Archive for the ‘Media and Politics’ Category

Note explains why Current sold to Al Jazeera: Shared values.

Thursday, January 3, 2013 by:jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com (Joe Garofoli)
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The big question behind the sale of San Francisco-based Current TV is “Why would owners Al Gore and Joel Hyatt sell to Al Jazeera?” OK, besides the estimated $500 miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiillion sale price — $100 mill to be pocketed by Gore. But besides the Benjamins, why Al Jazeera?

Fox News is preparing to feast on this development for years. Doesn’t get much better for them that liberal former VP Gore — long one of their punching bags — sells to the network that once broadcast Al Qaeda videos in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. No matter that A-J has won all sorts of journalistic awards; Bill O’Reilly just got his programming set for the next month.

Here is a note that Hyatt sent to Current employees Wednesday afternoon explaining their reasoning. Interesting to note how Hyatt points out the journalistic strengths of A-J as well as the underlying values it shares with Current. (Somewhere around the seventh paragraph of this note, we’re guessing that O’Reilly has rolled onto his back, giggling in delight.) And you gotta love Hyatt’s “Colin Powell” name check.

Al and I are thrilled and proud to announce that a few moments ago Current was acquired by Al Jazeera, the award winning international news organization.

When considering the several suitors who were interested in acquiring
Current, it became clear to us that Al Jazeera was founded with the same goals we had for Current: To give voice to those whose voices are not typically heard; to speak truth to power; to provide independent and diverse points of view; and to tell the important stories that no one else is telling. Al Jazeera, like Current, believes that facts and truth lead to a better understanding of the world around us.

Al and I did significant due diligence as part of our evaluation process.
We were impressed with all that we learned about Al Jazeera and its
journalistic integrity, global reach, award-winning programming, and
growing influence around the world. That influence has recently been
demonstrated by Al Jazeera’s important and impactful coverage of the Arab Spring, which was widely credited as being the most thorough and
informative coverage from any media company. Colin Powell told Al that Al Jazeera is the only cable news network he watches (which he is able to do because Comcast carries it in the Washington, DC market).

As you may know, Al Jazeera is funded by the government of Qatar, which is the United States’ closest ally in the Gulf Region, and is where the United States bases its Middle East Air Force operations. I have had first-hand knowledge of Qatar’s policies as a result of my tenure on the Board of The Brookings Institution. The Saban Center for Middle East Policy is a joint venture of The Brookings Institution and Qatar, and it has offices in Washington, DC and Doha, Qatar. Its purpose is to propose practical public policies that can contribute to peace in the Middle East,and its founding Director is my friend, Martin Indyk, the former U.S.Ambassador to Israel.

While considering this decision, I spent a week in Doha, Qatar, where Al
Jazeera is headquartered, and I am pleased to tell you that I could not
have been more impressed with their operation. First of all, they are
bringing large-scale resources to journalism – something which we have not been able to do. Al Jazeera has more than 80 bureaus around the world,and is seen in more than 260 million homes in 130 countries. Al Jazeera has a staff of over 4000 people, including 400 journalists. Its
journalists hail from more than 50 countries, with every conceivable
nationality and religion represented on its professional team. Al Jazeera
is a major global media player.

The rest of the world thinks so too. Al Jazeera English has won many, many awards including an Alfred I DuPont Award for Best Documentary, the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Four Freedoms Awards for freedom of speech and expression, an Amnesty International Award for International TV and Radio, the prestigious Peabody Award, and the Huffington Post Ultimate Media Gamechanger award.

All of this is compelling, but what really convinced Al and me that Al
Jazeera would be a great home for the people of Current was their publicly stated Values and Core Capabilities. Their mission includes the
following: Diversity (“bringing stories from the underreported communities, societies and cultures from across the globe), Journalistic
Integrity (“committed to the uncompromising pursuit of truth and the
ideals of journalism”), and A Voice for the Voiceless (“promoting the
basic human right of the freedom of expression for people everywhere”).

