Intermarkets' Privacy Policy Support
Donate to Ace of Spades HQ! Recent Entries
Democrat Hit Man Jack Smith Discussing How to "Wind Down" His Political Prosecutions of Donald Trump With Merrick Garland
Pro-Crime Soros "Prosecutor" George Gascon Booted Out of Office In 60%-40% Wipeout Quick Post: Whither Ka-Mala? Kamala Harris Addresses What Can Be (Unburdened By What Has Been) Kamala Has Finally Sobered Up Enough to Call Trump to Concede Trump Officially Wins Michigan And Now: The Gloating Wednesday Morning Rant Mid-Morning Art Thread The Morning Report 11/6/24 Absent Friends
Bandersnatch 2024
GnuBreed 2024 Captain Hate 2023 moon_over_vermont 2023 westminsterdogshow 2023 Ann Wilson(Empire1) 2022 Dave In Texas 2022 Jesse in D.C. 2022 OregonMuse 2022 redc1c4 2021 Tami 2021 Chavez the Hugo 2020 Ibguy 2020 Rickl 2019 Joffen 2014 AoSHQ Writers Group
A site for members of the Horde to post their stories seeking beta readers, editing help, brainstorming, and story ideas. Also to share links to potential publishing outlets, writing help sites, and videos posting tips to get published.
Contact OrangeEnt for info:
maildrop62 at proton dot me Cutting The Cord And Email Security
Moron Meet-Ups
|
« CLAIM: FAST & FURIOUS WAS PART OF SECRET DEAL WITH SINALOA DRUG CARTEL TO SUPPLY THEM WITH ARMS IN EXCHANGE FOR INFORMATION ABOUT THEIR COMPETITORS |
Main
| Mikhail Kalishnikov Expressed Remorse Over His Famously Lethal Creation Before His Death Plus: Open Thread Link-o-Rama » January 13, 2014
Corey Booker Falls Below 130% of the Intellectual Poverty Line For Math, Reading, and Basic Common SenseCorey Booker, our newest idiot Senator, Tweeted this:
Could that possibly be true? Half of all students -- which means half of all children, period, given that school is compulsory until age 16 or so -- are in poverty? No. It's not possible. Booker should have realized that half of all children in America were not living in poverty. It's such an outrageous stretch it defies imagination that a halfway reasonable man could have believed such a thing is true. So where did he get this? Let me explain. And as I do, keep two things in mind: 1. These are supposedly our "elite," who do the thinking about policy that we can't do. 2. That "studies" are offered by various quarters on the left which are then taken as proof that we need to Do Something! These should be discounted. Booker should have realized something was wrong with his claim from his own "cite" for the proposition. Because early in the piece, it offers a much lower estimate of student poverty. Not half, but almost 25%. Poverty is the most relevant factor in determining the outcome of a person's educational journey, and in Finland, the child poverty rate is about 5%. In the U.S., the rate is almost five times as high. So that's around 25%. Does that bother Senator Booker? No, because later on there's a "half" figure cited. He doesn't read it very carefully, and doesn't check the citation to see if it's legit. He just seizes on it. Here comes the "half" nonsense: But here's the really bad news. Two new studies on education and poverty were reported in Education Week in October. The first from the Southern Education Foundation reveals that nearly half of all U.S. public school students live in poverty. Two errors in Booker's claim, then: First, this says nearly half. More importantly, it specifies that nearly half of children in public schools "live in poverty." Public schools presumably service a generally-less-wealthy cohort, so we'd expect to find higher poverty rates there. Booker just clips that "public" limitation out of his claim. But still-- half? Doesn't that seem a mite high? What "study" determined this? Well, if Booker had clicked the link, which he obviously did not do, he would have found out that the USAToday contributor misrepresents the "study," as did Edweek.org, which reported on it. Because while this article does indeed make that claim, it gets there by a crooked path: Nearly half of all American public school students now live in poverty, and in broad swaths of the South and Southwest, state supports have not kept pace with significant and rapidly rising majorities of poor students in classrooms, a new report finds. The report says that nearly half are "living in poverty"? Ummm... not quite. Let's read this carefully. In 17 states spanning nearly all of the South, Southwest, and West Coast, a majority of public school students qualified for free or reduced-price meals in 2011, according to the analysis released last week by the Atlanta-based Southern Education Foundation. So