With the presidential election returns on Tuesday remaining close well past 10:00 p.m. Eastern, a few figures in the major broadcast networks began to take stock of the situation (with some not taking it as well as others) with NBC’s Tom Brokaw and Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd admitting that we may have “totally underestimated” and looked down on “rural America.”
Brokaw admitted not long after the 10:00 p.m. Eastern projections and poll closings, the former NBC Nightly News anchor admitted to those around the set that “[w]hat has been totally underestimated by those of us in the so-called press establishment and the people who have been looking at this is the depth of the anger.”
He further ruled that the media didn’t fully consider “[t]he depth” of how much people “want change” regardless of whether or not they “have to pull a pin on a grenade and roll it across the country, whatever it takes, we want change and we want big change.”
Todd agreed and responded with much the same sentiment, suggesting that perhaps “the biggest critique on the establishment, and I throw the media in here as well as the two political parties, we have overlooked rural America a bit too much.”
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Referring directly to “rural America,” Todd opined: “[W]e've forgotten about rural America and rural America is basically saying, um hello? They are screaming at us to say, stop overlooking us, you know, we're not ready to have just 21st century fly by us.”
To further bolster their confessionals, they received a seal of approval from The Blaze founder, conservative talk radio host, and Never Trump supporter Glenn Beck, who ruled that Todd in particular “was exactly right on the money” in that [emphasis mine]:
We have not listened to — I think Chuck said the heartland. I don't think we've listened to each other at all and I know I've been at fault in this. In the last couple of years, I've really tried to analyze myself and analyze what I've done and what I do and we don't listen to each other and we don't trust each other and, you know, the media, that includes me, that unfortunately, Tom, includes you. I can't believe it would, but it does, that 34 percent of Americans trust any of our voices and that is because they view us as speaking down to them, pontificating, telling them and not listening to them, declaring who they are.
The relevant portions of the transcript from NBC’s Decision Night in America on November 8 can be found below.
NBC’s Decision Night in America
November 8, 2016
10:10 p.m. Eastern
TOM BROKAW: What has been totally underestimated by those of us in the so-called press establishment and the people who have been looking at this is the depth of the anger. The depth of the people saying I want to change, I don't care if I have to pull a pin on a grenade and roll it across the country, whatever it takes, we want change and we want big change.
CHUCK TODD: But the other thing we did, and I have to say this is that the biggest critique on the establishment, and I throw the media in here as well as the two political parties, we have overlooked rural America a bit too much
BROKAW: Yeah.
TODD: And I think in hindsight, you know, everybody's been talking about the changing demographics of America and the changing face of America. That's all true, but we've forgotten about rural America and rural America is basically saying, um hello? They are screaming at us to say, stop overlooking us, you know, we're not ready to have just 21st century fly by us.
SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: But some of this has been hiding in plain sight. Donald Trump came in with a message that was very distinct and very different from Republican orthodoxy, from Republican — the way that Republicans have always run as free traders and they love free trade agreements and if his message is resonating, this is where it was going to resonate. If it was going to make a difference, this is exactly where. So, in some ways, ultimately it's not surprising that now we're focused like a laser on this section of the country.
(....)
10:11 p.m. Eastern
GLENN BECK: You know, I think what Chuck just said was exactly right on the money. We have not listened to — I think Chuck said the heartland. I don't think we've listened to each other at all and I know I've been at fault in this. In the last couple of years, I've really tried to analyze myself and analyze what I've done and what I do and we don't listen to each other and we don't trust each other and, you know, the media, that includes me, that unfortunately, Tom, includes you. I can't believe it would, but it does, that 34 percent of Americans trust any of our voices and that is because they view us as speaking down to them, pontificating, telling them and not listening to them, declaring who they are.
