Testing for Cross country heterogeneity in Growth Models
using a finite mixture approach
Marco Alfo', Giovanni Trovato and Robert J. Waldmann
We use an empirical model to test if the economic growth can be
considered exogenous in the Solovian sense. We apply multivariate
mixture model proposed by Alfo' and Trovato (2004) to the
Bernanke and Gurkaynak (2000) extension of the Solow model. We
find that the explanatory power of the Solow growth model is
enhanced, since growth rates are not statistically significantly
associated with investment rates, when cross-country heterogeneity
is considered. Moreover we find no sign of convergence to a single
equilibrium.
Friday, January 27, 2006
Thursday, January 26, 2006
Now That is Data Mining
Kevin Drum explains. Data mining is not when you handle way lots of data, data mining is when you handle data Lott's way.
Kevin Drum explains. Data mining is not when you handle way lots of data, data mining is when you handle data Lott's way.
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Glenn Reynolds discusses comments at the WAPO
I submitted a comment, but I think I missed the deadline for consideration (and besides they probably had a backlog of comments by then).
Dear Professor Reynolds
You wrote
"Glenn Reynolds: [snip] And unmoderated comments raise a risk of the kind of thing I mention above, as well as possible libel and copyright issues."
Are you familiar with the law. In this case the law makes it very clear that if people can post comments automatically, the organiser of the site is not legally liable for the comments. Thus there could be no libel of copywrite violation liability for you if you were to allow comments. Further you do not acquire such liability by deleting some comments. The law is very clear that such deletions do not make a blogger the editor of a comments section for legal purposes.
Of course this was fully discussed when Daniel Luskin threatened to sue Atrios (see
http://tinyurl.com/b45lz).
Professor Reynolds. What subject exactly do you teach ? Are you completely ignorant about the law or were you trying to pull a fast one ?
Why does Reynolds feel the need to deceive when talking about the response to a factual error.
Also it is ironic, given that Reynolds was invited by a MSM organ to help them defend themselves against angry readers and the two who showed the readers the way to get the Post's attention, that he begins his answer by blaiming "media treatment".
Sure Glenn participants in the discussion are going to be real convinced that the MSM is unfair to righties and just doesn't know it has a problem with liberal bias. Just ask Deborah Howell.
My guess is that he doesn't even notice when he distorts or appeals to the assumption that the MSM has a liberal bias.
Comments:
As much as I hate political discussions that focus on my team/your team arguments instead of the issues themselves, I have to agree that the entire point of public discussion of politics SHOULD be to develop, through dialog and sharing ideas, political and economic systems for the betterment of the nation in question.
Blogs that just rant, however, without allowing for EXCHANGE of ideas are pointless.
Plus, and perhaps more to the point... if a blog has it's mouth open but its eyes and ears shut, then its author is likely the same way. How well informed and intelligent can any such speaker be?
# posted by K. R. Robling : 11:49 PM
Now I welcome comments but there are so few to welcome. I wish that Blogger had a setting so that comments appeared up here with the post and I didn't have to pull them up by hand.
posted by rjwaldmann
Washington, D.C.: Hi, my question is for Glenn and then maybe Jane would like to comment.
Why is it that most of the high traffic right-wing blogs don't take comments, while most of the left-wing blogs do?
From my perspective, it looks like the conservatives can dish it out, but can't take it, that they are uncomfortable subjecting their ideas to scrutiny on their own Web sites.
Jeff Jarvis: Heh.
Glenn Reynolds: I think that one reason has to do with media treatment. Charles Johnson, for example -- who does have comments -- has repeatedly faced media stories about his site in which comments made by his readers are directly attributed to him, as if he had written them. I certainly worry about that sort of thing, too. I think that lefty sites expect, and get, less of that kind of mistreatment.
I've never had comments. I get about 1000 emails a day, and I don't have time to look at those, post on my blog, AND moderate comments. And unmoderated comments raise a risk of the kind of thing I mention above, as well as possible libel and copyright issues. I've actually considered bringing someone in to do that, but that seems too impersonal.
I submitted a comment, but I think I missed the deadline for consideration (and besides they probably had a backlog of comments by then).
Dear Professor Reynolds
You wrote
"Glenn Reynolds: [snip] And unmoderated comments raise a risk of the kind of thing I mention above, as well as possible libel and copyright issues."
Are you familiar with the law. In this case the law makes it very clear that if people can post comments automatically, the organiser of the site is not legally liable for the comments. Thus there could be no libel of copywrite violation liability for you if you were to allow comments. Further you do not acquire such liability by deleting some comments. The law is very clear that such deletions do not make a blogger the editor of a comments section for legal purposes.
Of course this was fully discussed when Daniel Luskin threatened to sue Atrios (see
http://tinyurl.com/b45lz).
Professor Reynolds. What subject exactly do you teach ? Are you completely ignorant about the law or were you trying to pull a fast one ?
Why does Reynolds feel the need to deceive when talking about the response to a factual error.
Also it is ironic, given that Reynolds was invited by a MSM organ to help them defend themselves against angry readers and the two who showed the readers the way to get the Post's attention, that he begins his answer by blaiming "media treatment".
Sure Glenn participants in the discussion are going to be real convinced that the MSM is unfair to righties and just doesn't know it has a problem with liberal bias. Just ask Deborah Howell.
My guess is that he doesn't even notice when he distorts or appeals to the assumption that the MSM has a liberal bias.
Comments:
As much as I hate political discussions that focus on my team/your team arguments instead of the issues themselves, I have to agree that the entire point of public discussion of politics SHOULD be to develop, through dialog and sharing ideas, political and economic systems for the betterment of the nation in question.
Blogs that just rant, however, without allowing for EXCHANGE of ideas are pointless.
