I've always thought Tom Brokaw was a decent guy, but...

[Syrinx]

I just heard him say something on C-SPAN 2 (BookTV) that really floored my in its illogic.

This was on a program that was taped some time ago when he gave he talk about his book about 1968. He opened the floor to questions. Someone asked him about his thoughts on the reliability of our system of elections, given the events of the 2004 presidential election.

His immediate response, he didn't hesitate for a moment, was "I'll never trust an exit poll again."

Consider that.

He answered the question immediately, questioning a tool of his journalistic trade that he had relied on since at least the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan. This, a tool that been been quite accurate until the disastrous "election" of George W. Bush in the year 2000.

He went on to lament the fallibility and utter lameness of exit polls. The very same exit polls that he had proudly championed for at at least the previous twenty years, the heyday of his journalistic career.

It never occurred to him, or he didn't want to mention, that maybe it wasn't the exit polls that were out of whack. Apparently he never suspected that maybe it was the official vote count that was inaccurate.

He went on to offer his own solution to make our voting methods more accurate, trustworthy, secure, happy, family-friendly and benign.

Brokaw wants to devote a full weekend to elections, to give people more time to vote, and to make it more convenient, thus ensuring that we get maximum participation. I'm with him so far.

He lost me after that. He wants everyone to have a magnetic voter card, much like an ATM card, so that we can conveniently vote from "wherever you are." It would be perfect, he says. We trust it for buying groceries, why wouldn't we trust it for elections?

I'm sure I'm not alone in seeing a gaping flaw in this logic.

If I notice that Diebold, or ES&S, is charging me seventy-six dollars for a gallon of milk, I'm sure as hell going to raise hell to the store manager, and demand about seventy dollars back!

On the other hand, if I vote for John Edwards, and they record my vote for Rudolph Giuliani, how am I going to know the difference?

I have it on reliable background that Brokaw used to have a social conscience. Has he sold his soul to the fascists? Does he have early-onset Alzheimer's? Is he just a dipshit?

Just what the hell is wrong with the man?

Tom Brokaw is a likable man. I've always enjoyed his visits with Letterman and such. Brokaw is quite charming.

But now I must ask.

Is Tom Brokaw deluded or is he a shill?

Has one of the most liked and respected men in television news been bribed, blackmailed or threatened into toeing the Party line, or is he really much dumber than I ever expected?

[Jack Bone]

1. I think it was the anthrax letter...

[polichick]

2. Wow, that's pretty disturbing...

Guess he's bought and paid for.

[depakid]

3. Brokaw's been a shill since Reagan was NBC's little darling in the 80's

Couldn't stand his pandering and dishonesty then- still can't stand him now.

[indepat]

21. That goes double for me: Tom oozes the inherent pious hypocrisy obligatory of 'pukes

[Perry Logan]

4. I've never believed a word that slurred out of his mouth.

[Kolesar]

5. "They" purged the voter roles and made people wait in lines for the election in 2004

That is how they buggered the election.

[nuxvomica]

6. Brokaw's dumb as a sack of rocks. Always has been.

He's a longtime buddy of Poppy Bush but I don't think he's in on any of the nasty stuff. He's just an idiot who believes everything rich people tell him.

[mwb970]

7. His voice is OK but there's nothing behind it.

Brokaw is consistently disappointing in his radio and TV appearances. He tends to come across as shallow and illogical. I think he's at his best reading news off a teleprompter, not commenting on it.

[Didereaux]

8. Let's see...Brokaw, Donaldson, Rather all from Texas! We ship our retards OUT! (well most of 'em)

[texanshatingbush]

10. I disagree with you on Rather......

.....he's been willing to speak truth to power, at a high personal cost.

Don't forget another notable Texan who is most definitely NOT a "retard", either: Bill Moyers, whom I regard with absolute awe for his incisive analyses of our modern plight.

[Didereaux]

11. please show me where I even mentioned Moyers? get a life!

[LTR]

13. I thought Brokaw was from South Dakota

:shrug:

[Didereaux]

19. I stand corrected! he is from SD...course that is just a disconnected northern county! heh

[kskiska]

14. Brokaw is from South Dakota n/t

[TwilightZone]

17. "retards"?

What are you, twelve?

