Twitter roundup

	Brendan Nyhan Aug 20, 2010 at 12:36pm From my Twitter feed (8/18-8/20)
	BrendanNyhan Aug 20, 2010 at 5:33am Claim that GWB is 6 points more popular than Obama in key dists. http://j.mp/9uV6x1 Not sure I believe - Obama up 7 on favorability in July
	Bush More Popular Than Obama in Key Districts? Political news, polls and buzz
	BrendanNyhan Aug 20, 2010 at 5:34am Also, even if Bush's numbers have rebounded somewhat, many people will soon be reminded (by Dems) why they didn't like him
	BrendanNyhan Aug 20, 2010 at 5:29am Howard Kurtz jumps on the bandwagon of nonsense about why Obama is not "connecting" http://j.mp/bHpXSQ (via @jamisonfoser)
	Howard Kurtz - The Obama conundrum For more than a year and a half, pundits, pontificators and soothsayers have been trying to figure out why Barack Obama hasn't been a more effective president.
	BrendanNyhan Aug 20, 2010 at 3:58am .@mattyglesias on fire on occupational licensing cartels http://j.mp/a0ifuw http://j.mp/c8P4sc http://j.mp/b9mAyF
	Matthew Yglesias » Do Straight Razors Justify Barber Licensing
	Matthew Yglesias » Licensing and Health Care
	Matthew Yglesias » Barack Obama, Barbering Deregulator
	BrendanNyhan Aug 19, 2010 at 5:35pm Kind of cool -- my post on Obama Muslim myth is on HuffPo front page above one by Katie Couric. Bring it MSM! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
	Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
	BrendanNyhan Aug 19, 2010 at 8:31am A nice take by @ezraklein on the proliferation of ad hoc narratives purporting to explain Obama's political standing http://j.mp/c0nzzW
	Ezra Klein - If only Obama had ... See if this structure seems familiar to you: Over the past two years, Barack Obama has done X. Now, his poll numbers have slipped to 44 percent. His party is slated to lose a lot of seats in the 2010...
	BrendanNyhan Aug 19, 2010 at 7:26am Added update to post on Pew poll -- there's also a new Time poll (diff. wording) showing 24% think Obama is Muslim, 47% http://bit.ly/9zWFh4
	New Pew poll: Obama Muslim myth on the rise - Brendan Nyhan The Pew Research Center released a new poll this morning updating its measure of public belief in the misperception that President Obama is a Muslim (coverage: NYT, WP, AP). The news is not good -- belief that Obama is a...
	BrendanNyhan Aug 19, 2010 at 3:34am RT @normative New depths of psychosis even for Powerline: scare quotes when AP notes the "fact" that Obama isn't Muslim http://bit.ly/b2Kr6L
	Power Line - Who Is He, Anyway? Barack Obama is a polarizing and sometimes puzzling figure. It is no shock that many Americans don't know what to...
	BrendanNyhan Aug 18, 2010 at 6:00pm Daily Telegraph also pushing the false meme that FDA advisory vote on Avastin approval = "death panel" http://j.mp/aV8kXl
	Avastin Death Panels Meme - Anatomy of a Right-Wing News Headline - Esquire Matt Drudge gets his news from irresponsible reporters like Nick Allen at the Daily Telegraph, whose story on Avastin and "death panels" has started a right-wing meme. Inside the anatomy of a conservative news headline.
	BrendanNyhan Aug 18, 2010 at 5:38pm As @jbplainblog notes, today's "legislative president" nonsense from Matt Bai is part of a pattern of ad hoc narratives http://j.mp/bs2Vrj
	Oy Bai | The New Republic The New Republic covers politics, culture, and the arts with a focus on national politics, foreign policy, Congress, Capitol Hill, the 2010 midterm elections, literature, and more.
	BrendanNyhan Aug 18, 2010 at 8:20am Another phony narrative on why Obama's messaging is his problem rather than the economy -- he's a "legislative president" http://j.mp/cKSzAn
	The New York Times > Log In

Comments

[David in Cal]

Some 35 or 40 years ago, the WSJ editorial page had a series of articles complaining about barber licensing laws. Props to Yglesias for his current series. Better late than never.

[David in Cal]

Kurtz writes: one could argue that Obama's approach is admirable, that he has resisted the urge to create scapegoats

I appreciate Brendan's reminder that, on the contrary, the Dems have used George Bush as a scapegoat and will continue to do so.