Plus, and perhaps more to the point... if a blog has it's mouth open but its eyes and ears shut, then its author is likely the same way. How well informed and intelligent can any such speaker be?
# posted by K. R. Robling : 11:49 PM
Now I welcome comments but there are so few to welcome. I wish that Blogger had a setting so that comments appeared up here with the post and I didn't have to pull them up by hand.
posted by rjwaldmann
What is a Fishing Expedition ?
As has been noted everywhere, Scott McClellan said, when asked who Jack Abramoff met in the White House etc
"If you've got some specific issue that you need to bring to my attention, fine. But what we're not going to do is engage in a fishing expedition that has nothing to do with the investigation."
As has been noted at Think Progress, Mr McClellan spun himself into a loop on that one since, "This most recent explanation shows the White House has completely spun itself into knots. Whereas the White House used to refrain from comment on matters related to the leak investigation because the questions WERE related to an ongoing investigation, the White House is now arguing it won’t comment because the questions are NOT related to an ongoing investigation."
I would just like to note that he span himself into two loops. As far as I can tell "fishing expedition" is pejorative and is a synonym for "data mining" which is good.
The term is not just a term for a leisure activity, it is also a legal term of art referring to invasion of privacy and abuse of supoena power. A judge must not grant a warrent for a fishing expedition. A lawyer may not draf a reluctant witness on a fishing expedition. A fishing expedition violates a right to privacy.
The current Bush administration position is that I do not have a right to privacy when I talk to my mom on the phone, but they have a right to privacy while at work being paid by public money. I can point to the 4th amendment. They can point to the law which requires meetings with lobbyists to be open to the public but ooops.
Tomorrow we attempt to define "transparency in government".
As has been noted everywhere, Scott McClellan said, when asked who Jack Abramoff met in the White House etc
"If you've got some specific issue that you need to bring to my attention, fine. But what we're not going to do is engage in a fishing expedition that has nothing to do with the investigation."
As has been noted at Think Progress, Mr McClellan spun himself into a loop on that one since, "This most recent explanation shows the White House has completely spun itself into knots. Whereas the White House used to refrain from comment on matters related to the leak investigation because the questions WERE related to an ongoing investigation, the White House is now arguing it won’t comment because the questions are NOT related to an ongoing investigation."
I would just like to note that he span himself into two loops. As far as I can tell "fishing expedition" is pejorative and is a synonym for "data mining" which is good.
The term is not just a term for a leisure activity, it is also a legal term of art referring to invasion of privacy and abuse of supoena power. A judge must not grant a warrent for a fishing expedition. A lawyer may not draf a reluctant witness on a fishing expedition. A fishing expedition violates a right to privacy.
The current Bush administration position is that I do not have a right to privacy when I talk to my mom on the phone, but they have a right to privacy while at work being paid by public money. I can point to the 4th amendment. They can point to the law which requires meetings with lobbyists to be open to the public but ooops.
Tomorrow we attempt to define "transparency in government".
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
What is Data Mining ?
I am familiar with the phrase as a pejorative. If a researcher performs a large number of statistical tests and cherry picks the on which provides the strongest evidence for his or her hypothesis, he or she has come close to fraud. A reader informed only of the selected results can be misled. This is a particularly serious problem if readers rely on standard significance tests. Data snooping is a less severe offence against statistics. In data snooping the researcher informally looks at the data without generating test statistics. This can still create the illusion that a statistically significant pattern has been found.
The phrase is suddenly all over the papers. However, it is not used as a pejorative. It definitely is not used to mean "cherry picking". It has now been widely noticed that cherry picking can lead to false conclusions.
"Data mining" in contrast is now used to refer to mysterious information processing techniques which are very powerful, perhaps dangerously powerful. They are not described in detail but they have something to do with huge powerful computers and data sets so massive as to be incomprehensible to mere humans. Evidently the computers search through huge amounts of data looking for suspicious patters. Also the computers find a huge number of such suspicious patters.
Unfortunately people processing the ore from the data mine are not impressed
"We'd chase a number, find it's a schoolteacher with no indication they've ever been involved in international terrorism - case closed," said one former FBI official, who was aware of the program and the data it generated for the bureau. "After you get a thousand numbers and not one is turning up anything, you get some frustration."
Ah yess that sounds like the result of data mining to me. If you look through a huge amound of data concerning innocent people for suspicious you will find many cases of patters so suspicious that the probability they are do to chance is very low like one in a hundred thousand. If you check every phone number in the world, you will end up sendign harassed FBI agents to harass thousands of innocent people. I mean the math isn't complicated.
However, a 1 in a 100,000 pattern is very very impressive. Our brains are not made to understand that 1 in a 100,000 is very different from 1 in 10,000 or 1 in 10,000,000. Furthermore computers remain strange and very impressive (especially google I mean how the hell can it search so fast ?).
It seems that the new meaning of "data mining" is very close to the old meaning and, thus, about the same as "cherry picking" or, to be exact, mechanised cherry picking.
It's connotations were not pejorative a year or so ago. People have to learn the same lesson again and again.
I am familiar with the phrase as a pejorative. If a researcher performs a large number of statistical tests and cherry picks the on which provides the strongest evidence for his or her hypothesis, he or she has come close to fraud. A reader informed only of the selected results can be misled. This is a particularly serious problem if readers rely on standard significance tests. Data snooping is a less severe offence against statistics. In data snooping the researcher informally looks at the data without generating test statistics. This can still create the illusion that a statistically significant pattern has been found.
The phrase is suddenly all over the papers. However, it is not used as a pejorative. It definitely is not used to mean "cherry picking". It has now been widely noticed that cherry picking can lead to false conclusions.