Al Jazeera is planning to invest significantly in building “Al Jazeera America,” a network focused on international news for the American
audience. Al and I will both serve on the Advisory Board of Al Jazeera
America, and we look forward to helping build an important news network.

Obviously there will be a lot of transition work in the coming weeks. Al Jazeera does not have a management team in place in the U.S to run this new venture. They are extremely impressed with our people and our accomplishments. I will be holding staff meetings in the next few days and will introduce the senior folks from Al Jazeera who have led the planning for this entry into the United States. (I will separately communicate as to the day and time for those staff meetings.) We will communicate more of the details of this acquisition during those meetings.

Getting this transaction done was very difficult. One of Current’s
distributors, Time Warner Cable, did not consent to the sale to Al
Jazeera. Consequently, Current will no longer be carried on TWC. This is
unfortunate, but I am confident that Al Jazeera America will earn
significant additional carriage in the months and years ahead. In the
United Kingdom, it has become the number three news network (behind the BBC and Sky News). It did that by investing in great programming – as it intends to do in the United States.

Al and I are incredibly proud of what all of us have been able to
accomplish together. Throughout our short history, Current has been a
thought leader for the media industry, innovating many exciting features that became standard after we introduced them. (Tweets on television anyone?!) Just this past year, we’ve been able to provide our viewers with fantastic interactive and social TV 2.0 coverage of the Presidential Election, including a peek inside the Obama Campaign headquarters, in depth analysis of the Libor Scandal, the breaking and relentless coverage of the Trayvon Martin scandal, and the list goes on and on. We have won most of the important awards in the journalism profession. We have stayed true to our independence and courage. And in our choice of new corporate parent, we are continuing to strive to make a difference – to provide the American people with information and analysis they need to live better, more secure, happier lives. I am confident this will continue into the future.

As I reflected deeply about this decision – both to sell the company and to whom – I kept coming back to one basic notion: The purpose of journalism is to provide those who don’t know with information and knowledge so that they can become those who do know. Bias and hatred are fueled by ignorance. Information and knowledge are the only antidotes to that ignorance. That is the role journalism must play – to provide the knowledge that sweeps away the bias and hatred caused by ignorance. It is a noble pursuit. I am proud of each and every one of you for your dedication to pursuing that noble goal. And it is a privilege to have worked with all of you these past few years.

Please accept my best wishes for a happy, healthy, exciting and fulfilling New Year!
All the best,
Joel

Mitt Romney Wins!….Lie of the Year award

Wednesday, December 12, 2012 by:jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com (Joe Garofoli)
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Mitt Romney may have lost the election, but he did win something Wednesday: Politifact’s annual Lie of the Year...uh…award.

Mitt took home the hardware for his statement that Barack Obama “sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China” at the cost of American jobs, say the nonpartisan factcheckers at Politifact. They continue:

“It was a lie told in the critical state of Ohio in the final days of a close campaign — that Jeep was moving its U.S. production to China. It originated with a conservative blogger, who twisted an accurate news story into a falsehood. Then it picked up steam when the Drudge Report ran with it. Even though Jeep’s parent company gave a quick and clear denial, Mitt Romney repeated it and his campaign turned it into a TV ad.

And they stood by the claim, even as the media and the public expressed collective outrage against something so obviously false.

People often say that politicians don’t pay a price for deception, but this time was different: A flood of negative press coverage rained down on the Romney campaign, and he failed to turn the tide in Ohio, the most important state in the presidential election.”

Not only did Team Romney not back off the Lie, his turned it into a TV commercial:

“His lie is embarrassing, frankly, and it should be unsettling for the rest of the world,”MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow said after the Lie of the Year rolled out. “Imagine Romney waking up in the Lincoln bedroom or whatever, checking his conservative Twitter feed and running with whatever he finds there.”

Karl Rove, Dick Morris to disappear from Fox. For a while. (VIDEO)

Tuesday, December 4, 2012 by:jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com (Joe Garofoli)
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You won’t be seeing any more Karl Rove meltdowns or Dick Morris flat-out-wrong predictions on Fox News. For a while.

