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9/11 and birther misperceptions compared
[Update (6/30/10): Serious questions have been raised about the validity of Research 2000’s polls. The results below should thus be viewed as potentially suspect until the matter is resolved.] Update (7/18/11): Given that questions about the validity of Research 2000’s polling remain unresolved, I’ve created a new version of the chart that appears in this
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Grassley joins Senate visual aid HOF
It was ridiculous when Senator Orrin Hatch read a quotation from Disney’s Robin Hood to oppose the Obama budget back in April: But Chuck Grassley’s disquisition on the battle between “Sir Tax-a-lot” and “the massive, fire-breathing Debt and Deficit Dragon” — complete with giant cartoon-style posters from Kinko’s — might be the most inane use
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The statistical illiteracy of journalists (cont.)
Yet another example of the statistical illiteracy of journalists in general and sports journalists in particular — the false claim in today’s New York Times that a champion player of the card- and dice-based baseball game APBA has “a knack for rolling doubles”: The 16-year-old-Wells, a fast-talking native of Wyomissing, Pa., who has a summer
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Pearlstein smears GOP as “political terrorists”
Washington Post columnist Steven Pearlstein is smearing Republicans as “political terrorists,” writing that “they’ve given up any pretense of being the loyal opposition” (via TPM): As a columnist who regularly dishes out sharp criticism, I try not to question the motives of people with whom I don’t agree. Today, I’m going to step over that
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Pew: Republicans want more birther coverage
Another day, another disturbing birther poll. A new Pew poll finds that 79% of Americans have heard at least a little about the false claim that Barack Obama was not born in this country. Within this group, a staggering 39% of Republicans (as well as 30% of independents and 14% of Democrats) think there has
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Health care/birther misinformation playbook
Between the birthers who promote the myth that the President was not born in this country and opponents of health care reform who falsely claim the legislation would promote euthanasia, there is a lot of misinformation floating around about the Obama administration. That shouldn’t be surprising, though; Obama’s honeymoon is ending. What is striking is
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Gelman and Sides on 2008 election narratives
The political scientists Andrew Gelman and John Sides have published a must-read Boston Review article that fact-checks various popular claims about the results of the 2008 election. Send it to your favorite political journalist!
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Radio interview on White House v. Drudge
For those who are interested, I’ll be talking about the White House response to the misleading Drudge health care video today around 3:10 PM EST on KUOW (NPR) Seattle’s The Conversation with Ross Reynolds.
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VA poll backs Kos result on Obama birth
[Update (6/30/10): Serious questions have been raised about the validity of Research 2000’s polls. The results discussed below should thus be viewed as potentially suspect until the matter is resolved.] Tom Jensen of Public Policy Polling just reported on Twitter that a new poll his firm conducted finds that only 32% of Virginia Republicans think
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Creating unidimensionality in Congress
Matthew Yglesias and Paul Krugman comment on the finding by political scientists Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal that Congress is essentially one-dimensional in the post-civil rights era — here’s Yglesias: We often think of a simple 2-dimensional models like the Nolan Chart in which people should be sorted along both a left-right axis about economics,