"Data mining" in contrast is now used to refer to mysterious information processing techniques which are very powerful, perhaps dangerously powerful. They are not described in detail but they have something to do with huge powerful computers and data sets so massive as to be incomprehensible to mere humans. Evidently the computers search through huge amounts of data looking for suspicious patters. Also the computers find a huge number of such suspicious patters.
Unfortunately people processing the ore from the data mine are not impressed
"We'd chase a number, find it's a schoolteacher with no indication they've ever been involved in international terrorism - case closed," said one former FBI official, who was aware of the program and the data it generated for the bureau. "After you get a thousand numbers and not one is turning up anything, you get some frustration."
Ah yess that sounds like the result of data mining to me. If you look through a huge amound of data concerning innocent people for suspicious you will find many cases of patters so suspicious that the probability they are do to chance is very low like one in a hundred thousand. If you check every phone number in the world, you will end up sendign harassed FBI agents to harass thousands of innocent people. I mean the math isn't complicated.
However, a 1 in a 100,000 pattern is very very impressive. Our brains are not made to understand that 1 in a 100,000 is very different from 1 in 10,000 or 1 in 10,000,000. Furthermore computers remain strange and very impressive (especially google I mean how the hell can it search so fast ?).
It seems that the new meaning of "data mining" is very close to the old meaning and, thus, about the same as "cherry picking" or, to be exact, mechanised cherry picking.
It's connotations were not pejorative a year or so ago. People have to learn the same lesson again and again.
Monday, January 23, 2006
A block buster article by Dan Eggen on political bias in the Justice Department's voting section.
As has been reported already, Bush's political appointees have a pattern of over ruling staff attorneys in ways which help Republicans (and in one case which was held to be unconstitutional). One key issue was a Georgian law requiring voters to present photo identification. The law clearly establishes a poll tax and thus is unconstitutional. Georgia is now working on a new bill under which they will give people photo ID.
The Justice Department's voting section has a very relaxed view of conflict of interest. It's decision to accept the law was made by a former Republican party official who had advocated the law before evaluating it.
Well at least Mr Holland has a sense of humor. Of course advocating something has no impact on whether you declare it to be illegal.
As to von Spakovsky, he is out of there as "Von Spakovsky has since been named to the Federal Election Commission in a recess appointment by President Bush."
Michael A. Carvin, a civil rights deputy under Reagan, won't let Holland claim the craziest quote prize without a fight. He argues that career lawyers in the Justice Department's voting section have long been acting counter to normal practice. Now my problem with this claim is not that it is false, it is self contradictory. There aren't a lot of competing voting sections you know. The systematic behavior of voting section career lawyers *is* the normal practice.
Now that is special. I don't think the FEC is enough for this guy. By taking on logic itself for Bush, he's earned a nomination to the supreme court.
As has been reported already, Bush's political appointees have a pattern of over ruling staff attorneys in ways which help Republicans (and in one case which was held to be unconstitutional). One key issue was a Georgian law requiring voters to present photo identification. The law clearly establishes a poll tax and thus is unconstitutional. Georgia is now working on a new bill under which they will give people photo ID.
The Justice Department's voting section has a very relaxed view of conflict of interest. It's decision to accept the law was made by a former Republican party official who had advocated the law before evaluating it.
One of the officials involved in the decision was Hans von Spakovsky, a former head of the Fulton County GOP in Atlanta, who had long advocated a voter-identification law for the state and oversaw many voting issues at Justice. Justice spokesman Eric W. Holland said von Spakovsky's previous activities did not require a recusal and had no impact on his actions in the Georgia case.
Well at least Mr Holland has a sense of humor. Of course advocating something has no impact on whether you declare it to be illegal.
As to von Spakovsky, he is out of there as "Von Spakovsky has since been named to the Federal Election Commission in a recess appointment by President Bush."
Michael A. Carvin, a civil rights deputy under Reagan, won't let Holland claim the craziest quote prize without a fight. He argues that career lawyers in the Justice Department's voting section have long been acting counter to normal practice. Now my problem with this claim is not that it is false, it is self contradictory. There aren't a lot of competing voting sections you know. The systematic behavior of voting section career lawyers *is* the normal practice.
Carvin and other conservatives also say the opinions of career lawyers in the section frequently ...
"The notion that they are somehow neutral or somehow ideologically impartial is simply not supported by the evidence," Carvin said. "It hasn't been the politicos that were departing from the law or normal practice, but the voting-rights section."
Now that is special. I don't think the FEC is enough for this guy. By taking on logic itself for Bush, he's earned a nomination to the supreme court.
Ripon Rip Off
It is illegal for lobbyists to pay for travel for lawmakers. Thus non profit corporations serve as money laundrys. Most are newly founded with vague names. However even I have heard of the Ripon society. Thomas Edsall shows just how unafraid of any kind of oversight Republicans became.
They do have a sense of humor however
It is illegal for lobbyists to pay for travel for lawmakers. Thus non profit corporations serve as money laundrys. Most are newly founded with vague names. However even I have heard of the Ripon society. Thomas Edsall shows just how unafraid of any kind of oversight Republicans became.
In recent years, however, a leading public watchdog group suggests, the Ripon Society has added an unofficial mission: travel agency to lobbyists.
Under president Richard S. Kessler, himself a prominent Washington lobbyist, people who represent corporate interests before Congress have "spent millions taking lawmakers to European capitals and U.S. resorts" under the auspices of the Ripon Society and the affiliated Ripon Educational Fund, the group Public Citizen charged in a new report.
They do have a sense of humor however
McNeill adamantly defended the conferences. "We are not skirting any ethics rules," he said, adding that the society has a "hard and fast," if unwritten, rule that "we don't allow any lobbying."