Sez New York Magazine:Fox News chief Roger “Ailes’s deputy, Fox News programming chief Bill Shine, has sent out orders mandating that producers must get permission before booking Rove or Morris.” Seems that, as a Fox spokesperson told NYM, that Shine’s message was “the election’s over.”

Apparently, their visual musk is such a powerful reminder of their Election Night failures that their airtime must be limited, or else it could induce nausea among viewers. Apparently.

Or maybe it is because it is a proven fact what a terrible return-on-investment it was to give money to Rove-controlled political operations in 2012.

More from NYM: “Inside Fox News, Morris’s Romney boosterism and reality-denying predictions became a punch line. At a rehearsal on the Saturday before the election, according to a source, anchor Megyn Kelly chuckled when she relayed to colleagues what someone had told her: ‘I really like Dick Morris. He’s always wrong but he makes me feel good.’”

Morris — who predicted a Romney “landslide”— was SO wrong that even Fox’s own Bill O’Reilly ripped him.

“The problem was,” O’Reilly said, ripping Morris on the day after the numbers were in, “he was analyzing Uruguay.” BillOooooooooooooooooo!

Choosing the most flat-out-wrong Dick Morris prediction is like choosing your favorite child. But our favorite remains the TITLE of his 2005 book predicting the 2008 prez matchup: “Condi versus Hillary. The Next Great Presidential Race.”

Or, as Jon Stewart calls Morris, “The King of Wrong Mountain:”

And once more just because it was such compelling live television, Rove’s election night meltdown:

Fox’s chair Roger Ailes told Petraeus he’d quit to manage his prez campaign (AUDIO)

Tuesday, December 4, 2012 by:jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com (Joe Garofoli)
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Fox News likes to call itself “fair and balanced.” Key words: “call itself.”

The latest blunder for the cable news ratings leader is rooted in the new revelation that founder and chair Roger Ailes sent an emissary — Fox’s national security analyst K.T. McFarland — to offer General David Petraeus political advice and tell The General that he’d be willing to quit Fox to run his presidential campaign.

For realz. Comes from Bob “Watergate” Woodward in the Washington Post. And for those about to whine that this is mere conjecture from the liberal media, here’s a link to the audio of the conversation between McFarland playing bag man for Ailes to Petraeus.

Ah, yes. General Petraeus. You may remember him for the spectacular sex scandal that crashed his career a few weeks back. That Roger sure can pick ‘em.

Listen to the audio recording of the conversation because it is full of gems — starting with how McFarland tells the General that “everybody at Fox loves you.” Just because they’re “fair and balanced” perhaps.

Fox loves Dave so much that they want to know if there’s any suggestions he has, you know, when they’re covering the news in a “fair and balanced” way. Dave says he’s a bit worried about the “slant” he’s seeing at Fox. They’re sounding a little “skeptical”…you know, like journalists.

“The editorial policy of Fox had shifted,” Dave said. “It was almost as if, because they’re going after Obama, they had to go after Obama’s war as well.”

“Papers and news outlets have editorial policies,” the General said. “They know sort of how their bosses feel about things . . . and it causes a certain shading.”

Hmmm. Like say — hypothetically speaking of course — if the chair and founder of a network that bills itself as “fair and balanced” told a General that his network was COVERING that he’d quit to run his campaign for president. Would it be any wonder if the employees at that network “loved” that person.

And nice job by McFarland, who is supposed to “analyze” national security affairs for Fox. If she fawned over Petraeus any more than she did in this conversation, she could be his biographer.

Roger’s response to Woodward?

“It was more of a joke, a wiseass way I have,” he said. “I thought the Republican field [in the primaries] needed to be shaken up and Petraeus might be a good candidate.”

Nothing breeds credibility more than the I-was-just-joking defense from the leader of the network. As they say on Fox, “We report. You decide.”

Confused about the Petraeus scandal? Here is a flowchart from Gawker that explains all

Tuesday, November 13, 2012 by:jana.kasperka@chron.com (Jana Kasperkevic)
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Earlier Friday, CIA Director David Petraeus announced that he is resigning from the agency due to having engaged in an extramarital affair. His resignation set off a media storm that uncovered a scandal worthy of its own soap opera.