[David in Cal]

The Power Line post that Brendan calls "New depths of psychosis" does not assert that Obama is a Muslim. Their reason for putting "fact" in quotes was not to question the President's religion. Rather, it was to tweak the AP for, as they put it, having "evolved into an opinion machine."

It's sad to see Brendan quote a tiny snippet out of context and use it to falsely smear another blog. I'm guessing that he picked up this item from some other lefty blog and didn't bother to actually read the Power Line post

[bnyhan]

RT means "re-tweet," meaning that someone else wrote it and I am quoting them. And I did read the Powerline post. The tweet is accurate -- Powerline did use "fact" (with scare quotes) to describe the statement that Obama is a Christian. The criticism of the AP only makes sense if you believe Obama's religion is an opinion rather than a fact. And while we can't know the author's intent (contra David's claim), he does go on to state that "being a Muslim is one interpretation of Obama's exoticism" though it "may well be wrong."

[David in Cal]

You have a point, Brendan. You are correct that Power Line did not categorically state the Obama was not a Muslim, but rather allowed as conceivable that he might be a Muslim -- in effect implying that it was plausible.

In some abstract sense, Obama's religious belief is not quite a "fact" in the sense that "2=2=4" is a fact. It comes to us from what he says. He might be lying. We can't go into his heart and independently verify his faith.

However, because Obama doesn't do the any of the things Muslims do, such as attend Mosque service or pray to Mecca, Obama's not being a Muslim is so close to a fact that on reconsideration I agree with you that Power Line was wrong to raise the possibility that he might secretly follow the Islamic faith.

[MartyB]

"if Bush's numbers have rebounded somewhat, many people will soon be reminded (by Dems) why they didn't like him"

Do you think this is really even gonna be a factor, since Bush has been out of office for two years and many people feel that the Dems have done what what Bush did, but to an even greater degree (i.e. huge deficits etc.)?

[MartyB]

It's fine to warn against putting too much faith in any one narrative about Obama, but are they really all "nonsense" as you state above? Isn't it possible that one or more of them might be true, just impossible know or ever prove until after the fact?

It seems to me each narrative should be examined and challenged to see how well the facts fit (and not just built to fit the facts) as a possible explanation but never taken as definitive.

But your constant decrying of "narratives" is becoming a narrative itself.

[MartyB]

Rearding the HuffPo post - congrats.

I will say though that the more of the commenters over there seem pretty juvinile than here.

[MartyB]

I think you are wrong on the Powerline "fact" issue. The quotes in this case appear to be for emphasis only, since there is no indication in the post that the writer thinks Obama is a Muslim.

Contra your assertion in a later comment, I suspect the "being a Muslim is one interpretation of Obama's exoticism" comment is talking about the public's view in the poll, not the writer's own.

The most reasonable explanation - trying to avoid the much decried "mind-reading" or “psychosis” diagnosis - is poor consideration of style.

The use of quotes are only "scare” quotes if the writer's intention was inflammatory, and there appears to be no evidence in this particular post of that.

[bnyhan]

RT means "re-tweet," meaning that someone else wrote it and I am quoting them. And I did read the Powerline post. The tweet is accurate -- Powerline did use "fact" (with scare quotes) to describe the statement that Obama is a Christian. The criticism of the AP only makes sense if you believe Obama's religion is an opinion rather than a fact. And while we can't know the author's intent (contra David's claim), he does go on to state that "being a Muslim is one interpretation of Obama's exoticism" though it "may well be wrong."

[MartyB]

?? Is your re-posting the exact same comment as before directed towards my last post? If so, seems unusual since it doesn't address much of anything I wrote.

I assume that it was inadvertent.

[David in Cal]

Does Brendan maintain that it's "fact" that Obama is not Islamic? IMHO overwhelming evidence supports his not being Islamic. IMHO it's unreasonable to believe the contrary. However, Obama's religious belief is not "a truth known by actual experience or observation." So Power Line's scare quotes are appropriate.

Where I diverge from Power Line is their comment "Those who construe Obama [as Islamic] may well be wrong..." It's far too weak. It should say something like "Those who construe Obama [as Islamic] have no basis at all for their belief..."

During the campaign, there were fact-checking sites that treated any statement made by Obama as automatically factual. I would hope that we could now acknowledge that President Obama might conceivably dissemble, just as other politicians do.