Eugene Volokh's Blog, page 2723
August 31, 2011
"A New York Times Reporter Tips His Hand"
That's the title of a post from Heather Mac Donald (Secular Right); here's an excerpt, though you should read the whole post:
In the course of a column blasting media entrepreneur Steven Brill's new book on the school reform movement, New York Times reporter Michael Winerip inadvertently sets out his economic assumptions. A revelation of an entire world view does not get any more crystalline than this. (Regarding education, Winerip almost equally tellingly criticises Brill for not showing enough respect to teachers and teachers unions.)
Winerip lists several of Brill's sources — the "millionaires and billionaires who attack the unions and steered the Democratic Party to their cause" — then adds:
I expected Mr. Brill to explore why these men single out the union for blame when children fail. If a substantial part of the problem was poverty and not bad teachers, the question would be why people like them are allowed to make so much when others have so little.
Who exactly is doing the "allowing" here? In Winerip's world, people earn, keep, and invest money only by the sufferance of some greater authority — presumably the government, which implicitly decides how much they should be "allowed" to make. What if I decide that Michael Winerip is making too "much when others have so little"? Winerip's income undoubtedly dwarfs that of a teen mother on welfare in Harlem. Why should he be "allowed" to make so much? My guess is that Winerip feels that his income is at best commensurate with his labors, if not inadequate to those labors. Yet there have been plenty of governments in recent human history — the Cultural Revolution comes immediately to mind — for whom Winerip's income and class status would be a clear sign of bourgeois decadence and injustice, requiring radical redistribution or even the destruction of all such cushy Times positions....
The Tenth Amendment and Sovereignty
Doug Kendall of the Constitutional Accountability Center writes: "The Tenth Amendment, like all other Amendments, is a binding part of the Constitution that should be fully respected.... [But w]hen the states ratified the Constitution, they renounced their status as fully-independent sovereigns and endowed the federal government with enumerated but substantial powers."
Kendall is correct. Anyone, tea partier or not, who claims that the states retain full "sovereignty" after 1789 doesn't know what he is talking about.
Kendall's next sentence, however, doesn't follow at all: "The Tenth Amendment does not give tea partiers, or anyone else, a constitutional basis for rolling back critical laws that protect Americans' health, safety, and retirement security."
Through the New Deal period, it was accepted that the states did retain an important element of sovereign power inherited from the British Parliament, the "police power." The scope of the police power was subject to much debate, but it was typically thought to at least conclude the power to protect and promote state citizen's health, safety, and morals. Progressive types argued that promoting the public's "welfare" was also part of the police power.
Meanwhile, the Commerce Clause provided the federal government with the power to regulate commerce among the states. The scope of this power was also disputed, but there was a consensus that the Clause could not have provided the federal government with a "general police power," because the states (and "the people") never delegated, and would not have delegated, that aspect of sovereign power to the federal government. And then the Tenth Amendment reminds us that "the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution" remain with the states.
If the states HAD delegated the general police power to the Federal Government, then the liberty of contract cases of the pre-New Deal period would have had far more extreme outcomes. The reason that most forms of novel (and not so novel) state and local regulation were upheld before the New Deal period was because courts found that even if these laws interfered with liberty of contract, they were with the states' sovereign police powers.
Well, you may ask, why can't both the federal and state governments have a sovereign police power? It just can't be, given the nature of sovereignty. The federal and state governments can have overlapping powers, but they can't have overlapping sovereignties.
In short, then, the Tenth Amendment can, and historically has been, used as an argument to "roll back" federal health and safety laws. Whatever the scope of the Commerce Clause, it can't be the equivalent of a general police power, and the Tenth Amendment is part of the reason why. But since the New Deal period, most liberal jurists have adopted theories of the Commerce Clause that put no practical limits on federal regulatory power, and therefore do give the federal government the equivalent of a police power. [Just for example, in the Lopez case, the majority challenged Justice Breyer, who dissented, to come up with a single example of a federal law that would be unconstitutional under his interpretation of the Commerce Clause. Breyer demurred, most likely because there is no such law.]
Folks like Kendall simply don't take the understanding of state-federal relations that prevailed for over 150 years seriously, as witnessed by the fact that he used the precise example–health and safety laws–that would most clearly undermine his point. Of course, Kendall is free to argue that the whole notion of police powers, state sovereignty, and whatnot is undermined by the last seventy years of American history, and it's certainly a legitimate argument. But that's a far cry from saying that the counterargument is somehow crazy, irresponsible, or ahistorical.
August 30, 2011
Case Study of an L.A. Times Article
Part 2 of my book is entitled "A Distortion Theory of Bias." It begins with Chapter 6: "Lies, Damned Lies, and Omitted Statistics." The following are the first several paragraphs of the chapter:
In the previous chapter I applied an economic signaling model to the media. In particular, I suggested that the news reports of a journalist are similar to the "messages" that the "sender" in such a model reports to the "receiver."
For such an application to be appropriate, however, a particular principle must be true: The journalist must be more informed about the particular news topic than her readers or viewers are. Rarely, I suggest, will this principle not be true. Journalists, at least usually, read lots of background material and interview many key observers to make sure that it is true.
