Broaddrick to trust her."

What is it about proven fraud Joe Wilson that causes you to trust him more than Ms Broaddrick?

Admit it: It's the person that he's attacking that makes the difference.

You 'trust' those who are selling the story you want to buy. You can have your intellectual honesty reputation back by admitting Joe Wilson was a charlatan who made false allegations.

Are you ready to retract your earlier mistake of using Joe Wilson as a source for phony claims?