File Under: God has a
ArchPundit
File Under: God has a sense of humor
There is a call to pray for God to shift the US judiciary
I kid you not.
Can I get some other
Can I get some other names
I mean, in 1998 it would have been Poshard and Ryan, in 1994 Edgar and Netsch, in 1990 Edgar and Hartigan, in 1986 and 1982 Stevenson and Thompson and in ’86 I had the two fruitcakes on the Dem Ballot who were Larouchies, but had nice names. But nooooooooo…
I get Blagojevich. And I get Jim Ryan who can’t seem to get anyone to know he isn’t George Ryan.
Coal in your Stocking Blago
Coal in your Stocking
Blago and J-Ry seem to want to do as much as they can to support Southern Illinois Coal.
Clearly this is pandering and nothing shocking, but if one is interested in redeveloping the pit that is Southern Illinois, wouldn’t one want to invest in commerce with a future?
Just asking.
Tell us what you really
Tell us what you really think, Rich
Rich Miller takes another shot at Birkett
A Tiny Taste of Capitol Fax from October 17, 2002:
STATEWIDE STUFF (excerpt) Joe Birkett, then and now.
Chicago Tribune, August 21, 1994: “Last week he formally was named the lead prosecutor in the upcoming third trial of Rolando Cruz.”
Daily Southtown: June 6, 2002: “Birkett says his bosses, not he, led the Cruz trials.”
Chicago Tribune, August 21, 1994: “‘I feel very comfortable taking on this case,’ said Birkett, who will prosecute the case with DuPage Assistant State’s Atty. Barbara Preiner and one other attorney, who has yet to be named.”
Chicago Tribune: October 1, 2002: “I inherited, obviously, a nightmare.”
Oh Mickey, you are not
Oh Mickey, you are not so fine
So Mickey Kaus claimed that Tapped was about to be shut down. Then why did they bother with a redesign?
Either they were essentially finished and they are still going to drop it (not very likely), Mickey got it wrong, or Mickey got played.
Disturbing The entire North Korean
Disturbing
The entire North Korean situation is disturbing and a bit puzzling. &C has an interesting note that the Bush administration may be leaving the situation to the Japanese. I’ll give the administration that this is an especially tricky situation, but I’m deeply concerned if TNR is correct. This is a situation in which the US and Japan must work together and come up with a coherent strategy.
I find it hard to believe this was too shocking given we have assumed they were near or had nuclear capability. Isn’t there a strategy for this? If not, I’m deeply concerned about where this administration is going.
Get Zogby Let’s do a
Get Zogby
Let’s do a little mental exercise and compare the original post to Rothenberg’s article. The difference? Rothenberg takes specific issue with the results and demonstrates problems that fit our understanding of public opinion. The post by Ruffini tries to make an argument through innuendo and guilt by association. Oddly, Ruffini doesn?t seem aware of the Arab/Muslim-American strategy pursued by Grover Norquist and Karl Rove in 2000. For some background one should visit The New Republic stories here and here.
Is Ruffini upset at Norquist?s ties? Give Rove credit, he backed off a bit on learning the background of some of Norquist?s associates.
If one wants to address the accuracy of a poll, address the poll, not some bogeyman.
Traditionally, Zogby has been effective at estimating hang-ups and oversampling for similar demographics. Given refusals are more likely to come from Republicans, this is essential to getting an accurate poll. William Safire wrote some very complimentary columns about this before and after the 1996 election. Zogby specifically mentions this himself on his site. The art of polling is how one determines the likely voter profiles. These two methods are proprietary and as such, a big black box that people can’t evaluate except at the end of an election.
This, of course, makes Mr. Hanks comments about how Zogby was way off until the end rather strange. Nothing new there given it is Hanks, but how does one know if he was way off if one doesn’t know the characteristics of the underlying population? Details, Smetails.
Looking at the 2000 election, let’s examine the bias. For Senate races mentioned on his site we see nine Senate races from 2000. All but two of those fall within the margin of error. The two that don?t fall within the margine of error are Pennsylvania and New York. The Pennsylvania race undercounts the Democratic vote, but primarily because the Democratic candidate was horrible and undecideds probably broke late. Zogby was hardly to blame for that. In fact, he probably had an accurate snapshot going into election day.
In New York his numbers were significantly off and overestimated Rick Lazio?s support by a great deal. Why? This probably occurred because he overestimated the number of Republican voters and thus oversampled them in trying to get an accurate count. He messed up. But he did so attempting to correct for underrepresenation of Republicans.