As others mentioned, Brokaw is from SD.

Care to explain why you think Rather is a "retard"?

[Didereaux]

20. just because he is suing CBS does not change his career. remember the Mujahadee turban?

which was staged. the bastard was a marshmalloman whenever a Nixon flunky got near him. Oh yes and all those 'crocodile' tears? More likely onion tears carefully applied by the makeup dept. You realize that most of the parodies done over the years about airhead egotistical anchors were based upon Rather?

No, Rather is not defensible on intelligence, character, or damn near anything else either.

[ikojo]

22. I thought Tom Brokaw was from South

Dakota.

[argyl]

33. Brokaw's from South Dakota.

[Oceansaway]

9. Is Tom Brokaw deluded or is he a shill?

both of the above and a major DRUNK too...hes totally pickled, IMO....

[liberalla]

30. that was my response too -

deluded AND a shill.

He slurs his words alot and sounds drunk. I couldn't believe he became a news anchor speaking like that!

[UTUSN]

12. I noticed him out-of-it on Election Night 2000

The other anchors -- Dan and Peter --- were revved up and rolling, while BROKAW was bored, projecting a blase I've-seen-it-all-before. Unbeknownst to him was that the biggest story of his career was unfolding in front of him. He looked sleepy eyed and mumbled between that slur and that lisp of his. G.E.RUSSERT was bouncing off the walls next to him. Even late in the evening when the awfulness was becoming clear, he never snapped out of his fog.

If he wants to be retired, why doesn't he do it all the way. I'm even guessing he might have early stage Alzheimer's---yes, doing my diagnosing a la FRIST, without any medical qualifications and not having seen the patient in person.

[begin_within]

15. Little side story:

When the Republican convention was held here in San Diego in 1996, a waitress at a restaurant downtown refused to serve Brokaw any more drinks because she thought he was intoxicated - she didn't know who he was and was unfamiliar with his normal slurred speech patterns.

[TZ]

16. Maybe because he is partially correct?

I have an Uncle who is a respected retired Professor of Poli Sci/Media and Elections from Georgetown U. He in fact wrote a book on how the media influences elections and if there is an expert on this field he is it (he currently does research for Pew and btw, his best friend is semi-regular on The Daily Show and Colbert Report). He knows Brokaw personally and has great respect for his intelligence..(although he thought Peter Jennings smarter). And yes, he says ONE of the issues in the election of 2000 were very flawed exit polls. He does also acknowledge other shenanagans in Florida. But what Brokaw says is true. Exit Polls are worthless. What he was saying is that 2000 PROVED that. And the flaw in your argument is that does not necessarily exclude him thinking there were OTHER issues as well.
Now, are you going to say, my Uncle is a paid Corporate Shill too, even though he and his ex- wife (who worked in the Carter WH and in Gore's campaign) are long time Democratic Party bigwigs?

[Usrename]

24. I think you are just being misinformed by these people.

Voter News Service (VNS) called Florida exactly as it was in real life.

When asked about the discrepancy between the projected and actual counts, the VNS guy said on live TeeVee (at 2AM while pointing out the areas with his telestrator on his little monitor) that there were votes missing in the returns from Brevard and Duvall Counties.

He was dead right. No sane person would ever dispute that fact.

In the African American precincts of Duvall county they recorded an astonishing overvote, one precinct supposedly had an overvote of twenty percent. One of every five voters supposedly voted for two different candidates for president. Is that what you believe happened?

And we KNOW about the butterfly ballots in Brevard.

The exit polls in Florida in 2000 were a whole lot more accurate than the certified vote count. By orders of magnitude.

That is a matter of record which is so easilly proven, and, as far as I know, no serious election experts have ever disputed that fact, the buffoons at Edison/Mitofsky not withstanding.