the study does not claim that they're "living in poverty," but rather that they receive either free or reduced price lunches through the schools. So that must mean the free and reduced lunches are only offered to students "living poverty," right? Students are entitled to free lunches if their families’ incomes are below 130 percent of the annual income poverty level guideline established by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and updated annually by the Census Bureau (currently $21,756 for a family of four)... Okay, so let's see how EdWeek.org misrepresented this study, which was then misrepresented by USAToday, and then by Cory Booker: It claims that anyone receiving free or reduced-price lunches is "living in poverty." Not true. Free lunches are offered to children of families at 130% of the poverty line -- 30% over it -- and reduced-price lunches are offered to families at up to 185% of the poverty line, nearly double the poverty income level. But Edweek.org takes "130-185% of the poverty line" as "the poverty line." The actual study EdWeek.org purports to be faithfully reporting doesn't say that half of students are "living in poverty." The actual study calls them "low income students" -- a perfectly accurate description, but not grandly Dickensian enough claim to be useful for purposes of political agitation. So that gets edited to "living in poverty." Note what's going on here. The left is essentially running an information-laundering operation. Rather than laundering money, they're laundering information. At each step of the process, the claim is changed ever so slightly, to allow the next lefty to change it slightly more. So that we start with something like: a majority of students in public schools are eligible for free or reduced price lunches, which are given to anyone under 185% of the poverty line and we end up with: Half of all students live in poverty And all we had to do to get there was define "the poverty line" as "the poverty line plus another 85% again of the poverty line." At each step, the claim is cheated and distorted just a little bit more, deformed and tweaked bit by bit until a not-particularly-breathtaking claim is turned into a Ready For Public Consumption Alarmist Factoid, a hot new false new meme spit-polished to a high shine and ready to be bandied about in every Democratic stump speech from now until January 2017. All I needed to debunk this obviously false claim was four things: 1. A functioning bullshit detector and a basic working knowledge of what "half" means 3. The twenty minutes of time required to do so 4. An internet connection Apparently Corey Booker, USAToday, and EdWeek.org are missing one or more of these things. Whatever we do, we should listen more to "wonks," because they're Johnny-on-the-Spot with "studies" and "facts" and really know what they're talking about and have no deceptive agenda at all. And we should trust the media's multiple layers of painstaking fact-checking editorial oversight, of course. I will ask USAToday to correct its misrepresentation of the Souther Education Foundation study. Despite my being right about the study and their being wrong, they will, of course, refuse. | Recent Comments
fd:
"Every time I get to a thread there are already 350 ..."
Soothsayer: " Is this post a Redux? ..." naturalfake: " Ace found this thread at - Dixey's Gently Use ..." Warai-otoko: "346 Can you imagine if the USDA was not owned by B ..." Dash my lace wigs!: "Christopher R Taylor! We've missed you! ..." CTHillary, dead but dreaming: "Oh, yeah - impeachment. Kamala should be impeached ..." Oldcat: "So Harris and the MSM demonizing him as Hitler was ..." Harry Paratestes: "347 It's an old nood, but it checks out. Posted b ..." Shaftoe: "Hochman guy looks like a squish. ..." blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1): "I live here and can't think of any. Posted by: Ol ..." Gentlemen, this is the end of the junta: "Seems she would fit right in on The View ..." Dr. T: "Whining from Michael Ian Black (I forget who that ..." Recent Entries
Democrat Hit Man Jack Smith Discussing How to "Wind Down" His Political Prosecutions of Donald Trump With Merrick Garland
Pro-Crime Soros "Prosecutor" George Gascon Booted Out of Office In 60%-40% Wipeout Quick Post: Whither Ka-Mala? Kamala Harris Addresses What Can Be (Unburdened By What Has Been) Kamala Has Finally Sobered Up Enough to Call Trump to Concede Trump Officially Wins Michigan And Now: The Gloating Wednesday Morning Rant Mid-Morning Art Thread The Morning Report 11/6/24 Search
Polls! Polls! Polls!
