Political Pundits

   As election time rolls around, the political world starts moving as fast as New York during rush hour, which occurs every four years. People of all ages take to the media to share who they're voting for, why, and why you should vote for them too, many of these individuals are known as political pundits. A political pundit is a person who gives opinions in an authoritative manner, usually through the mass media. Whether we like it or not, these individuals weigh heavily on our views of the candidates running. However, this is becoming more and more frightening as these pundits are seemingly pulling their opinions out of thin air.

    Political pundits have been around since World War II as Edward R. Murrow "rose to prominence as the lead of CBS News London-based coverage [...]" and spoke out on his "See It Now" television program. Jack Paar, the original host of NBC's The Tonight Show, also rose to fame speaking out and hosting presidential guests. Each of these political pundits could weigh heavily on their viewers and place opinions on the politicians running in the race. Most of these pundits are retired politicians or political advisors; in fact, you may even see them, on shows like CNN, labeled as "CNN political commentators." While the "art" of voting and predicting a winner of the election may seem like a timely and thought-out decision, their prognostications have seemed to be of a whim in recent years.

    Looking back on the election in 2016, political pundits proved to be utterly wrong in their assumptions on who would claim the presidency that year. For months "longtime political researchers and experts, including Nate Silver of the closely watched site FiveThirtyEight, predicted that Clinton had numerous broad paths to the 270 electoral college votes that would place her in the White House, while Trump had only a few narrow ones." That year almost everyone had Hillary Clinton down as the winner, and some media outlets even went as far as releasing magazines and statements, claiming Trump as a "Loser" and that he was "[...] going to get his ass kicked." These beliefs stemmed from the thought that Trump was such an outrageous candidate that "true" Republicans would either vote Democrat or not vote at all, but boy were they wrong. 

    While many pundits may appear to lean a certain way already, they are truly supposed to use "predictive journalism" and decipher what the possible outcome may be for the upcoming election. However, no one can truly predict the future, so predictive journalism is just a big hoax. One journalist will come out with their "prediction" for the year, which is almost always just a glorified opinion, and everyone will hop on that train of thought with them. When it comes to political pundits, they are used to being wrong but never want to be wrong alone. This leads one to believe that most of their claims are not as well thought out as one may think, as they may, in fact, just be stating their prediction based on the majority vote. While you may believe that these political pundits would be well educated, knowledgeable retired politicians, virtually anyone can be one if they want to.

    In an age where social media rules our lives, political pundits can be found on virtually any platform. Bloggers, vloggers, and influencers have taken to their profiles to put their opinions on display. Political pundits are even found on the hit new app, TikTok. Most of the stars found on this app are not even of the age to vote; they have "quietly [become] a political force." Using such an influential application to today's youth is a great way to entice political conversations among the next generation. There are even specific feeds, known as hype houses, that encourage this sort of discussion, this is where the next political pundits are born. While it may seem scary that kids who aren't even old enough to vote are making predictions and influencing voters on who to vote for, this involvement in political media may finally spark a younger group's involvement.

    Using influential platforms ads a new twist to the political pundit, but practiced predictive politicians will always reign supreme. Whether their predictions are researched or pulled out of thin air, these pundits play a considerable role in affection who voters will choose in an upcoming election. It appears that there truly is no rhyme or reason to the predictions placed by these political gurus and may even be just a bandwagon guess to refrain from standing alone. Political pundits make predictions on who they think will reign supreme in an election and affect how  voters lean. Whether you're a retired politician or a 12-year-old with a smartphone, if you have a voice, you can be a political pundit.