September 18, 2012

A Final Look at the Convention Bounce: It’s All Obama

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It’s now been nearly two weeks since the end of the conventions, and before long the polls will start to show the effects of the secret Romney video. So this seems like a pretty good time to check in on Sam Wang for a final look at what kind of convention bounce we saw. And luckily for me, Sam fixed a technical glitch in his polling feeds today, providing us with a corrected look at his estimated electoral vote count. Here it is:

Bottom line: The net effect of both the RNC and DNC appears to be a bounce from about 300 electoral votes for Obama to 322 electoral votes. That’s a pretty big bounce.

By the way: Some of you might be wondering why I usually use Sam Wang’s forecast rather than all the others that are out there. The reason is that back in 2008 I ran a pool to predict the results of the election, and Sam was one of the co-winners. For now, then, I consider him the official election forecaster for this blog. This is, needless to say, a tenuous position, and requires him to predict really well this year too if he wants to hold on to this prestigious post. But that’s life in the free market, no? Red in tooth and claw and all that. For now, though, he’s top dog.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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