Frequently Asked Questions
The (Almost) Complete Paul Anka Integrity Kick
Primary Document: The Audio
Paul Anka Haiku Contest Announcement Integrity SAT's: Entrance Exam for Paul Anka's Band AllahPundit's Paul Anka 45's Collection AnkaPundit: Paul Anka Takes Over the Site for a Weekend (Continues through to Monday's postings) George Bush Slices Don Rumsfeld Like an F*ckin' Hammer Top Top Tens
Democratic Forays into Erotica New Shows On Gore's DNC/MTV Network Nicknames for Potatoes, By People Who Really Hate Potatoes Star Wars Euphemisms for Self-Abuse Signs You're at an Iraqi "Wedding Party" Signs Your Clown Has Gone Bad Signs That You, Geroge Michael, Should Probably Just Give It Up Signs of Hip-Hop Influence on John Kerry NYT Headlines Spinning Bush's Jobs Boom Things People Are More Likely to Say Than "Did You Hear What Al Franken Said Yesterday?" Signs that Paul Krugman Has Lost His Frickin' Mind All-Time Best NBA Players, According to Senator Robert Byrd Other Bad Things About the Jews, According to the Koran Signs That David Letterman Just Doesn't Care Anymore Examples of Bob Kerrey's Insufferable Racial Jackassery Signs Andy Rooney Is Going Senile Other Judgments Dick Clarke Made About Condi Rice Based on Her Appearance Collective Names for Groups of People John Kerry's Other Vietnam Super-Pets Cool Things About the XM8 Assault Rifle Media-Approved Facts About the Democrat Spy Changes to Make Christianity More "Inclusive" Secret John Kerry Senatorial Accomplishments John Edwards Campaign Excuses John Kerry Pick-Up Lines Changes Liberal Senator George Michell Will Make at Disney Torments in Dog-Hell Greatest Hitjobs
The Ace of Spades HQ Sex-for-Money Skankathon A D&D Guide to the Democratic Candidates Margaret Cho: Just Not Funny More Margaret Cho Abuse Margaret Cho: Still Not Funny Iraqi Prisoner Claims He Was Raped... By Woman Wonkette Announces "Morning Zoo" Format John Kerry's "Plan" Causes Surrender of Moqtada al-Sadr's Militia World Muslim Leaders Apologize for Nick Berg's Beheading Michael Moore Goes on Lunchtime Manhattan Death-Spree Milestone: Oliver Willis Posts 400th "Fake News Article" Referencing Britney Spears Liberal Economists Rue a "New Decade of Greed" Artificial Insouciance: Maureen Dowd's Word Processor Revolts Against Her Numbing Imbecility Intelligence Officials Eye Blogs for Tips They Done Found Us Out, Cletus: Intrepid Internet Detective Figures Out Our Master Plan Shock: Josh Marshall Almost Mentions Sarin Discovery in Iraq Leather-Clad Biker Freaks Terrorize Australian Town When Clinton Was President, Torture Was Cool What Wonkette Means When She Explains What Tina Brown Means Wonkette's Stand-Up Act Wankette HQ Gay-Rumors Du Jour Here's What's Bugging Me: Goose and Slider My Own Micah Wright Style Confession of Dishonesty Outraged "Conservatives" React to the FMA An On-Line Impression of Dennis Miller Having Sex with a Kodiak Bear The Story the Rightwing Media Refuses to Report! Our Lunch with David "Glengarry Glen Ross" Mamet The House of Love: Paul Krugman A Michael Moore Mystery (TM) The Dowd-O-Matic! Liberal Consistency and Other Myths Kepler's Laws of Liberal Media Bias John Kerry-- The Splunge! Candidate "Divisive" Politics & "Attacks on Patriotism" (very long) The Donkey ("The Raven" parody) |