“After being married for over 37 years, I showed extremely poor judgment by engaging in an extramarital affair. Such behavior is unacceptable, both as a husband and as the leader of an organization such as ours. This afternoon, the President graciously accepted my resignation,” Petraeus wrote in a letter sent to CIA employees to announce his resignation.

Since Friday, it has been revealed that Petraeus engaged in the affair with Paula Broadwell, his biographer. The scandal has also extended past their relationship to include Jill Kelley and Gen. John Allen.

The entire affair is so complicated that in order to help us keep track of all the main players, Gawker has created this genius flowchart:

(Jim Cooke/Gawker)

To get a more detailed description of everyone’s role, you can read Gawker’s breakdown here.

The Tweetelection: Obama had more than just the ground game in his favor

Wednesday, November 7, 2012 by:jana.kasperka@chron.com (Jana Kasperkevic)
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President Barack Obama might have won yesterday’s election thanks to his ground game, but the 44th president also dominated the race on social media.

The Tweetelection

As the clocks announced the beginning of Nov. 6,  the worldwide promoted trend on Twitter for the day became #VoteObama. Not only did Obama for America purchase the worldwide trending topic for the day, but they paid to have a variety of their tweets promoted throughout the day.

As early as 5:30 a.m. ET, before many of the polls opened, the campaign tweeted out a link that enable @BarackObama Twitter followers to locate their polling station. The tweet was promoted and for most of the day appeared as the top tweet on the account’s Twitter feed. Later on in the day, as lines at polling places became long and many were concerned about voters becoming impatient and tired, the campaign tweeted: “If you’re in line when the polls close, stay in line to vote. It could help make the difference.”

The campaign also promoted this tweet making it appear on their followers’ feeds, various searches and the top of @BarackObama‘s account.

While Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney did not seem to promote tweets from his feed and had not purchased trending topics on Nov. 6, he also tweeted a link containing information regarding locating one’s polling station to his followers.

The last tweet to be promoted by @BarackObama‘s campaign this election day was the tweet sent out when the networks called the election in his favor. Within minutes, this tweet became the most re-tweeted tweet by President Obama.

The tweet contained a photo of President Barack Obama embracing his wife Michelle Obama with simple “Four More Years.” Within two hours, the photo was re-tweeted 456,845 times and shared on Facebook 207,348 times.

A photo shared by Obama for America on Twitter and Facebook. (Jana Kasperkevic/Houston Chronicle)

President Obama’s re-election was also the most tweeted moment of the 2012 election, reaching 327,453 tweets per minute at 11:19 p.m. ET, reported Twitter. About 31 million election-related tweets were sent that day.

How It Played:

The popular vote might have been close, but the vote on social media was overwhelmingly in Obama’s favor. Having tracked both Romney’s and Obama’s followers on Facebook, Twitter and Google plus, we were able to see Obama surge forward and leave the Republican nominee behind in the dust.

Not only had Obama’s campaign built a loyal core of followers on social media over the 2008 campaign as well as the first term of his presidency, but they have been making significant strides in adding to it throughout this campaign season. Not only did Obama start election day with 20 million more Twitter followers, but while Mitt Romney was only able to gain 44,550 new Twitter followers, Obama added more than a quarter million of new followers to his already high numbers.

Similar trends emerged on Facebook and Google Plus, as can be seen in the graphic below:

(Jana Kasperkevic/Houston Chronicle)

In an interesting turn of events, after the networks called the election for President Obama, Romney actually began to lose followers on Facebook. At 11: 30 p.m. ET on Nov 6., the number of his Facebook followers was 12,135,972. By 2:00 a.m. ET on Nov. 7, that number dropped to 12,131,785 and by 6 p.m. ET on Nov. 7, it was 12,103,112 with Romney having lost over 30,000 followers.

On Twitter, Romney’s number of followers continued to climb through Nov. 7.