Antidigital Divide
A narrow interest group for me. It is a group of Italian residents who don't have broad band and who protest this injustice. I can't get broad band here.
La Repubblica reports
A narrow interest group for me. It is a group of Italian residents who don't have broad band and who protest this injustice. I can't get broad band here.
La Repubblica reports
Kathryn Jean Lopez (NRO Editor) does not know what Irony is.
via firedoglake via The General himself.
With respect to General JC Christian (patriot [heterosexual patriot])'s review of "Women Who Make the World Worse," she writes
I can only assume that K-Lo thinks it is funny to pretend that she is taking the general seriously. Sad to say, it is not. Unless she really really didn't notice that the General shouldn't be taken literally. Oh and since when has Lopez been in the habit of cutting off "little soldiers"
(Yglesias reminds us of the importance of the use mention distinction).
via firedoglake via The General himself.
With respect to General JC Christian (patriot [heterosexual patriot])'s review of "Women Who Make the World Worse," she writes
Of course, we didn’t really need the admission; the lead customer review on Amazon for a few days now — besides citing “her frequent attacks against the television show, ‘Sex in the City,’” (good luck finding them in the book — they aren’t in there) — says:As much as I enjoyed this book, I can't give it more than a single star because it has a fatal flaw. It promotes the most destructive myth of all, the existence of lesbianism. Mrs. O'Beirne discusses it throughout the book as if it is something that is real. She doesn't seem to be able to understand that women can't have sex with each other.
There’s not a single mention of lesbians in the book. That reviewer’s got his own vast-right-wing-conspiracy book fantasy going on.
I can only assume that K-Lo thinks it is funny to pretend that she is taking the general seriously. Sad to say, it is not. Unless she really really didn't notice that the General shouldn't be taken literally. Oh and since when has Lopez been in the habit of cutting off "little soldiers"
(Yglesias reminds us of the importance of the use mention distinction).
Sunday, January 22, 2006
Speaking of Paranoia
Recently I was discussing 1984 and paranoia with my daughter. The NSA spying is not our families main concern at the moment. We are more distressed over the fact that our refrigerator is broken and the refrigerator repair guy was out of coolant when he came to not fix it. I'm not paranoid, but the latest spam I got at hotmail was this
From : Free Appliances
Sent : Sunday, January 22, 2006 6:19 PM
To : rjw88@hotmail.com
CC : offer@senderrrsite.com
Subject : We're giving away a Free Refrigerator
Now I know that, unlike google, microsoft co-operated with the latest DOJ invasion of privacy effort, but I didn't know they got information in exchange and how does the DOJ know we need a new refrigerator ?
Update: OK now I know microsoft is spying on me. Just after I posted my thoughts about the mysteriously timed refrigerator spam, my hotmail spam tried to reassure me. I got spam for "men's wedding bands" and "Engagement Rings" as if the sinister organization which knows my refrigerator is broked didn't know that I am currently married and, in fact, wearing a wedding ring. Also I got spams for "drug rehab" and "road to recovery" even though I have never been addicted to a banned substance and haven't consumed one in ... well a very long time (definitely more than 5 years).
Now you might argue that using evidence that the spam fits my case and evidence that it doesn't equally as proof that MSN is spying on me is clearly paranoid. If you do, I just hope they paid you well to be part of their conspiracy.
Recently I was discussing 1984 and paranoia with my daughter. The NSA spying is not our families main concern at the moment. We are more distressed over the fact that our refrigerator is broken and the refrigerator repair guy was out of coolant when he came to not fix it. I'm not paranoid, but the latest spam I got at hotmail was this
From : Free Appliances
Sent : Sunday, January 22, 2006 6:19 PM
To : rjw88@hotmail.com
CC : offer@senderrrsite.com
Subject : We're giving away a Free Refrigerator
Now I know that, unlike google, microsoft co-operated with the latest DOJ invasion of privacy effort, but I didn't know they got information in exchange and how does the DOJ know we need a new refrigerator ?
Update: OK now I know microsoft is spying on me. Just after I posted my thoughts about the mysteriously timed refrigerator spam, my hotmail spam tried to reassure me. I got spam for "men's wedding bands" and "Engagement Rings" as if the sinister organization which knows my refrigerator is broked didn't know that I am currently married and, in fact, wearing a wedding ring. Also I got spams for "drug rehab" and "road to recovery" even though I have never been addicted to a banned substance and haven't consumed one in ... well a very long time (definitely more than 5 years).
Now you might argue that using evidence that the spam fits my case and evidence that it doesn't equally as proof that MSN is spying on me is clearly paranoid. If you do, I just hope they paid you well to be part of their conspiracy.
Kickapoo Joy
In one shot that TIME saw, Bush appears with Abramoff, several unidentified people and Raul Garza Sr., a Texan Abramoff represented who was then chairman of the Kickapoo Indians, which owned a casino in southern Texas.
via think progress
I deeply respect the Kickapoo and would never have used an insulting and racist reference to "Kickapoo joy juice" if I had know that they actually exist.
In one shot that TIME saw, Bush appears with Abramoff, several unidentified people and Raul Garza Sr., a Texan Abramoff represented who was then chairman of the Kickapoo Indians, which owned a casino in southern Texas.
via think progress
I deeply respect the Kickapoo and would never have used an insulting and racist reference to "Kickapoo joy juice" if I had know that they actually exist.
Howell's by now retracted corrected and cancelled howler
I am beginning to be concerned about my obsession with Deborah Howell. I believe that Carol Burnett got her big break when she sang the hit song "I made a fool of myself over John Foster Dulles." Attempting to avoid personal insults, I should add both that Deborah Howell is much sexier than John Foster Dulles and that she doesn't have to worry about me stalking her and harassing her with phone calls in which I talk about the unambiguity of the third person singular pronoun "he" and felafel.
