Word: wrongful
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Suspense (Thurs. 9 p.m., CBS). Sorry, Wrong Number, again...
...news went around the world with the speed of light: the owlish little man in spectacles-not the fellow with the mustache-had won the U.S. election after all. And the experts, including especially all the American experts with their wonderful, scientific slide-rule assurance, had been grievously, laughably wrong. The world, cheering for a miracle of any kind, loosed a 'delighted, friendly roar...
Never had the U.S. press been so wrong on the outcome of a national election. Partisanship was not the answer, though 65% of the press had supported Tom Dewey (see below). Many of the newspapers, columnists and newsmen who had supported President Truman had been just as wrong. The press had compiled an anthology of error that it should not forget. Some of the dreadful examples...
...Wrong Can You Get? But the humiliating fact that the press had been completely wrong on the outcome of the election could not be laughed off. Furthermore, the blame could not be brushed off on the pollsters (see below), politicos and pundits, or even on the stupidity or slyness of the voters. The blame, as a few top editors sadly admitted in their painful soul-searching after election day, lay primarily on the press itself...
Even when they were confronted by the actual news that proved them wrong, some editors refused to believe it, or report it. The morning after the election, the face of the U.S. press wore a ludicrous look. The Republican Detroit Free Press, for example, put its final edition to bed at 3:30 a.m. At breakfast its readers heard on their radios that Truman was winning -and on Malcolm W. Bingay's editorial page, they read about the "Lame Duck President ... a game little fellow . . . who went down fighting with all he had . . ." Flanking the editorial were Drew Pearson...