Mitt Romney has changed his relationship status

In a world where break ups and heartbreaks as well as upcoming nuptials and other happy occasions are announced on a variety of social media platforms, Mitt Romney has only admitted to his heartbreak on Facebook.

His new cover photo features him on the stage as he delivers his concession speech and the last post is a photo with signed “Thank You.”

His Google Plus and Twitter accounts, on the other hand, remain silent.

Youth vote amplified through buzz on Facebook

According to Facebook, the 2012 election received a record breaking level of buzz. On a 10-point scale, it scored 9.27. The 2008 presidential election scored an 8.95.

This is due to the younger voters on Facebook, who were more engaged on Nov. 6 than throughout the campaign season. Older Facebook users were responsible for majority of the buzz created during the national political conventions and the debates. The top scores for buzz during Nov. 6 were earned by men aged 25 to 34, at 9.47, and women aged 25 to 34, at 9.27.

Individually, both Obama and Romney had the most buzz among both men and women aged 18 to 24. The two candidates beat their highest scores earned during the first presidential debate – Obama went up a full point from 7.41 to 8.41 while Romney earned just half a point, going from 7.38 to 7.83.

“There were 71.7 million election-related mentions across Facebook posts and comments in the United States on Election Day,” reported Facebook. “There were 88.7 million mentions across Facebook posts and comments globally.”

What the Trend

Yesterday’s election might not have given rise to any of those trends that we have become so fond of such as “Binders full women,” “Big Bird” or “Horses and bayonets,” but the day warranted its own set of trends. Most notably, “If Romney” trended throughout the day in various areas implying that number of people were speculating on the possible results and the aftermath.

Additional, the most frequent trending topic was “I Voted” as many Twitter users proudly announced that they have done their civic duty.

Here are the topics that trended as the networks called the election for President Obama:

In the hours that followed, the most notable Twitter trend was “Bout Damn Time,” which at first was aimed at Romney as the nation awaited his concession speech. Later on, the same trend was aimed at President Obama as his tired supporters stayed up to see him deliver his victory speech.

Here are the topics that trended during President Obama’s victory speech:

Of course, it wouldn’t be a proper political event if we did not come away with at least one meme/gif. And we present you with the flaglady — an Obama supporter, who had a flag stuck in her hair as Obama delivered his victory speech.

(Michael Hayes/Buzzfeed)

Are you sure you want to share that?

As previously mentioned “I Voted” was a frequently tweeted phrase yesterday. Often times, the tweets containing these words would accompany a photo. Sometimes this would be a photo of an “I Voted” sticker, like this:

John Vandermark wears his ” I Voted” sticker after voting on primary day as Michigan heads to the polls at Royal Oak Farmers Market on February 28, 2012 in Royal Oak, Michigan. Voters head to the polls as the Republican party continues the process of deciding who will be their general election candidate against President Barack Obama. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

However, a new trend emerged across variety of social media platforms as voters began to share photos snapped of their ballots and voting machines inside of the voting booth.

As the Instagram, Twitter and Facebook became flooded by photos of ballots, Gizmodo reported that taking such photos is actually a misdemeanor in number of states, including New York. In Texas, recording devices are prohibited within 100 feet of a voting station.

So next time you want to tell everyone that you voted, snapping a photo of that “I Voted” sticker might be safer bet.

From the polls to the president: which presidential polls were the most accurate

Wednesday, November 7, 2012 by:summer.ballentine@chron.com (Summer Ballentine)
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Even as the first returns started rolling in, it was a tight presidential race to call. And with an election this close, polling projections for the national popular vote were tightly grouped, varying by five percentage points or less.

In the end, President Barack Obama won the popular vote with 50.4 percent to Republican candidate Mitt Romney’s 48. 1 percent as of 4 p.m. Wednesday. Less than 3 million votes made the difference.

IBD/TIPP, ABC News/Washington Post, Pew Research and National Journal all projected Obama’s popular vote within 1 percent. Each is ranked next based on how accurately it placed Romney.

