What is the purpose of an endorsement?
Is it to tell which party will win, or which party will be best for Ontario?
If it is the former, then the mainstream media was indeed wrong. If it is the latter, then the verdict will only be known in 4 years time.
In hindsight, we can say that any mainstream media that supported the Liberals in 2011 or 2007 made the wrong call, because the province is much worse due to their rule. But in this election, the judgement on their endorsement can only be made in the future.
I agree with you, good point. An endorsement is which party you think is best. BUT, I will also say that it shows a disconnect between the media and the general population when that 75% of the media endorsed (newspaper and it sounds radio hosts as well) was so roundly rejected by the citizens. PC were the only of the major parties (including the Green's who were not even in the debate) who lost votes. They went from 35 to 31%, that's losing about 12% of their 2011 base. It shows that things like gas plants where the PC (along with the media) beat everybody on the head about that it was the FIRST question of a debate it turned out not to be as important as everybody (pushed by the PC) thought it was. I found twitter actually to be a much more realistic feel how regular voters felt was important much more than what the media/ talk radio did.
I talked about some losers, I guess I should talk about winners some. The Star, who seemed to be much more on the ball in their media reflection of the election than any other, it also helps that they partnered with Forum to do polls of the election and Forum did pretty well in prediction, completely different from Bell media, (CP24, CTV, CFRB) who partnered with Ipsos and were way off the mark the entire election. Speaking of polls, Ekos probably got it closest in the polls, while Forum did well with the margin of Liberal victory. Classic telephone eligible/decided formula worked best (not to brag but as I predicted lol)
Other winners I have to give a big thumbs up to the Liberal party, not just during the election but right from the beginning of their third term. Normally parties wait until it too late, but they did the transfer of power from McGuinty to Wynne early. Wynne was able to establish herself from McGuinty during that time (something Eves wasn't able to do) McGuinty got out of the spotlight and let the party re-brand itself with somebody he seems very different (visually and personality) from Dalton. Just look at the difference between the team work and sacrifices that the liberal side did compared to the selfishness and ego of somebody like Ford who's dragging his party down and his party is too scared to cut ties with him fully.
The other winner is Wynne herself, even though her debate wasn't great her campaign and her entire premiership was smartly done. From working closely with the NDP and gaining the trust of many soft NDP voters and then putting the blame on Horwath for calling the election. Her campaign team also did a great job in making it a referendum on Hudak and conservatism than on them. Now Hudak and Horwath certainly helped her accomplish that but they give her that opening and she took it. Other winners I would include Unions, they worked together as one and made their anti-Hudak case much better than Hudak people could in demonizing them.