Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics
In scanning todays news, (Thursday, 9/11/08), I saw two competing headlines, one from the Boston Globe, and one from Fox News.
I am not real familiar with the Globe, but I suspect that it may have a bit of a liberal view of things, but the gist of its story was that the war on terror has slipped a little in ther minds of the electorate in terms of its weight in the decision making process on what candidate to support on November 4.
The Globe pitches the statistic that 30% of voters fear a terror attack 'in the next few weeks', down from last year and down very significantly from the first anniversary of the attack in 2001. The modifiers, "fear" & "in the next few weeks" throw me a little. For the purposes of this poll, what do they mean?
Then we have FOX News. Fox reports that 80% of Americans think that the war on terrorism is as important today as it was on the day of the attacks. That is the headline. The fine print goes on, (admirably), to break down the stat's by party affiliation and circumstances, although the modifiers are still a bit slanted towards a Republican outcome.
As a well known movie character once lamented, "what we have here, is failure to communicate".
Maybe not. What we have here, is repetition of a notion that somebody wants to stick in our minds on election day. The so called "war on terror" is quickly taking its place along side abortion as one of those clubs that mean everything and mean nothing. It won't be long before we see the term creep into local issues, such as street repairs and local community elections.
"Vote for Joe Blow for Dog Catcher, he's tough on terrorists".
In my own community I have seen local politicians state, for the record that illegal immigration was the biggest problem that we face. This, in a state whose closest border is a mere 800 miles away, that, by its own audit, has eliminated most, if not all, undocumented persons from the relief rolls, and cut benefits by a large percentage for the documented, (of all ethnic persuasions).
The time has come to ask simple questions and demand simple answers.
What is "the war on terror"? What are it's goals? I have a sick feeling that there is no clear answer, and that the driving philosophy behind it is that "doing good has no end".
If Obama or McCain wanted to impress me, they would deliver bin Laden and ten miscellaneous al Qaida stooges and parade them through the US before they were tried and convicted. They ought to be stored in a nice prison someplace, maybe with Charlie Manson, or a few lesser known serial killers, and trotted out every year or two for a procedural court appearance, just to show we care. The rest can be shot while escaping. The chief cash crop in the Afghanistan region, opium poppies, should be purchased at a very fair price and eradicated. teach them to grow something else and warn them that we are watching and won't pay the next time we burn the fields. The world will scream for a week or so, then move on to the price of music downloads from iTunes or something really important.
My point is that there needs to be a clear ending to these issues. If they pop up again, take care of them in a decisive but quick way. Sooner or later, it will no longer be advantagous for them to pop up. I am tired of messing with them. There is a middle ground between just stopping and saving the money, and milking things, hoping for an everybody wins victory. it ain't pretty, in fact it is ugly, but at least the ugly gets spread around.
I am not real familiar with the Globe, but I suspect that it may have a bit of a liberal view of things, but the gist of its story was that the war on terror has slipped a little in ther minds of the electorate in terms of its weight in the decision making process on what candidate to support on November 4.
The Globe pitches the statistic that 30% of voters fear a terror attack 'in the next few weeks', down from last year and down very significantly from the first anniversary of the attack in 2001. The modifiers, "fear" & "in the next few weeks" throw me a little. For the purposes of this poll, what do they mean?
Then we have FOX News. Fox reports that 80% of Americans think that the war on terrorism is as important today as it was on the day of the attacks. That is the headline. The fine print goes on, (admirably), to break down the stat's by party affiliation and circumstances, although the modifiers are still a bit slanted towards a Republican outcome.
As a well known movie character once lamented, "what we have here, is failure to communicate".
Maybe not. What we have here, is repetition of a notion that somebody wants to stick in our minds on election day. The so called "war on terror" is quickly taking its place along side abortion as one of those clubs that mean everything and mean nothing. It won't be long before we see the term creep into local issues, such as street repairs and local community elections.
"Vote for Joe Blow for Dog Catcher, he's tough on terrorists".
In my own community I have seen local politicians state, for the record that illegal immigration was the biggest problem that we face. This, in a state whose closest border is a mere 800 miles away, that, by its own audit, has eliminated most, if not all, undocumented persons from the relief rolls, and cut benefits by a large percentage for the documented, (of all ethnic persuasions).
The time has come to ask simple questions and demand simple answers.
What is "the war on terror"? What are it's goals? I have a sick feeling that there is no clear answer, and that the driving philosophy behind it is that "doing good has no end".
If Obama or McCain wanted to impress me, they would deliver bin Laden and ten miscellaneous al Qaida stooges and parade them through the US before they were tried and convicted. They ought to be stored in a nice prison someplace, maybe with Charlie Manson, or a few lesser known serial killers, and trotted out every year or two for a procedural court appearance, just to show we care. The rest can be shot while escaping. The chief cash crop in the Afghanistan region, opium poppies, should be purchased at a very fair price and eradicated. teach them to grow something else and warn them that we are watching and won't pay the next time we burn the fields. The world will scream for a week or so, then move on to the price of music downloads from iTunes or something really important.
My point is that there needs to be a clear ending to these issues. If they pop up again, take care of them in a decisive but quick way. Sooner or later, it will no longer be advantagous for them to pop up. I am tired of messing with them. There is a middle ground between just stopping and saving the money, and milking things, hoping for an everybody wins victory. it ain't pretty, in fact it is ugly, but at least the ugly gets spread around.
posted by eccentric recluse at 8:54 AM
1 Comments:
You know people will lose their shit and cry shenanigans when iTunes downloads go over $.99 for one song.
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