Before Tuesday, which was election night in Georgia’s sixth congressional district, I hadn’t been following the affair. I knew there would be a special election to replace a Republican congressman — Tom Price — whom President Trump had appointed to the cabinet. I also knew there was something funny about the Democratic candidate: the guy didn’t live in the district.
Jon Ossoff, a former Democratic staffer and “documentary film maker,” was typical of a class: a young, pretty-for-a-politician, supposedly charismatic person who was used as a target for big-money donations, most of them from Hollywood. A couple of times a year, one of these people — a Kennedy, some kind of activist, something — is revealed as the hope for America’s future, a leader whom the citizens of Anytown, USA, will certainly hail as a savior, if only he or she is well-funded. These people almost always lose. The locals just don’t like ’em.
But Ossoff pushed the envelope. He didn’t live in the district, and he didn’t bother to move there. His explanation was that his girlfriend didn’t live in the district. Oh, I see. His opponent, Karen Handel, a standard Republican, created what seems to have been the only memorable moment of her campaign by asking Ossoff, in a debate, whom he intended to vote for. Long silence from Ossoff, who couldn’t vote because he didn’t live in the district.
A couple of times a year, one of these people — a Kennedy, some kind of activist, something — is revealed as the hope for America’s future.
So that’s what I knew before Tuesday, June 20, when I saw the morning headline in the Washington Post: “Hard-fought House race in suburban Atlanta comes to an end as a referendum on Trump.” That headline was No. 1 all day in Google News Top Stories. It was run as if it were a locally generated headline by online newspapers across the world. And it got my interest. Polls were showing a 50-50 race in the sixth district of Georgia, but the guys at the Post hated Trump so badly that they couldn’t keep from betting all their chips on Blue. If, contrary to their fervent hope, the Republican happened to win — so would Trump!
That was enough for me; I decided to follow the returns as they came in. Clicking around, I discovered that the best sources for updates on the vote were the special live sites of the Atlantic and the New York Times. Both of them offered frequently refreshed totals, and the Times added maps of the district clearly showing where the votes for each party were coming from.
By contrast, CNN’s TV coverage was absurdly bad. A big panel of “experts” had been assembled, and they dealt out the usual inanities; but if you wanted the vote totals, you wouldn’t get them from CNN. Sample: At 9:16 Georgia time, CNN showed Ossoff ahead by 2%, with 156,000 votes counted, while the Atlantic showed Handel leading by 4.5%, with 184,000 counted. Oops. Guess we missed something. CNN’s vote analyst kept talking about votes still being awaited from places that according to the Times were mainly counted already, and must have been, to reach the current totals. At 9:53, when the Times’ vote analysts called the election for Handel, she was 10,000 votes ahead with only 30,000 remaining to be counted; but at 9:50 the vote total on CNN was still 20,000 behind, and at 9:54, 42,000 behind.
Ossoff didn’t live in the district, and he didn’t bother to move there. His explanation was that his girlfriend didn’t live there.
Fox News followed the vote only sporadically, perhaps because it wasn’t betting on the success of the Republican, but it had an absurd moment too. At the point where the vote total reached 120,000, Bret Baier, its most respected news anchor, was brought in for an interview, and he prattled on about how it was still early in the evening, only a fraction of the votes had been counted, who could tell?, etc. Dauntless researcher that I am, I had just been checking Wikipedia to determine the number of votes that are usually cast in the district. I easily and accurately predicted that 250,000 would be counted on June 20, but Baier had obviously not benefited from such research. It was clear from discussions on both Fox and CNN that their people hadn’t noticed the difference between the percentage of precints that had (fully) reported and the percentage of votes that had actually been counted.
Suddenly, at 10 PM, CNN’s vote total miraculously caught up, and it conceded what had been obvious for almost an hour before: the election had gone to the Republican. The Times election-returns site called the election at 9:53. Right to the end, however, the Times itselfkept the headline it had been running all day (also high up on Google Top Stories): “Georgia’s special election comes to a nail-biting finish.” And the Post kept its own headline, which, as I mentioned, was “Hard-fought House race in suburban Atlanta comes to an end as a referendum on Trump.”
One minute after CNN declared a victor, its irrepressibly behind-the-curve anchor Don Lemon opined, “The results were actually really close.” No, they weren’t. Except in safe districts, a vote of 52-48 is well within the “decisive” range in an American election.
A big panel of “experts” had been assembled, and they dealt out the usual inanities.
So Trump had won? I doubt it. Ossoff was the kind of gasbag who in his concession speech informed his followers: “As darkness has crept across this planet, [you] have provided a beacon of hope for people here in Georgia, for people across the country, and for people around the world.” Well, Ossoff may not have had any self-awareness, but he did have money — something between $20 and 40 million in funding, making this the most expensive congressional election in American history. Still, it wasn’t enough to cancel the fact that he didn’t even live in the district. As for Trump, he appears to have been popular in some parts of the district, but not in others. What a surprise.
So who knows? Unfortunately, either the Republican or the Democrat had to win.
Now, I know that the Washington Post sees things differently. But I’m still waiting for the headline that, according to its own logic, it should now be running — the headline that says, “Trump Wins Referendum.”
