Tag: bias

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Accountability folly ideological culture media and media people moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies too much government

Almost Right

Politifact, Snopes, facts, fact check, bias, propaganda, lie, truth, interpretation, analysis

The popular fact-checking sites, such as Snopes and Politifact, cannot stick to the facts.

When Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky) predicted that a recent repeal of “three regulations” would save “hundreds of millions of dollars and tens of thousands of jobs,” Politifact rated the statement “Half True,” on the grounds that, well, not all experts agreed.

In 2015, objecting to a reported low figure for the Clinton Foundation’s grants to other groups that actually did things, PunditFact gave a “Mostly false” judgment despite admitting that the statement was “technically true.”

NBC engaged in a similar move, admitting to the technical truth of a claim about unemployment, but said it was “extremely misleading.”

Snopes found reasons to tag a “Mixture” rating onto the simple fact that Omar Mateen, the Pulse nightclub mass murderer, was a registered Democrat. He was*.

The funny thing is, these sites are “Almost Right”: fact checking isn’t enough.

Facts can be true, but deceptively used.

Unfortunately, these “fact-checkers” repeatedly fail to clearly distinguish matters of fact from matters of context. They could offer a double analysis and double rating: True/False for the factual; Clear/Caution, to cover interpretations and implications.

Why don’t they?

Perhaps for the same reason the CIA is planning a Meme Warfare Center — to provide a “full spectrum meme generation, analysis, quality control/assurance and organic transmission apparatus”** — instead of a Center for the Analysis of Popular Argument: the idea is not to increase knowledge.

It is to maximize influence.

Which leaves us on meme patrol, ever vigilant.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* What Snopes did was speculate that the terrorist perhaps changed his mind after initially registering a decade before the shooting.

** I wrote more about this in Sunday’s Townhall column (from which this Common Sense foray is adapted; see relevant links here), and first broached the goofy/ominous CIA proposal with Saturday’s featured video.

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Accountability media and media people national politics & policies political challengers

The Crooked News Network

HIllary Clinton, CNN, bomb, bombing, bias, illustration

A recent Gallup poll found Americans’ trust in their news media has fallen to the lowest level ever recorded. Only 32 percent expressed either “a great deal” or “a fair amount” of confidence in the press “to report the news fully, accurately and fairly.”

Trust among Republican is down to a mere 14 percent.

Sad statistics . . . but not surprising. Remember Rathergate in 2004?

Over the weekend, CNN earned its “Clinton News Network” nickname by blatantly misreporting Hillary Clinton’s and Donald Trump’s responses to the terrorist bombings in New York and New Jersey.

Both candidates initially called these incidents “bombings” — even before government officials had definitively confirmed the obvious. But in its reports, CNN edited out Mrs. Clinton’s remarks to that effect and ran with the angle that Mr. Trump was irresponsible for saying . . . well, what she said.

“The press has since largely slammed Trump for referring to the explosion as a ‘bomb’ too soon,” reported The Hill, adding that major media outlets have somehow “also failed to mention Clinton in focusing on Trump.”

Some blame the public’s low esteem for the media on Mr. Trump’s scathing attacks. The Donald dubbed CNN, for example, “disgusting and disgraceful” over this latest controversy.

He’s right.

Enough. CNN’s desire to propagate stories favorable to one candidate and unfavorable to another has spiraled down to the withholding of relevant information, for no better reason than to mislead the public. As a news junkie with an itchy trigger finger on my TV remote, I’ve stopped clicking over to CNN.

Now, Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown will be even more so.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Accountability ideological culture national politics & policies responsibility

Pollsters Are Political Players, Too

polling, polls, pollster, democracy, influence, elections, Common Sense, Bias, illustration

Is Trump electable? Can Carson nab the GOP presidential nomination? Does Rand Paul have a chance? Is Chris Christie finished — before a voter has voted?

It’s still pre-primary season, and it is worth remembering that — even as we judge candidates on  various capacities, including their ability to “handle the media” — one arm of the media possesses potentially the most influence along with too little scrutiny: the pollsters.

They are allegedly the most scientific and objective folks in the industry, with closest ties to actual intellectual disciplines, statistics and political science.

But they are also, willy nilly, political players, not just observers.