Still in this harmless, low traffic, non obscene, not too personal and occasionally correctly spelled blog, I link to Josh Marshall who manages to have something useful to say as always. In his brief summary he notes that some have claimed that the distinction between money given by Abramoff and money given by his clients after he so recommended is without a difference. I can't help responding to this argument (I tried).
First I don't think a newspaper can make that argument when one of the statements is a factual error. I don't think a newspaper can argue that an error of fact is too minor to correct when it is challenged. This seems to me (and Deborah Howell) to be an obviously necessary rule.
Second I don't think the distinction is without a difference. In fact, I think it is necessary to make more distinctions if one wants to understand the controversy (although I have no idea why any sane person would want to do that). Consider 5 catagories
a. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients
b. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients after he recommended such giving
c. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients because he recommended such giving
d. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients at his direction.
e. Money given by Jack Abramoff.
In the original Howler, Howell conflated a and e. This is clear since she claimed that the giving was "substantial." If one clicks the link she used for evidence of b,c or d, and one relies on Mark Schmitt (see below) to understand how capitoleye works (it is very very simple) one finds that the total in c demonstrated by the Washington Post is $500 (to Max Cleland) which is not substantial.
Now are these distinctions without differences ? I think it is absolutely clear that the distinction between a (for which the Post presents significant evidence of considerable contributions to Democrats) and e must be important exactly because Abramoff gave often and always always to Republicans. If one wishes to argue that there is no important difference between a and e, one has to explain why the patterns are totally different. I think any attempt to understand this undeniable fact leads one to consider some donations by Abramoff clients to have been made in spite of not because of Abramoff. This means that the data on total giving by Abramoff clients is even less relevant than it appeared at first (which is basically totally irrelevant).
Howell says she wrote e when she should have written d. d clearly is zero dollars. Abramoff worked for his clients. They gave him money. They did not owe him obedience. Indeed (see below) the tiny scrap of information on Abramoff recommendations does not match actual giving. This shows, as if it were needed, that Abramoff did not command his clients.
To be charitable replace d with c. The distinction between c and b is as important as any aspect of Abramoff campaign donations (which is not very). It is clear that Abramoff could not convince his clients to instantly cut off Democrats completely and that he would have lost their trust if he tried. The scrap of a document cited as evidence provides no information on this. Thus Howell has shifted from a false claim to a claim unsupported by evidence.
I assume that, at this point, I have no readers to whom to apologise for this boring pointless post.
I am beginning to be concerned about my obsession with Deborah Howell. I believe that Carol Burnett got her big break when she sang the hit song "I made a fool of myself over John Foster Dulles." Attempting to avoid personal insults, I should add both that Deborah Howell is much sexier than John Foster Dulles and that she doesn't have to worry about me stalking her and harassing her with phone calls in which I talk about the unambiguity of the third person singular pronoun "he" and felafel.
Still in this harmless, low traffic, non obscene, not too personal and occasionally correctly spelled blog, I link to Josh Marshall who manages to have something useful to say as always. In his brief summary he notes that some have claimed that the distinction between money given by Abramoff and money given by his clients after he so recommended is without a difference. I can't help responding to this argument (I tried).
First I don't think a newspaper can make that argument when one of the statements is a factual error. I don't think a newspaper can argue that an error of fact is too minor to correct when it is challenged. This seems to me (and Deborah Howell) to be an obviously necessary rule.
Second I don't think the distinction is without a difference. In fact, I think it is necessary to make more distinctions if one wants to understand the controversy (although I have no idea why any sane person would want to do that). Consider 5 catagories
a. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients
b. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients after he recommended such giving
c. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients because he recommended such giving
d. Money given by Jack Abramoff's clients at his direction.
e. Money given by Jack Abramoff.
In the original Howler, Howell conflated a and e. This is clear since she claimed that the giving was "substantial." If one clicks the link she used for evidence of b,c or d, and one relies on Mark Schmitt (see below) to understand how capitoleye works (it is very very simple) one finds that the total in c demonstrated by the Washington Post is $500 (to Max Cleland) which is not substantial.
Now are these distinctions without differences ? I think it is absolutely clear that the distinction between a (for which the Post presents significant evidence of considerable contributions to Democrats) and e must be important exactly because Abramoff gave often and always always to Republicans. If one wishes to argue that there is no important difference between a and e, one has to explain why the patterns are totally different. I think any attempt to understand this undeniable fact leads one to consider some donations by Abramoff clients to have been made in spite of not because of Abramoff. This means that the data on total giving by Abramoff clients is even less relevant than it appeared at first (which is basically totally irrelevant).
Howell says she wrote e when she should have written d. d clearly is zero dollars. Abramoff worked for his clients. They gave him money. They did not owe him obedience. Indeed (see below) the tiny scrap of information on Abramoff recommendations does not match actual giving. This shows, as if it were needed, that Abramoff did not command his clients.
To be charitable replace d with c. The distinction between c and b is as important as any aspect of Abramoff campaign donations (which is not very). It is clear that Abramoff could not convince his clients to instantly cut off Democrats completely and that he would have lost their trust if he tried. The scrap of a document cited as evidence provides no information on this. Thus Howell has shifted from a false claim to a claim unsupported by evidence.
I assume that, at this point, I have no readers to whom to apologise for this boring pointless post.
Howell's Howler Case Closed
Deborah Howler has written a column which has been printed in which she, finally, admits that the 11 word sentence "And he had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties." was false not unclear, a poor way to put it, or anything else.
Her current claim that "he directed his client Indian tribes to make campaign contributions to members of Congress from both parties" is unproven given the anomaly noted by Mark Schmitt.