Most polls underestimated Obama’s victory. FOX News was the worst with a -4.4 difference, although it also underestimated Romney’s strength.

Nate Silver, who accurately predicted 49 of 50 states in 2008, had them all running in circles. This year his mathematical models based on a conglomerate of polls won him a perfect score despite ongoing criticisms of his methodology.

Here’s a breakdown of which polls were dead on and which ones were duds:

1. IBD/TIPP, Nov. 3-5

Prediction: Obama +1. Obama 50, Romney 49

Off by: Obama -.4, Romney +.9

2T. ABC News/Washington Post, Nov. 1-4

Prediction: Obama +3. Obama 50, Romney 47

Off by: Obama -.4, Romney -1.1

2T. Pew Research, Oct. 31-Nov. 3

Prediction: Obama +3. Obama 50, Romney 47

Off by: Obama -.4, Romney -1.1

4. National Journal, Oct. 25-28

Prediction: Obama +5. Obama 50, Romney 45

Off by: Obama -.4, Romney -3.1

5. CNN/Opinion Research, Nov. 2-4

Prediction: Tie. Obama 49, Romney 49

Off by: Obama -1.4, Romney +.9

6. Gallup, Nov. 1-4

Prediction: Romney +1. Obama 49, Romney 50

Off by: Obama -1.4, Romney +1.9

7T. Monmouth/SurveyUSA/Braun. Nov. 1-4

Prediction: Tie. Obama 48, Romney 48

Off by: Obama -2.4, Romney -.1

7T. Rasmussen Reports, Nov. 3-5

Prediction: Romney +1. Obama 48, Romney 49

Off by: Obama -2.4, Romney +.9

9T. CBS News/New York Times, Oct. 25-28

Prediction: Obama +1. Obama 48, Romney 47

Off by: Obama -2.4, Romney -1.1

9T. NBC News/Wall Street Journal, Nov. 1-3

Prediction: Obama +1. Obama 48, Romney 47

Off by: Obama -2.4, Romney -1.1

10. Politico/GWU/Battleground, Nov. 4-5

Prediction: Tie. Obama 47, Romney 47

Off by:  Obama -3.4, Romney -1.1

11. FOX News, Oct. 28-30

Prediction: Tie. Obama 46, Romney 46

Off by: Obama -4.4, Romney -2.1

Six key takeaways from Tuesday’s election results

Wednesday, November 7, 2012 by:richard.dunham@chron.com (Richard Dunham)
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The voting is over. The finger-pointing has begun.

After covering every presidential election since 1980, I find such exercises rarely useful, if sometimes cathartic.

Rather than casting blame, let’s do something productive. Here are six take-aways I gleaned from the 2012 election results:

1. There truly is a demographic tidal wave sweeping over the nation, and Republicans ignore it at their own peril.

The percentage of the electorate made up of non-Hispanic Caucasians (“white voters”) has dropped from 91 percent to 72 percent since the Seventies. Election strategies must keep up with the times.

As we all know, the Latino population is the fast-growing bloc in the United States, and Hispanics favored President Obama by more than 40 percentage points over Republican Mitt Romney. The Latino vote tipped the balance of power in Florida, Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico, and played gave the Democratic incumbent a cushion in Pennsylvania, Virginia and Iowa. If Republicans don’t make inroads — and fast — Arizona, Tennessee and then Texas will become competitive at the presidential level.

Other demographic warning signs for the GOP:

– Asian Americans favored Obama by 3-to-1. As recently as 2000, they were a Republican-leaning swing voter bloc.

– The percentage of the electorate that identified as white evangelical Protestant (a strong GOP bloc) is declining. In Virginia, their smaller share of the electorate accounted for Romney’s margin of defeat. Romney won 78 percent of the white fundamentalist vote and still couldn’t claim a majority in Virginia or Florida (and just barely in North Carolina).

– The urban/rural split. Obama carried urban America by about the same percentage that Romney won in rural areas. Urban areas are growing. Rural areas are shrinking. Bad for Republicans.

