I was watching Dan Abrams on MSNBC the other night run down his top 5 Super Tuesday blunders by political pundits and the media.
It got me to thinking how the NJ media faired on its coverage of the presidential primary.
Pretty well…based on an analysis of the run-up coverage prior to Tuesday judged against the final tallies!
In the category of:
Turnout Predictions: The Asbury Park Press forecasted a big voter turnout: “Unaffiliated could make super impact on Super Tuesday”…and they did. More Democrats showed up to vote than all primary voters combined in the last Presidential contest.
Gender Gapping: Ledger syndicated columnist Froma Harrop predicted single (or is that unmarried women) would likely follow the patterns of the early primary states and show up in big numbers on Tuesday, largely casting Democrat ballots. According to exit polls, unmarried women cast 25% of all Democrat ballots, a 15 point advantage over unmarried men.
God and Country: Trying to size up, the albeit small, evangelical Christian vote among Republican voters, The Herald News took its best shot in “Trying to reconcile God and country – Evangelicals thinking about next week's GOP primary”. The paper got pretty close — McCain only got 38% of support from Evangelicals, followed by Romney (28%) and Huckabee (26%).
The Latino Voting Bloc: Here the Ledger relied on past election results, a bit of theory and some street smart folks to paint a picture giving Hillary the edge (“Clinton depending on a powerful bloc: Latinos”). When all was said and done, Latinos supported Hillary by a 2:1 margin according to the exit polls.
Best Day-After Analysis: The winner in this wrap-up category goes to the Star Ledger, hands down. Its story, “Jersey Democrats looked in the mirror, and then voted” did a great job matching up the exit polls to the real returns and demographics to paint a detailed picture of who voted for whom.