Howell also approvingly quotes Michael Crowley who considers the difference between a false statement and an arguable true statement "foolish semantics." If a factual error is challenged, it must be corrected. No serious journalist can consider a factual error "foolish semantics." There is no plus side to refusing to correct an error immediately. At least two Post journalists refused to quote the offending 11 words for days debating readers obout what had been written in the Post and was available on its web page. That was dumb.
There is no evidence that Abramoff controlled his clients enough to justify the word "directed" as opposed to "advised." The scrap of evidence that Howell presented to prove such "direction" undermines her claim since actual money was not given as "directed."
Howell and the Post have presented no evidence that Abramoff ever encouraged anyone to give anything to a Democrat as opposed to reluctantly accepting that he could not prevent them from doing so.
Still the key issue of an uncorrected unambiguous error has been settled.
Deborah Howler has written a column which has been printed in which she, finally, admits that the 11 word sentence "And he had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties." was false not unclear, a poor way to put it, or anything else.
I wrote that he gave campaign money to both parties and their members of Congress. He didn't. I should have said he directed his client Indian tribes to make campaign contributions to members of Congress from both parties.
My mistake set off a firestorm. I heard that I was lying, that Democrats never got a penny of Abramoff-tainted money, that I was trying to say it was a bipartisan scandal, as some Republicans claim. I didn't say that. It's not a bipartisan scandal; it's a Republican scandal, and that's why the Republicans are scurrying around trying to enact lobbying reforms.
Her current claim that "he directed his client Indian tribes to make campaign contributions to members of Congress from both parties" is unproven given the anomaly noted by Mark Schmitt.
Howell also approvingly quotes Michael Crowley who considers the difference between a false statement and an arguable true statement "foolish semantics." If a factual error is challenged, it must be corrected. No serious journalist can consider a factual error "foolish semantics." There is no plus side to refusing to correct an error immediately. At least two Post journalists refused to quote the offending 11 words for days debating readers obout what had been written in the Post and was available on its web page. That was dumb.
There is no evidence that Abramoff controlled his clients enough to justify the word "directed" as opposed to "advised." The scrap of evidence that Howell presented to prove such "direction" undermines her claim since actual money was not given as "directed."
Howell and the Post have presented no evidence that Abramoff ever encouraged anyone to give anything to a Democrat as opposed to reluctantly accepting that he could not prevent them from doing so.
Still the key issue of an uncorrected unambiguous error has been settled.
As we were driving in my car, My daughter Marina said
M "So George Orwell is your favorite author"
R "yeah I guess so why ? Are you reading something by him ?"
M "No I'm remembering 1984 a great book, especially for paranoid people like us."
R "Shhhhh" pointing at a vaguely microphone shaped bit of my car."
M "Your countrymen are listening to you."
R "Well actually they do record it when I talk to my mom [capsule summary of the NSA scandal]. It's getting hard to be paranoid these days.
I am delighted that my daughter appreciates Orwell, less delighted that she refers to *our* countrymen as "your countrymen" and worried about the fate of the paranoid. I mean I suppose there is some psychological reason they believe crazy things that no one else takes seriously, and whatever they get out of it they risk losing as George Bush et al model the world after their fantasies.
With this in mind, I was seriously worried by the Deibold story in the Washington Post. Next are they going to write an article about the beneficial health properties of tinfoil hats ?
M "So George Orwell is your favorite author"
R "yeah I guess so why ? Are you reading something by him ?"
M "No I'm remembering 1984 a great book, especially for paranoid people like us."
R "Shhhhh" pointing at a vaguely microphone shaped bit of my car."
M "Your countrymen are listening to you."
R "Well actually they do record it when I talk to my mom [capsule summary of the NSA scandal]. It's getting hard to be paranoid these days.
I am delighted that my daughter appreciates Orwell, less delighted that she refers to *our* countrymen as "your countrymen" and worried about the fate of the paranoid. I mean I suppose there is some psychological reason they believe crazy things that no one else takes seriously, and whatever they get out of it they risk losing as George Bush et al model the world after their fantasies.
With this in mind, I was seriously worried by the Deibold story in the Washington Post. Next are they going to write an article about the beneficial health properties of tinfoil hats ?
Saturday, January 21, 2006
Howell's Howler VII
Mark Schmitt absolutely nails the Washington Post in a very important ...
comment on Brad DeLong's blog. "And he had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties." This lead to an avalanche of furious complaints. Howell replied conceding (sortof) that her claim was false, but also claiming that Jack Abramoff
"directed his Indian tribal clients to make millions of dollars in campaign contributions to members of Congress from both parties." To support this claim she links to two graphics. A graph of donations by Abramoff and Abramoff's clients which provides no evidence on which donations of clients were directed by abramoff and a scrap of evidence about direction which does show some names of Democrats in a memo identified by the Post as a communication from Abramoff to the Lousiana Coushettas.
Mark Schmitt notes that the actual donations to Democrats by the Coushettas do not match those on the list. Thus there are donations from Abramoff's clients and indications from Abramoff about donations to Democrats, but no match. I had trouble finding the FEC records last night and tip my hat to Schmitt. However, the Washington Post can not use that as an excuse. Howell and 3 defenders at the Post have repeated that they have proof that Abramoff directed donations to Democrats. The scrap of evidence they present is no such thing. Due dilligence would have included checking FEC records before libelling Democrats. Posting the scrap is not asserting that it corresponds to what actually happened, but they have since made that assertion without checking.
The scrap of evidence stolen
I'm just going to steal Mark Schmitt's response to Howell. I can't understand why I had trouble getting to the page with data myself.
