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Andrew Sullivan: Biased processing in action!
Here’s Daniel Okrent’s parting cheap shot at Paul Krugman: Op-Ed columnist Paul Krugman has the disturbing habit of shaping, slicing and selectively citing numbers in a fashion that pleases his acolytes but leaves him open to substantive assaults. Maureen Dowd was still writing that Alberto R. Gonzales “called the Geneva Conventions ‘quaint’ ” nearly two
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What are Ron Wyden and Max Baucus talking about?
I’ve written before about how the alternative minimum tax needs to be fixed before it explodes into the middle class at the end of the decade — a nasty problem that the Bush administration has used to keep deficit projections down. Surprisingly enough, the administration has insisted that any fixes be “revenue-neutral”; ie lost revenue
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Google vs. the American Association of University Presses
The New York Times reports that Google Print for Libraries is being challenged by the American Association of University Presses: How long is a snippet? That is one of more than a dozen questions directed at Google Inc. this week by the executive director of the Association of American University Presses, the trade group representing
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Goo-goo watch: David Broder
More McCain fetish nonsense from David Broder, dean of the “can’t we all get along” wing of the press: The Monday night agreement to avert a showdown vote over judicial filibusters not only spared the Senate from a potentially ruinous clash, but also certified John McCain as the real leader of that body. In contrast
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McClellan disinformation watch
Via Atrios, here’s Editor & Publisher on the latest nonsense from the White House podium: At a White House press briefing Monday, Press Secretary Scott McClellan, pressed by reporters and with Afghan President Karzai in disagreement, retreated on claims that Newsweek’s retracted story on Koran abuse cost lives in Afghanistan. He also claimed that he
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The real question about the nuclear option deal
I don’t have much to add on last night’s agreement to avert the nuclear option, except to say that the fate of specific nominees is a minor concern compared with the larger issue — preventing the GOP from breaking the rules of the Senate on a party-line majority vote. Can the agreement hold back the
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Read Jim Stimson!
UNC political scientist Jim Stimson is the most distinguished analyst of public opinion in the country, and he’s written a wonderful new book for a general audience called Tides of Consent. The stereotype is that public opinion is transient and easily manipulated, but Stimson shows that its movements over time are systematic responses to the
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Polling on non-“objective” journalism
Steve Lovelady at CJR Daily reports on an Annenberg Public Policy Center poll showing the public is much more sympathetic to partisan journalism than the press is: The Annenberg poll found that the public is far more sympathetic to the idea of a partisan press than journalists are. Whereas only 16 percent of the journalists
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“World’s greatest deliberative body”
Dana Milbank joins me in mocking the nuclear option clown show: Senators love to talk about their chamber as the “world’s greatest deliberative body.” Yesterday morning, Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) used the phrase. Yesterday afternoon, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) used it. But it took Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) to show why
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The Rodney Dangerfield of the social sciences
The New York Times interactive class graphic dumps political scientists into the category “Miscellaneous social scientists,” while economists and sociologists have their own categories. Where’s the love?