Twitter roundup

From my Twitter feed (4/5-4/8) Brendan Nyhan Apr 8, 2011 at 5:55 PM
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	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan MT @kinggary "27% of communication by members of Congress is taunting, prof concludes" WaPo http://j.mp/etHP8D based on http://j.mp/ey1oxs
	27% of communication by members of Congress is taunting, professor concludes Here’s a statistic that may explain the budget impasse: A professor has concluded members spend 27 percent of their time just taunting one another.
	General Purpose Computer-Assisted Clustering and Conceptualization | Gary King Grimmer, Justin, and Gary King.  2011.  Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesWe develop a computer-assisted method for the discovery of insightful conceptualizations, in the form of cl...
	Apr 8, 2011 at 5:31 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan Awesome of Silver to share data RT @fivethirtyeight: Vote-Counting Error In WI Points to Incompetence, Not Conspiracy http://bit.ly/h5ZjJB
	Vote-Counting Error In Wisconsin Points to Incompetence, Not Conspiracy - NYTimes.com Statistical analysis of turnout trends suggests that the revised vote totals for a hotly contested judicial election are more likely to be correct than the originals.
	Apr 8, 2011 at 5:22 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan .@on_the_media cites Groseclose/Milyo study saying NPR biased http://j.mp/f9OQi8 But see my post on assumptions it makes http://j.mp/h1ECC6
	http://j.mp/f9OQi8
	The problems with the Groseclose/Milyo study of media bias - Brendan Nyhan UCLA political scientist Tim Groseclose and Missouri economist Jeff Milyo have published a study (PDF) alleging liberal media bias that is receiving a lot of attention, including a link on Drudg...
	Apr 8, 2011 at 5:04 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan MT @pewresearch: 16% of Americans believe in the "evil eye" or that certain people can cast curses or spells. http://pewrsr.ch/fCMaZC
	Daily Number: Eyed by Evil - Pew Research Center A nonpartisan fact tank that provides information on the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world through public opinion polling, social science research, reporting news, analy...
	Apr 8, 2011 at 4:16 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan .@jbplainblog on "Why Fox News Won’t Help—and Might Hurt—Republicans During The Shutdown" (TNR) http://j.mp/e5Of3c
	Why Fox News Won’t Help—and Might Hurt—Republicans During The Shutdown. | The New Republic The New Republic covers politics, culture, and the arts with a focus on the White House, foreign policy, Congress, Capitol Hill, Wikileaks, the lame duck session, literature, and more.
	Apr 8, 2011 at 12:09 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan Cognitive dissonance alert MT @daveweigel WANTED: Pundit who had same reaction to missing ballots changing result in MN ’08, WI ’11
	Apr 8, 2011 at 12:13 AM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan MT @NEJM: Too many use “invalid argument” that Medicaid coverage < no coverage at all http://bit.ly/gwEoHi (via @phlu)
	Our Flawed but Beneficial Medicaid Program — NEJM Perspective from The New England Journal of Medicine — Our Flawed but Beneficial Medicaid Program
	Apr 7, 2011 at 9:59 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan A Canadian election forecast from my friend J.F. Godbout (University of Montreal) and his colleague Éric Bélanger http://j.mp/htmCPS
	Forecasting the Canadian Election Thefollowingisaguestpostfrom
	Apr 7, 2011 at 1:54 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan UWM political scientist's take MT @tofias: Tom Holbrook on (not very) non-partisan WI Supreme Court races of 2007-11 http://bit.ly/i6CoBK
	Politics by the Numbers: The (not very) Non-Partisan WI Supreme Court Race The votes are now in for Wisconsin's "non-partisan" Supreme Court race, which featured incumbent David Prosser, a former Republican state legislator, and Assistant Attorney General JoAnne Kloppe...
	Apr 7, 2011 at 11:41 AM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan RT @GlennKesslerWP: New Fact Checker: Four Pinocchios for Nancy Pelosi http://wapo.st/eReal7
	Nancy Pelosi’s absurd math on senior citizens losing their meals - The Fact Checker - The Washington Post Fact Checker | She claimed 6 million seniors would lose their meals. It’s a stretch.
	Apr 7, 2011 at 11:37 AM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan RT @sethmnookin: VA private school closes for week when 1/2 of students, all unvaccinated, infected w/whooping cough. http://bit.ly/idoufD
	Today’s lesson: “Alternative” Virginia school closes after half of its students infected with pertussis. All of them were unvaccinated. → 12:37 pm // 6 Comments One of the most painful chapters to write in was the story of Danielle and Ralph Romaguera, whose infant daughter, Brie, died of a pertussis infection when she was less ...
	Apr 7, 2011 at 12:12 AM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan In the post-Lakoff era, even super-wonks get drawn into offering tactical advice on framing. Bizarre. http://bit.ly/dOxQWP
	Democracy Journal Wednesday, Apr 6, 2011, 11:50 AM On Tuesday morning, Republican Representative Paul Ryan released a budget plan that would slash spending over the next few decades with no increase in taxes and ...
	Apr 6, 2011 at 11:15 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan RT @ThePlumLineGS Good stuff from @adamserwer on how public opinion on Libya illustrates the "bully pulpit fallacy": http://wapo.st/fTL2mW
	Public reaction to Libya illustrates the `bully pulpit’ fallacy - The Plum Line - The Washington Post Public opinino on the war shows bully pulpit’s limitations.
	Apr 6, 2011 at 2:57 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan It had any? http://j.mp/eemEOA http://j.mp/i04tW4 MT @ezraklein 1 effect of Ryan budget: Heritage lost lot of credibility http://j.mp/h2vBuy
	Creaky foundation - Salon.com A journalism dean credits the Heritage Foundation for being what it's frequently not: Rigorous, evenhanded and scholarly.
	Spinsanity - The Heritage Foundation's dishonest "survey" A judicial nomination comes under fire -- and we all get slimed.
	Paul Ryan's Absurdly Optimistic Budget Projections Draw Widespread Ridicule 2.8% unemployment? $150 billon a year in new economic growth? Tax revenues that rise with tax cuts? All this can be yours -- and more! -- even while cutting trillions of dollars from the federal...
	Apr 6, 2011 at 2:52 PM
	BrendanNyhan Brendan Nyhan .@mattyglesias on the hacks at Heritage http://j.mp/hga8Xl For more on the quality of their work, see http://j.mp/eemEOA (Spinsanity link)
	Yglesias » Paul Ryan’s Tax Plan Based On Discredited Heritage Foundation Analysis That Forecast Bush Boom One particular laugh line from Paul Ryan’s budget proposal is his citation of the Heritage Foundation as the analytic basis for his claim that it will boost growth: A study just released by the ...
	Creaky foundation - Salon.com A journalism dean credits the Heritage Foundation for being what it's frequently not: Rigorous, evenhanded and scholarly.
	Apr 5, 2011 at 2:32 PM