Though tasked to provide data on public opinion about matters of importance, they also influence public opinion in several crucial ways:

  1. By how they phrase poll questions. This is an art, and can be extremely propagandistic. Pollsters can often “get” the information they want — if they want something in particular, perhaps for partisan reasons — by wording those questions carefully.
  2. By ordering questions in particular ways. The first question sets up a context. The second is then interpreted by those polled in that context. Pollsters can nudge people to reverse their usual opinions by providing an alien context.
  3. By presenting the results, skewed or not. People are influenced by others. Voting for candidates, especially, partly depends on second-guessing other voters. Few people wish to vote for someone who “cannot win.” Therefore, a published poll result that shows popularity can increase popularity, in a sort of multiplier effect.

Polls and poll results can provide useful information. Hey, I’ve used professional pollsters. But we all have to be cautious . . . remembering that voting one’s conscience is a high-percentage play.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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ideological culture

The Left Discriminates

The political “left” dominates a number of institutions, including, most famously, Hollywood entertainment and up-market journalism. But perhaps even more striking is the heavily “liberal-progressive” bent observed in many academic fields, particularly in the humanities and social sciences, far in excess of the leftist percentage in America at large.

And this certainly deserves an explanation.

Could it be the result of bias and discrimination?

It’s long been fun to listen to academics defend their heavily leftist cut of the higher ed pie using arguments that have nothing to do with bias. Why “fun”? Because similar arguments trotted out in other fields receive nothing but scorn from academics.

Now there’s a study showing that social psychologists, at least, self-admit to an anti-conservative bias in grading papers, awarding grant proposals, inviting symposium speakers, and accepting job applicants. And here’s the kicker: “The more liberal the survey respondents identified as being, the more likely they were to say that they would discriminate.”

Those who are already sharpening their ad hominem retorts should note that the study was not conducted by folks on “the right.” Co-author Yoel Inbar described himself to Inside Higher Ed as “‘a pretty doctrinaire liberal,’ who volunteered for the Obama campaign in 2008 and who votes Democrat. His co-author, Joris Lammers of Tilburg, is to Inbar’s left, he said.”

The most interesting aspect of bias uncovered in the study, however, is that interviewed academics estimated that their colleagues were twice as likely as themselves to discriminate on ideological grounds.

The “other guy” is always worse than oneself.

Which is where bias and prejudice begin, perhaps.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment ideological culture

Swinging a Dead Cat

Americans too often forget how ugly politics used to be. In the 19th century, “tarring and feathering” was just one terrible way among many of “making a point.” Drenching somebody in hot tar is painful; putting feathers on that someone and sending them running was humiliating, as well.

And a sign of horrid cruelty.

Politics, which (we should remind ourselves) is how we publicly decide who gets to use the awesome and awful powers of the state (itself known to be the cruelest of cold monsters), can’t help but conjure up hate and violence. We must remain vigilant against that tendency.

So the recent killing of a Democratic campaign manager’s cat — actually, his child’s pet — and its desecration with the word “liberal” marked on it, has a context.

But that context is no excuse. It’s an incredibly sick, deranged, hateful act. We should all hope justice prevails.

The campaign manager responded reasonably, condemning whoever did it without casting blame about blindly. Too bad I can’t say that about the comments to the article on ThinkProgress.org. Many commenters there blame all “conservatives,” right-wingers, Rush Limbaugh, et al.

Like racist rhetoric, this paints blame with a wide brush, holding a whole group of people responsible for what one person in that group does. Shameful. But it’s even a bit worse in this case, since the guilty person has not been caught, so we don’t even know who did it or whether that person was actually a “conservative.”

Isn’t it time to get past blind hatred of the “they”?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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term limits

Too Much Trouble?

Can you believe it? A new political argument . . . well, not really.

Over at the Michigan Students for a Free Economy website, Isaac Morehouse reports on what he calls the “most honest anti-term-limits argument ever.” It’s too much work! Not only politicians, but lobbyists and reporters, too, find it difficult getting to know all the new guys.

Thanks largely to term limits, there are 46 new lawmakers coming into Lansing. According to Michigan political reporter Tim Skubrick, “It’s a very disconcerting feeling to know that you need to get news out of these folks, but . . . if you got in the elevator with any one of them you’d have no idea if they were lawmakers, staffers or capitol tourists.”

Sure. How much easier making the same old deals with the same old crowd!

Foes of term limits often claim that lobbyists “love” term limits, because lobbyists can presumably leverage their knowledge of issues to more easily control ignorant freshmen legislators. But term limits are a hassle for lobbyists, too. All those new people to befriend, and try to convince that your special interest is identical to the public interest.

Morehouse sees through the arguments. He says that as a citizen concerned about his wallet, he can do without politicians who “know their way around” the capitol and are experts in politics as usual.

Most people can agree — except those who absolutely hate updating the rolodex.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.