[pretzel4gore]

18. he's a rat...

brocawcaw knew the good ship USS America was controlled, thanks to pigmedia scheming, by a gibbering half wit (mr bush, fyi) and such half wits can't even clean up their own feces, much less plot a course for a huge ship...bracawcaw wanted to, like donalson and ari flieher, tom ridge, powell, asscrack, ted olson, cookie roberts, mclennon, p0j oroark and a plague of host other mediawhores/bushevikis put distance between him and the aforementioned gibbering 1/2 wit (agin, that's mister bush, junyer, from midlands texas, top gun pilot and wet dream of nazipooh pillow biters mathews/limbahumbug, also jennings, glen beck, oreally brite humm, woof '700 club' blitzer, scheiffer, schneider, kent brockman etc)
brocawcaw etc created the bush phenomenon...it will cost for at least a couple generations, and brocawcaw don't want folks to recall how he was pigmedia heavy when bush became the biggest thing since ted bundy ;)

[avenger64]

23. Yeah, I think, "I'll never trust an electronic voting machine again"...

... would have been more on the money.

[Major Hogwash]

25. Consider this remark by Brokaw in the 2006 elections and you will never trust him again.

While the results were coming in for the Senate, the balance of the Senate was still undetermined. The race for Allen's seat was so close that it was sure to be contested, although he had narrowly lost the race.

While waiting for more results for elections held out West, the few remaining seats for the Senate would decide if it was going to remian in control of the Republicans or the Democrats.
The Democrats only needed 1 more seat to take control.
When the results came in late at night for the state of Montana, when Tester won in Montana, Brokaw literally spun in his chair and said, "There's something wrong here."

What?

Did Brokaw expect a different outcome?
Didn't he think Burns could be beat?
I mean, Burns was screwing up for months in 2006 before the election.

Let me tell ya, when my 76 year-old mother saw Brokaw say that on national tv, she grit her teeth and said "Well, I always knew he liked Bush."

I was stunned that Brokaw said that. He doesn't live in Montana and him owning a vacation ranch in Montana does NOT give one the insight of the people that live in that state year round.

When Brokaw interviewed Bush for the 1st anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, they strolled along while Brokaw tossed Bush softballs to hit out of the park and sound "presidential".
It was sickening.

Especially when you consider the fact that Brokaw was the only network anchor who talked about the Lewinsky scandal in 2000. Brokaw mentioned the Lewinsky scandal on national tv 198 times after Clinton was found not guilty in the Senate. Brokaw referred to Clinton's legacy being tainted far more than any other news anchor or reporter.

That was when my mom told me Brokaw was a Republican.
She said he didn't even give fair coverage when Brokaw talked about the impeachment of Clinton, Brokaw was already making statements that Clinton would probably be found guilty and removed from office.
Brokaw had already decided what the fate of Clinton should be before the trial was over.

[Cha]

29. brokaw is a ge corporate

shill..he's not on the air now but he still gets retirement bennies.

[applegrove]

26. Personally I agree the exit polls were out of whack. Just my opinion.

[Usrename]

28. Every indication is that the exit polls were correct in 2000.

If you don't mind answering, what is it that makes you think they were out of whack?

[applegrove]

31. Wrong exit polls have followed Karl Rove from Texas. Easier

to steal an election with "reluctant responders" messing up exit polls than hacking into machines. I agree there must be fifty ways the GOP got down and nasty during the 2004 election. I think "reluctant responders" were just one of many ways.

In 2000 I don't remember the exit polls. Just that horrid constitutional mess afterward re: Florida. That one, Gore won fair and square (as dems always do when they run).

[Usrename]

32. That's correct about them disbanding Voter News Service by 2004.

They "privatized" the exit polls for 2004 by defunding VNS and hiring Edison/Mikofsky (the networks, hired them) and it is a fraud.

But in 2000 when VNS called Florida for Gore, they were correct. Their exit polls showed EXACTLY how the people voted in Florida.

Only it doesn't matter so much how people vote, it's how the votes are counted (or in this case, not counted) that matters.

VNS predicted that there would be 25,000 missing votes in Florida, once the election became in doubt. They were right.

The votes were predominantly missing in two counties, Duvall and Brevard. And then once the Supreme Court decided that it is unconstitutional to count legally cast votes, it was all over but for the crying.

But VNS got their numbers right in 2000. That is why they called it for Gore.

[Usrename]

27. I'm going with "dipshit."

I haven't understood the guy since he pre-empted football to cover Reagan going to Reykjavik to meet Gorby.

Two days of him standing in front of a door saying "any minute now" while waiting for Reagan to come outside for a fucking photo-op.

What an asshole. I won't ever get over it. Worse than the "Heidi Game."