Comments

[metrichead.blogspot.com]

Brendan, thanks for the Canadian election post in your feed. I was an uber-nerd in college for following Canadian politics, and even did a symposium presentation on it.

[David in Cal]

Yglesias' anlysis of the Heritage Study is flawed. First of all, he says by the end of 2009, payroll employment in the United States was back down to 2001 levels. That's only true, if one considers a million more employed people to be at "2001 levels." More importantly, if one looks year by year, one sees that employment did indeed rise sharply after the Bush tax cuts, reaching 146,047,000 in 2007. That's an increase of over 9 million jobs from 136,933,000 in 2001.

Employment plunged in 2009, perhaps due to Democratic Congressional actions and the fear of Obama/Pelosi/Read policies -- a fear that turned out to be justified.

Based on his (incorrect) analysis of one Heritage study, Yglesias deduces that everything Heritage does or has done is totally worthless and Heritage are hacks. If a missed projection is the standard, no liberal organization has credibility. Liberals have misprojected many things. E.g., the cost of Medicare was off by a factor of 10. Head Start has had virtually no lasting effect on academic performance. LBJ was going to eradicate poverty. Obama's stimulus plan was projected to prevent the unemployment rate from reaching 8%. Etc, etc. etc., as the King of Siam might say.

[metrichead.blogspot.com]

Brendan, I don't think your link about NPR bias and the Groseclose/Milyo study is working. All I'm getting is a webpage with a giant blowfish.

[bnyhan]

Hmm. There may have been a problem with the link shortening service. Here is the full URL: http://www.brendan-nyhan.com/blog/2005/12/the_problems_wi.html

[David in Cal]

I sgree that the study showing that Medicaid does more harm than good is a flawed study, especially because of selection bias. However, policy studies are in general do not meet scientific standards. For that matter, the political science studies done by Brendan and reported by him would not meet the standards used by my wife in her biostatistics studies. The political science studies have inadequate sample size to draw causal conslusions, inadequate analysis of alternative explanations, the lack of true consistency over time, etc.

I don't mean to say that political science studies are worthless. They're done as well as possible and they offer useful guides. I feel the same way about the study of Medicaid. It's a good guide, suggesting that even if Medicaid isn't really counter-productive, it provides worse medical care than we would like it to.

This quote from the NE Journal article shows the authors' bias:

If Medicaid's critics were seeking to raise its reimbursement rates and increase spending on the program, we would join their chorus.

In other words, the studies they criticize are too flawed to justify policies they disagree with, but those studies are good enough to justify policies they favor.

P.S. IMHO the comment quoted above is naive on policy grounds. Of course, Medicaid would provide better care if it had more money. However, given today's enormous deficits, increased spending on Medicaid (or any other program) must also be justified by comparing it with the cuts it would require in other programs. There's isn't enough money for the government to do every possible beneficial thing.