– The generation gap. Younger voters are the most Democratic age group. The oldest voters are the most Republican. Today’s young voters will be picking presidents for decades after today’s seniors have died. Republicans must manage to persuade more under-30 voters to abandon the Democratic Party.

– The gender gap. Obama’s support among women was almost the same from 2008 to 2012, while male voters shifted toward the GOP by double digits. Republicans must figure out ways to improve their appeal to mothers, working women and highly educated women. They can’t stand pat as the party of old white men.

2. The polls were right.

This is a big deal.

First, there is no liberal polling conspiracy, despite what you may have heard on talk radio. (It’s a ridiculous notion, anyway, because Fox News’ own polling was in line with the supposedly biased polls.)

The most important point is that almost every major pollster pinpointed the presidential results within the margin of error — despite the difficulty of getting a representative sample of American voters in this era of mobile communications and reduced landline usage.

What’s more, almost every polling organization effectively created a “likely voter” screen, which predicted the voting outcome (vs. the feelings of non-voters, most of whom would have voted for Obama).

3. There is a myth of the undecided voter.

You saw way too many stories on television about undecided voters. During every debate, we had televised focused groups of undecided voters.

Well, that whole thing is a myth.

There is no such thing as an “undecided voter.”

People call themselves “undecided” as a snapshot in time along their journey toward a candidate. After the Democratic convention, for example, undecided voters tended to be people who were disappointed in President Obama but unconvinced by Mitt Romney. After the first debate, many of them became Romney supporters — and undecided voters were former Obama supporters who were spooked by the first debate performance. Many of them ended up as Obama voters.

What we really should be analyzing are “persuadable voters.” This is the 10 to 15 percent of the electorate that is not locked in to supporting one party or the other. But let’s drop this “undecided” charade.

4. Independent voters are no longer the key “swing” group.

Let’s face it: Most of the time, most people who call themselves Independents end up voting Republican. (2008 was an exception that proves the rule.)

Mitt Romney won a narrow majority among Independents. He also lost a number of swing states where he carried the Independent vote.

At this point in our political history, we need to develop a “shopping cart” of swing blocs. We should look at moderates, which tend to lean Democratic (56 percent for Obama in 2012).

For a Democrat to win the presidency in this decade, they’ll probably need to win 55 percent of moderates.

For a Republican to win the presidency in the foreseeable future, they’ll probably need to win 55 percent of Independents.

Let’s stop pretending that a simple majority of Independents means anything.

5. Suburbs can’t be analyzed as a single unit.

Mitt Romney carried America’s suburbs, 51 percent to 47 percent.

So what?

It doesn’t tell us anything about who will win key swing states.

The reason: Suburban voters act very differently based on the region of the nation.

In the Mid-Atlantic and West Coast states, suburban voters leaned heavily Democratic. They helped bury Romney in Pennsylvania (Philadelphia) and Virginia (Washington, D.C.). Other suburban Democratic bastions: San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York.

In the South, suburbanites tend to be heavily Republican. Think Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Atlanta, Charlotte and South Carolina.

In western swing states, they tend to be swing voters. Look at Denver, Las Vegas and Phoenix.

Bottom line: Any analysis of suburban voters must take into account the region you’re studying.

6. We have to rethink the way we contemplate the role of money in politics.

Campaign spending in 2012 is expected to top $6 billion. For what? A status-quo election.

The biggest success story of the year may have been Karl Rove’s ability to separate conservative billionaires from many millions of their dollars.

All the money that washed through the U.S. political system — including hundreds of millions of dollars in secret, undisclosed donations — had very little effect on the final results.

A more effective way of influencing the election would have been the old-fashioned method: paying voters cash for their votes.

You have to give a special thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court, which opened the floodgates with its 2010 Citizens United decision that equated unlimited political money with free speech. SCOTUS has become the second-most important federal institution — next to the Federal Reserve — in aiding our nation’s economic recovery. After all, the justices helped bail out the economies of Florida, Nevada, Ohio, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Michigan, North Carolina, California and many, many other recession-ravaged states.

Oyez, oyez. (Or is it oy vey, oy vey?)

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