Posted by: Mark Schmitt | January 21, 2006 at 09:06 AM
Also Brad's comments on the scrap of evidence that Abramoff directed donations to democrats are very convincing. I'd say that it is no mystery that no donations to Dascle were actually made.
Mark Schmitt absolutely nails the Washington Post in a very important ...
comment on Brad DeLong's blog. "And he had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties." This lead to an avalanche of furious complaints. Howell replied conceding (sortof) that her claim was false, but also claiming that Jack Abramoff
"directed his Indian tribal clients to make millions of dollars in campaign contributions to members of Congress from both parties." To support this claim she links to two graphics. A graph of donations by Abramoff and Abramoff's clients which provides no evidence on which donations of clients were directed by abramoff and a scrap of evidence about direction which does show some names of Democrats in a memo identified by the Post as a communication from Abramoff to the Lousiana Coushettas.
Mark Schmitt notes that the actual donations to Democrats by the Coushettas do not match those on the list. Thus there are donations from Abramoff's clients and indications from Abramoff about donations to Democrats, but no match. I had trouble finding the FEC records last night and tip my hat to Schmitt. However, the Washington Post can not use that as an excuse. Howell and 3 defenders at the Post have repeated that they have proof that Abramoff directed donations to Democrats. The scrap of evidence they present is no such thing. Due dilligence would have included checking FEC records before libelling Democrats. Posting the scrap is not asserting that it corresponds to what actually happened, but they have since made that assertion without checking.
The scrap of evidence stolen
I'm just going to steal Mark Schmitt's response to Howell. I can't understand why I had trouble getting to the page with data myself.
A detailed list of contributions by Abramoff, Scanlon, and their clients is here:
This excludes contributions made before Abramoff was a registered lobbyist, but makes no effort to detect whether he directed them or not, or to compare their pre- and post-Abramoff giving.
Comparing it to the list that Howell cited, reveals some interesting discrepancies: the fragment of the list directs $2,000 to former Sen. Max Cleland. The Center for Responsive Politics list shows the Coushattas giving $500 to Cleland and $5,500 to his opponent, Saxby Chambliss. Likewise, the fragment suggests $2,000 to Jean Carnahan; in reality, neither the Coushattas nor any other Abramoff client gave to Carnahan but both Abramoff and his clients gave $3,000 to her opponent, Jim Talent. Senator Daschle, whose name appears on the fragment of a list with an illegible amount, did not receive any money from the Coushattas, although he did receive significant funding from other tribes, as did his opponent, now-Sen. Thune.
Not sure what this proves, except that the fragment of an e-mail cited by Howell does not seem to be an accurate representation of actual donations directed by Abramoff.
Posted by: Mark Schmitt | January 21, 2006 at 08:54 AM
Here, by the way, is the list just for actual Coushatta contributions:
[That is]
http://www.capitaleye.org/abramoff_donor.asp?Name=Coushatta+Tribe+of+Louisiana
I'll let someone else do the math. My inclination would be to exclude all the contributions to Louisiana Dems and Republicans -- since those are their own representatives -- and then add up the rest. There's some money to Tim Johnson in South Dakota on that list -- like Byron Dorgan, someone who "was supporting Indian tribes for longer than Abramoff was bilking them" -- and $2,000 to Tom Harkin (likewise), and the rest of the $220,000 or so is all Republicans, especially those in targetted races.
Posted by: Mark Schmitt | January 21, 2006 at 09:06 AM
Also Brad's comments on the scrap of evidence that Abramoff directed donations to democrats are very convincing. I'd say that it is no mystery that no donations to Dascle were actually made.
Howell's Howler VII
Mark Schmitt absolutely nails the Washington Post in a very important ... comment on Brad DeLong's blog. href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/14/AR2006011400859.html">"And he had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties."
This lead to an avalanche of furious complaints. Howell replied conceding (sortof) that her claim was false, but also claiming that Jack Abramoff "directed his Indian tribal clients to make millions of dollars in campaign contributions to members of Congress from both parties." To support this claim she links to two graphics. A graph of donations by Abramoff and Abramoff's clients which provides no evidence on which donations of clients were directed by abramoff and a scrap of evidence about direction which does show some names of Democrats in a memo identified by the Post as a communication from Abramoff to the Lousiana Coushettas.
Mark Schmitt notes that the actual donations to Democrats by the Coushettas do not match those on the list. Thus there are donations from Abramoff's clients and indications from Abramoff about donations to Democrats, but no match. I had trouble finding the FEC records last night and tip my hat to Schmitt. However, the Washington Post can not use that as an excuse. Howell and 3 defenders at the Post have repeated that they have proof that Abramoff directed donations to Democrats. The scrap of evidence they present is no such thing. Due dilligence would have included checking FEC records before libelling Democrats. Posting the scrap is not asserting that it corresponds to what actually happened, but they have since made that assertion without checking.
The scrap of evidence stolen
I'm just going to steal Mark Schmitt's response to Howell. I can't understand why I had trouble getting to the page with data myself.
Posted by: Mark Schmitt | January 21, 2006 at 09:06 AM
Also Brad's comments on the scrap of evidence that Abramoff directed donations to democrats are very convincing. I'd say that it is no mystery that no donations to Dascle were actually made.
Mark Schmitt absolutely nails the Washington Post in a very important ... comment on Brad DeLong's blog. href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/14/AR2006011400859.html">"And he had made substantial campaign contributions to both major parties."
This lead to an avalanche of furious complaints. Howell replied conceding (sortof) that her claim was false, but also claiming that Jack Abramoff "directed his Indian tribal clients to make millions of dollars in campaign contributions to members of Congress from both parties." To support this claim she links to two graphics. A graph of donations by Abramoff and Abramoff's clients which provides no evidence on which donations of clients were directed by abramoff and a scrap of evidence about direction which does show some names of Democrats in a memo identified by the Post as a communication from Abramoff to the Lousiana Coushettas.
