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Jon Stewart: Enemy of Democracy.There, I fixed that for you.I have read much of Richard Morin's column, but I think we can say off the bat that a)political scientists are not really scientists, but sociologists b) this guy is full of hot air, and highly bipartisan. What's wrong with liking Third parties?via (HoT)
This article says democrats are racist. That may be the first time I've ever seen that in print.Since the article has no link to the study, it's very difficult to get a handle on what they were measuring. Bluntly, I would be suspicious of any scientist who claims that the results of their study is that "democrats racist, republicans are principled" (I know the scientist didn't say that, but that's how the clearly unbiased Richard Morin parsed it).
I believe it, and republicans have always known it, but it's the first time I've seen it.
Very interesting, and kudos to Morin and Iyengar for the follow-up. We should say, though, that although these results are consistent with our own prejudices about those on the liberal side of the political spectrum, we doubt this study comes anywhere near proving anything. This is for several reasons:I could go on and on. Anyone have a link to the actual study, or am I safe just calling bullshit on this one? It appears that Morin and Iyegar are birds of a feather, which is to say both partisan Rebpublicans. This is fine and good, but I don't usually give a crap what partisans on either side have to say about the "principles" of themselves or thier opponents, because they're often most full of shit on that topic.
Also, we take issue with the characterization of Democrats as "generous" because they are willing to "give" more money to the hypothetical victims. Participants were not asked how much of their own money they were willing to contribute, but rather how much "government aid" they thought the victims should receive.
- Although it's not specified how the survey participants were chosen, it seems clear that they are a self-selected rather than representative sample. The follow-up work corrects for political bias but apparently not for other biases (e.g., toward highly educated whites).
- As we understand the description of the study, each individual participant saw either a white face or a black face (or another variant), not both. Thus the disparities found were between the averages of two different groups of people. It may be that the differences were the result of some unknown factor, whether random or systemic, that differentiates the two groups.
- Even if we assume that the disparity is the result of liberals "being affected by racial cues," such cues do not necessarily reflect racist attitudes (in the classic sense of believing that blacks are inferior). It could be that liberals believe blacks are more resilient and thus need less help to recover, or that they believe (correctly) that blacks have lower incomes on average and thus need less to compensate for lost wages.
If Democrats are more eager to spend "government" money than Republicans are--and, with the possible exception of members of Congress, it is a commonplace that they are--does this mean that Democrats are more "generous"? Or does it mean that Republicans are more apt to think of government as spending their money, while Democrats think of it as other people's?
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rulegovern needs to be cut down to size, just to keep them honest. So anyone who does that would be a friend of democracy, I think.posted by jonmc at 6:54 AM on June 27, 2006