The Republican Party of Virginia – RPV has finally chosen its nominee for Lieutenant Governor, Winsome Sears Wins Republican LG Nomination – Republican Party of Virginia. This lady deserves our congratulations for winning a hard fought race, as do Glenn Youngkin Wins VA GOP Gubernatorial Nomination – Republican Party of Virginia and Jason Miyares Wins Attorney General Nomination – Republican Party of Virginia.

Unfortunately, some in the news media “jumped the gun” and published Winsome Sears victory before the vote count had been completed and the party had announced a winner. Hence, the title of this post.

What happened? Around noon yesterday, I got an email from a friend with a message that did not make sense. He said Winsome Sears had won after Tim Hugo had been dropped in round 3 even though he had more votes than two other candidates. Since that did not make sense, I went to the Republican Party of Virginia – RPV‘s Live Results Spreadsheet (not posted anymore) to check for myself. The count was still in progress. Apparently, someone on fumble fingered and dropped Tim Hugo instead of the candidate with the lowest vote count, but that mistake had been corrected. Never, a search showed some outlets already publishing Winsome Sear’s victory.

Lesson learned? Since the news media cannot be trusted to use a little discretion, it is not a good idea to post a live results spreadsheet. Instead, the results of each round should be immediately posted AFTER those results have been validated.

Is it unusual for the news media to publish erroneous reports? No. Think about that phrase, “jump the gun.” Here is the first example from a description of this idiom.

The media jumped the gun and gave out their verdict of the scandal even before the investigation was complete.

jump the gun meaning, definition, examples, origin, synonyms (theidioms.com)

The folks in the news media are just like the rest of us, biased, careless, up against deadlines, and not as honest as they need to be. Like the rest of us, the folks in the news media are too willing to suffice their integrity for the sake of things that don’t matter very much.

When we see news media outlets that constantly favor one party over the other, that use unnamed sources to make partisan accusations, that don’t carefully document the sources they do have, or that strive to make us fearful instead of calm, then we need to make use one of their competitors to get our news.

What did the results look like? Check out Republicans Pick Winsome Sears for Lieutenant Governor, Completing Their Ticket for 2021 Election – The Virginia Star