Mark Schmitt notes that the actual donations to Democrats by the Coushettas do not match those on the list. Thus there are donations from Abramoff's clients and indications from Abramoff about donations to Democrats, but no match. I had trouble finding the FEC records last night and tip my hat to Schmitt. However, the Washington Post can not use that as an excuse. Howell and 3 defenders at the Post have repeated that they have proof that Abramoff directed donations to Democrats. The scrap of evidence they present is no such thing. Due dilligence would have included checking FEC records before libelling Democrats. Posting the scrap is not asserting that it corresponds to what actually happened, but they have since made that assertion without checking.
The scrap of evidence stolen
I'm just going to steal Mark Schmitt's response to Howell. I can't understand why I had trouble getting to the page with data myself.
A detailed list of contributions by Abramoff, Scanlon, and their clients is here:
This excludes contributions made before Abramoff was a registered lobbyist, but makes no effort to detect whether he directed them or not, or to compare their pre- and post-Abramoff giving.
Comparing it to the list that Howell cited, reveals some interesting discrepancies: the fragment of the list directs $2,000 to former Sen. Max Cleland. The Center for Responsive Politics list shows the Coushattas giving $500 to Cleland and $5,500 to his opponent, Saxby Chambliss. Likewise, the fragment suggests $2,000 to Jean Carnahan; in reality, neither the Coushattas nor any other Abramoff client gave to Carnahan but both Abramoff and his clients gave $3,000 to her opponent, Jim Talent. Senator Daschle, whose name appears on the fragment of a list with an illegible amount, did not receive any money from the Coushattas, although he did receive significant funding from other tribes, as did his opponent, now-Sen. Thune.
Not sure what this proves, except that the fragment of an e-mail cited by Howell does not seem to be an accurate representation of actual donations directed by Abramoff.
Posted by: Mark Schmitt | January 21, 2006 at 08:54 AM
Here, by the way, is the list just for actual Coushatta contributions:
[That is]
http://www.capitaleye.org/abramoff_donor.asp?Name=Coushatta+Tribe+of+Louisiana
I'll let someone else do the math. My inclination would be to exclude all the contributions to Louisiana Dems and Republicans -- since those are their own representatives -- and then add up the rest. There's some money to Tim Johnson in South Dakota on that list -- like Byron Dorgan, someone who "was supporting Indian tribes for longer than Abramoff was bilking them" -- and $2,000 to Tom Harkin (likewise), and the rest of the $220,000 or so is all Republicans, especially those in targetted races.
Posted by: Mark Schmitt | January 21, 2006 at 09:06 AM
Also Brad's comments on the scrap of evidence that Abramoff directed donations to democrats are very convincing. I'd say that it is no mystery that no donations to Dascle were actually made.
The Presidentialist Papers
via The Carpetbagger Report
A guide to reading as they read in the Bush White House f e d e r a l is pronounced like "presidential." In the DOJ they aren't so vulgar and pronounce it "unitary executive" with a strong Britich accent (hold the crown). This really does not overstate the inanity of a White Paper which asserts that a discussion of federal powers (as opposed to state powers) is a discussion of presidential powers as opposed to congressional powers.
You can't make this shit up.
via The Carpetbagger Report
A guide to reading as they read in the Bush White House f e d e r a l is pronounced like "presidential." In the DOJ they aren't so vulgar and pronounce it "unitary executive" with a strong Britich accent (hold the crown). This really does not overstate the inanity of a White Paper which asserts that a discussion of federal powers (as opposed to state powers) is a discussion of presidential powers as opposed to congressional powers.
You can't make this shit up.
the administration released a white paper insisting that there's nothing illegal about the NSA program.
The Bush administration argued yesterday that the president has inherent war powers under the Constitution to order warrantless eavesdropping on the international calls and e-mails of U.S. citizens and others in this country, offering the administration's most detailed legal defense to date of its surveillance program.
Unfortunately, over the course of 42 pages (.pdf), there's not much in the way of new arguments. Bush has the "inherent" authority to execute a war on terror, Congress' 9/11 resolution said the president could do anything he wanted in this endeavor, yada yada yada.
What I did find interesting, however, is to help find support for its case, the administration relied on the Federalist Papers. Yes, the ones from 1788. From the administration's report:
To carry out these responsibilities, the President must have authority to gather information necessary for the execution of his office. The Founders, after all, intended the federal Government to be clothed with all authority necessary to protect the Nation. See, e.g., The Federalist No. 23, at 147 (Alexander Hamilton) (Jacob E. Cooke ed. 1961) (explaining that the federal Government will be "cloathed with all the powers requisite to the complete execution of its trust"); id. No. 41, at 269 (James Madison) ("Security against foreign danger is one of the primitive objects of civil society . . . . The powers requisite for attaining it must be effectually confided to the federal councils."). Because of the structural advantages of the Executive Branch, the Founders also intended that the President would have the primary responsibility and necessary authority as Commander in Chief and Chief Executive to protect the Nation and to conduct the Nation's foreign affairs. See, e.g., The Federalist No. 70, at 471-72 (Alexander Hamilton); see also Johnson v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. 763, 788 (1950) ("this [constitutional] grant of war power includes all that is necessary and proper for carrying these powers into execution") (citation omitted).
I mostly agree with Jim Brady
On the other hand he typed an emoticon
"Jim Brady: Figured one note from a supporter would be OK. :-)"
Standard Mr Brady Standards :-((
On the other hand he typed an emoticon
"Jim Brady: Figured one note from a supporter would be OK. :-)"
Standard Mr Brady Standards :-((
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