So Veronique de Rugy put out a paper entitled Stimulus Facts. In it, she ran a regression of the money spent by Obama’s “stimulus” package recently, to see if it was actually being spent where unemployment is highest. It turns out it’s not, and most important factor she found in determining where money was spent, was whether the area was represented by a Republican or a Democrat. Democrats got more, you see.
Like any good scientist, she published her data, her formulas, all the results she got. This was all put out for the world to see, to criticize, and even to reproduce if desired. She then got some criticism, and re-ran her tests taking into account the suggestions she got, and then published a new version of the report without making the old version go away, even.
And as it turns out, whether a Republican represents you became the third most important factor in whether you got stimulus money. State capitals got a lot more, states with higher income levels (wealthier and presumably higher costs of living) got more, and then areas represented by Republicans got less.
Agree or disagree with her methodology, she’s putting the data out there and deserves to be commended for it. Let’s see her critics on the left take what she’s done and fix it, if what she’s done is so wrong.
And an aside to Nate Silver: it’s funny that you tell Veronique de Rugy to publish five models when you yourself only publish one. Well, you publish the results of one. While I fully understand you not wanting to give away the store, I think you should reconsider what you do from the porch of your glass house. After all, to take your own advice you could try running versions of your process with different sets of assumptions, fudge factors, and other subjective tweaks, and explain what’s going on with the different results. But you don’t, so it’s a pretty cheap shot to criticize her for sharing your own failing.
Aaron Gardner
Moe Lane
Steve Maley
KnightsofMalta
Dan Spencer
Dan McLaughlin
The state capital criticism needs further examination
Adjoran (Diary) Thursday, April 8th at 2:28AM EST (link)The revised models take into account that the monies sent to state capitals might be for the whole state, and not just the district it is in, but they do so by eliminating those funds from the calculations. This cannot be correct.
Although it would entail a lot more work, to truly fix the model and eliminate that bias without eliminating the funds, too, someone needs to track which CDs the capitals’ funds ended up enriching.
DD, SS
america1st (Diary) Thursday, April 8th at 5:27AM EST (link)The pattern is consistent – same thing with the takeover of the auto industry. Profitable dealerships which just happened to be owned by Republicans were cut out while failing dealerships which just happened to be operated by dims went on their merry way. While some degree of partisan favoritism has been always been part of the political equation – and openly in the US since Andy Jackson (he of the Jefferson – Jackson dimocrap celebrations) initiated his spoils system – this regime is well beyond that. It is the most cynical, most unethical, least American this nation has seen.
Logic in the mind of a liberal is like a snowflake in the desert: lost, alone and soon destroyed by a hostile environment.
Command economy
gwalt Thursday, April 8th at 7:45AM EST (link)When the first TARP went out and then Bad Odor (Barack Obama–B.O.) went to Bush to “save” the car companies in December of 08, I told my wife —He’s going to create a Command economy (soviet style).
GM and especially Chrysler are doing poorly. BUT, we hear how they are doing just fine—-welcome to Command Economy Comrades.
Little by little, he’s on his way.
The good news is he’s giving lots of campaign ammo to Republicans.
No internships for private business? What a joke.
B.O. might fall/fail under his own Cloward-Piven strategy. Get me some popcorn.
BTW—STILL haven’t seen a good strategy to combat the state-controlled media. All those billboards going up are great. But if we don’t specifically target news anchors and their lies, we’ll just continue to get slandered.
Lauer, Smith and Sawyer should not be allowed to get away with their propaganda. Until they are called out—-in public—on a billboard or TV ad—-we are done. Websites like MRC are great and do a terrific job, but lots and lots of people don’t know or don’t realize just how biased and in the tank they are. You have to go to the sites, the boards are in peoples faces.
RNC—hello?
“A lot of briefing for a 2 hr. special with Dan Rather. Saw the show & wonder why we bothered”. –Ronald Reagan, The Reagan Diaries (January 27, 1982)
Nate Silver is a lightweight
E Pluribus Unum (Diary) Thursday, April 8th at 11:27AM EST (link)Trading on a reputation that IMO was never earned.
Just an empty suit.
Kill the Terrorists
Protect the Borders
Punch the Hippies h/t IMAO
Example
jodetoad Thursday, April 8th at 1:02PM EST (link)In my rural valley we are to be blessed with Stimulus funds. True, we have high unemployment here.
However the funds are going to politically connected big $ guys hundreds of miles away in Los Angeles, to build a huge solar array. It will destroy property values, wreak havoc with adjacent farms and ranches, and is also adjacent to a wildlife preserve which will be damaged. Folks are up in arms over it, we hate the very idea, 10-20 miles down the road are places where nobody would care, but it is more convenient for the developers because of a small switching station near the site.
The construction workers (50) will be imported. The completed facility will employ 3 people, probably not locals.
Thanks so much, Dems.