In his other races we see Wisconsin off a bit in favor of Democrats, but this is similar to Pennsylvania where the Republican candidate was doing so poorly party regulars probably broke late. Washington shows favor towards Cantwell, but well within the margin or error. His other races were off nearly equally in both directions, but within the margins of error. Zogby wasn?t perfect, but he was pretty good.
So is there any evidence of Zogby tampering? Not really. The problem with the rant by Ruffini is polls are only as good as the user reading them. Ruffini isn?t very good at using them. The farther out from election day a poll is taken, the less reliable a poll is and thus the more likely one is to get wider swings in volatile races. This often is due to swings in the electorate itself. Believe it or not, some people change their minds due to campaigns.
Additionally, pollsters improve their sampling and likely voter methodology when they get strange results meaning later polls are better than earlier polls. Rothenberg?s criticism is accurate. Something was wrong. Zogby and other pollsters don?t admit it because it is bad for business, but common sense allows any reasonable person to figure that out. The worst thing Zogby (and about every other pollster on Earth) is guilty of is self-promotion.
Ruffini tries to draw conclusions about the swings of the polls from John Zogby?s political attitudes instead of addressing the underlying population being studied and Zogby?s techniques at capturing that dynamic. There are problems with some of the recent Zogby poll results, but those seem likely due to the factors Rothenberg cites and it still being a period where people are making up their mind. Zogby doesn?t do this for his health; he does it to make money. If your primary market is news agencies, inaccurate results will make selling your product harder.
Bottom line: Zogby is a pretty good pollster, but not perfect. Instead of hand waiving and whining about his ?political agenda,? one would be better served by looking at his polling techniques and addressing those. Rothenberg did it, why is it so hard for others?
Update: MyDD revisits the issue and makes some good points. He thinks I give Rothenberg too much credit. Fair enough, but I think Rothenberg makes a good point that we should be cautious of polls that don’t fit our intuitive sense of the race. I probably overstated his content in trying to point out how to successfully address the quality of a pollster. The New Jersey and Tennessee cases are examples of something being wrong. Missouri and Minnesota should be taken with some skepticism. Most likely the swings aren’t that great and Zogby is honing in on his correct samples. In most of his polls he’ll be within the margin of error and maybe one or two he’ll biff. His numbers before the final round are subject to his improvements, and to changing race dynamics.
My sense is that both are elections that will be determined by turnout. On the ground in Missouri there is no upswell of Talent support compared to before and from I’m hearing in Minnesota the race still feels like a damn close race. ally, both Carnahan’s and Talent’s campaigns are putting too much stock in the poll this time. Ultimately, we’ll find out on election day.
Election Reform I’m terribly frustrated
Election Reform
I’m terribly frustrated in having to give Kit Bond credit again. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch does a story on the his motivations and path to reform. Though very bitter, he turned from that into a fairly strong (though inadequate–not his fault) bill on voting reform. Once he, ahem, sobered up to reality, he made a bill that cracked down on potential fraud and made it easier and more reliable to vote.
What is interesting about the 2000 election is that it looks like very votes were actually illegal–like less than 50 if that. Now 50 votes is a problem, but not a crisis. What appears to have pushed the fraudulent registrations is a pay per registration incentive system. This appears to be the same problem in South Dakota currently. Democrats should devise a check on such perverse incentives before such charges begin to stick. Regardless of who is doing it, false registrations make them look bad. Conversely, if Democrats fix the problem, Republicans look really bad if they attempt to disenfranchise people.
(double post to both sites)
Illinois Circular Firing Squad Team
Illinois Circular Firing Squad Team Boob of the Day
J-Ry himself!
Capitol Fax reports J-Ry is whining that Blago is making the Nicarico case political. I’ll just quote the rich rest of the story.
Jim Ryan accused Rod Blagojevich not long ago of using the Nicarico murder case for political purposes. But this is not the first time the rape and murder of 10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico has been used in a campaign. The first time was way back in 1984, when a young DuPage County lawyer was vying to be the next state’s attorney. The young lawyer repeatedly blasted the incumbent state’s attorney for making no progress in the case. The young lawyer’s name? Jim Ryan. The incumbent, Michael Fitzsimmons, was under so much political pressure from Jim Ryan that he pushed for a grand jury indictment of Rolando Cruz and two others just days before the primary election, even though the lead investigator on the case with the DuPage County Sheriff’s office thought the three men were not involved in the crime. Years later, Cruz and the others were found innocent, freed from prison and paid over $3 million in restitution.
1984 and this boob and Birkett (the other boob) can’t own up to their mistakes.
Thanks to the Lefty Directory
Thanks to the Lefty Directory
They added me. I’ll be adding them in a blogroll real soon–I’m trying to get a bunch of site maintenance in one big event instead of fighting blogger repeatedly.