Hillary Aide Pressed Networks to Nix Ohio Call

NewsMax.com ^ | 11/05/04 | Carl Limbacher

[kattracks]

When the Fox News Channel called the state of Ohio for Bush a little after 12:30 a.m. Wednesday morning, NBC quickly followed.

But ABC, CBS and CNN held out for hours - in part because they had been pressured not to make the crucial call by Clinton operative-turned-Kerry advisor Howard Wolfson. Florida had just been called for Bush, with Pennsylvania going for Kerry hours before. After Fox put Ohio's deciding vote in Bush's column, the Clintonistas who had taken over team Kerry knew it was time to deploy the shock troops.

At that point, according to the New York Times, Wolfson, who served in 2000 as Hillary Clinton's press secretary - "burst into the 'boiler room' in Washington where the brain trust was huddled and said, 'we have 30 seconds' to stop the other networks from following suit."

Kerry pollster Mark Mellman and campaign organizer Michael Whouley started burning up the phone lines to ABC, CBS, CNN and NBC.

Only the Peacock network refused. "Then Mr. Wolfson banged out a simple, two-line statement expressing confidence that Mr. Kerry would win Ohio once the remaining ballots were counted," the Times said.

The message was issued under campaign manager Mary Beth Cahill's name shortly after 1 a.m.:

"The vote count in Ohio has not been completed. There are more than 250,000 votes that remain to be counted. We believe when they are, John Kerry will win Ohio."

The old Clinton warroom tactic succeed. ABC, CBS and CNN held their Ohio call till it was clear Kerry himself was prepared to concede.

[flashbunny]

They sure got dan rather's ear.

Watching Ed Bradley try on at least two occassions to explain to Dan that ohio was all but an impossibility for Kerry was almost difficult to watch.

[ladyinred]

Just what I had suspected. I remembered that Gore had done the same thing, and got his talking points directly to the newsreaders. They of course obeyed anything Kerry team said. They didn't want Bush to have the advantage of being declared reelected if they could steal it!

[need_a_screen_name]

Shouldn't this title say ex-Hillary aide? Hillary surley wanted Kerry to lose.

[beyond the sea]

Wolfson is an evil opperative. He, like Hillary, will never go away.

Where is Larry Nichols of Arkansas?

[fortheDeclaration]

Every network caved to the Democrats.

If they called Ohio, they just refused to call anymore states (like Nevada) so Bush would not get over 269.

The MSM ended the campaign the way they had gone through it, lap dogs for the Democratic party.

And that includes the conservatives beloved FOX which is now nothing more then CNN light.

[Pres Raygun]

I suspected as much. The MSM were shameless this year with their partisanship. They have exposed their treachery and we must now destroy them before they destroy the country.

[bullzeye66]

Isn't it amazing how the provisional ballot number keeps growing... and not to mention, if there were enough prov. ballots to count, sKerry would have to have 100% of the vote.... geesh!!! Unreal, these people...

[Mo1]

No suprise there .. none of them would call the states Bush clearly won .. but they had no problem calling states for Kerry long before the votes were counted

[Bronzewound]

Should have known. Everything on election night was clicking along at a certain pace; then when Ohio's turn was up suddenly everything stopped moving. I remember being really incensed, thinking here we go again.

Hillary is pure evil.

[GeronL]

You mean the NY TIMES admitted the networks answer to Hillary??

[nopardons]

bttt

[Bronzewound]

They sure got dan rather's ear.

Thats OK. Free Republic et al got another part of old Dan a few weeks ago.

[hummingbird]

Absolutely disgraceful...and THEY are the ones always yelling that Republicans are trying to pull a coup!

[sockmonkey]

Of all the DNC/Kerry folks I saw on television, Wolfson was the one I thought looked the most like what I imagine someone who is possessed by a Demon looks like.

Those totally dead brown eyes-like he lacked a soul. And the absolute contempt that he spewed. Talk about mega-ick factor.

[konaice]

Heard this today on Rush...

But one has to ask why?

By that time the voteing was all done. Nothing could
change (baring wholesale fraud), which they were not in
a position to cause.

So the tally, to paraphrase W, was what it was.

So who or what was served by having three networks hold off calling the inevitable for 12 hours? Kerry's wounded pride?

And what does this say about our wounderfull Press, where one phone call causes them to withhold a hot story regardless of what State elections officials are telling them?

[Southack]

In one of the great ironies of "unintended consequences," not calling Ohio early cost them the ability to challenge the vote later.

You see, the MSM had been calling states early (all for JFK, of course) all night long. California was called for JFK even before any votes were in, for instance.

Had Ohio been called for Bush early, too...then the Kerry Campaign could have blasted the media as the bad guy the next day and then used that "moral high ground" to warrant a full recount there.

Their 10,000 Democratic Party attorneys would have been deployed, but the press would have glossed over that army of trial lawyers as they challenged every legitimate Bush vote and every hanging chad Kerry vote...because the news media would have been demonized as the bad guy for calling the state early.

But instead, because the Kerry Campaign used its media influence to impact the call for Ohio, the Kerry Campaign lost the moral high ground to justify a full scale vote challenge.

[rawhide]

The CBS/Rather Network are still listening and are refusing to declare the winner of Ohio.

[Route66]

Some of the weirdness from Tuesday night is making a lot more sense.

[Shery]

I agree about Fox. Sorry to say it, but they gave tons of favorable coverage to Kerry and little to Bush. That speaks for itself. I emailed to complain that for a station that portends to be unbiased, they were VERY supportive of Kerry and took the bait on all the dirt on Bush. No response, though. I guess they wanted to wait it out and then they'd say that they were only following general public opinion. Huh!