Sometimes, however, it won't be true. That is, if you are lucky, there will be a rare moment or two in your life, where you read or watch a news story, and you know at least as much about the story as the journalist knows. Usually, for this to happen, you must be one of the participants in the story, or, due to special circumstances, a very close observer.
"A Startling Statistic at UCLA"
Such an occasion happened to me on June 3, 2006. "A Startling Statistic at UCLA" was the headline I read that morning on the front page of the Los Angeles Times.
The article noted the low number of African Americans who would enroll as freshmen at UCLA that Autumn; it implied that the applications process was stacked against them; and at times it hinted—mainly through quotes of some far-left students and other observers—that the problem was that UCLA faculty and administrators did not have sufficient desire for racial diversity.
At the time I was a member of the faculty oversight committee for admissions at UCLA, and accordingly, I knew the admissions process very well.
The author of the article, Rebecca Trounson, presented a very misleading picture of the process and its results, and I became outraged when I read the article. While the rest of the world would think one thing about UCLA admissions, I knew that if they were fully informed, they would think something vastly different.
Yet, while the article was misleading and outrageous, it contained zero false statements.
[From Left Turn by Tim Groseclose, PhD. Copyright © 2011 by the author and reprinted by kind permission of St. Martin's Press, LLC. All rights reserved.]
The article began as follows:
This fall 4,852 freshmen are expected to enroll at UCLA, but only 96, or 2%, are African American—the lowest figure in decades and a growing concern at the Westwood campus.
For several years, students, professors and administrators at UCLA have watched with discouragement as the numbers of black students declined. But the new figures, released this week, have … prompted school leaders to declare the situation a crisis.
UCLA—which … is in a county that is 9.8% African American — now has a lower percentage of black freshmen than either crosstown rival USC or UC Berkeley, the school often considered its top competitor within the UC system.
The 96 figure—down by 20 students from last year—is the lowest for incoming African American freshmen since at least 1973. And of the [96 expected to enroll], 20 are recruited athletes, admissions officials said.
You can read the entire article here.
As I explain, the bias in the article came not from any false statements that the author wrote but from true statements that she omitted. In the book, I list several such statements:
At UCLA almost half of all entering undergraduate students are transfers, not freshmen. During the time in question, early summer of 2006, 108 black transfer students were expected to enroll—22 more than the year before.Thus, on net, when you count freshmen and transfers, compared to the year before, the total expected black undergraduate enrollment increased by 2 students.Like many universities, UCLA has a separate admissions process for star athletes. Because the NCAA had imposed stricter standards in 2006, UCLA coaches requested that the admissions office hold athletes to a higher academic standard, which resulted in fewer black athletes admitted to UCLA. Specifically, in 2006 only 20 black athletes were expected to enroll, compared to 27 the prior year. Thus, if the NCAA had not changed its rules, UCLA would likely have enrolled approximately seven more black students. Accordingly, its net increase, compared to the year before, in total undergraduate black enrollment would have been not 2, but approximately 7 more, or 9. (A University official told me that Trounson was given this general information. However, the only part that she reported was that 20 of the 96 incoming black freshmen were athletes, not that this was a decrease from the year before, nor that this decrease was caused by new NCAA policies.)Attitudes among UCLA faculty and staff are extremely pro– affirmative action. The best evidence of this came in 1996, when California voters passed Proposition 209, which disallowed public universities to consider race in admissions. After it was implemented, black admissions decreased by approximately 50%. Thus, the new law revealed that, when the law did not constrain UCLA's ability to practice affirmative action, about half of all black students would not have been admitted had their skin color been different.Other evidence of the politically correct attitudes was how UCLA changed its admissions rules in response to Proposition 209. Shortly after the new law and the resulting decrease in black admissions, UCLA created a Life Challenge Index to help judge applicants. This gave students additional points if, e.g., their parents were poor, the quality of their high school was low, or if they faced a physical handicap. While most of the factors in the Index were fairly uncontroversial, some were not. For instance, a student gained a point if he or she was a single parent. Also controversial was the motivation behind the Life Challenge Index. As no one denies, it was designed to be a proxy for race.Like many universities, UCLA rewards high school students who take difficult classes, especially Advanced Placement classes. Students who take these classes receive a grade from their own high school, as well as a score from a national, standardized test. The test helps to eliminate idiosyncratic factors, such as varying degrees of grade inflation in high schools. UCLA, however, ignores the scores from the national test; it only considers the grade that the student's high school reports. The reason, as one of my senior colleagues on the committee told me, is that if UCLA did consider scores from the standardized test, fewer minority students would be admitted.Many aspects of the UCLA admissions process violated the spirit of Proposition 209, if not its letter. Although sociologist Darnell Hunt said the campus was doing less than it could, an argument could be made that the campus was doing more than it could, at least legally.Students who apply to UCLA are aware of the politically-correct, pro-affirmative-action attitudes, and in order to exploit them, a large number of minority students reveal their race on the personal essays that they write in their applications.Although they would not say it, the affirmative-action groups wanted a "holistic" system so that all readers could learn the race of applicants via the personal essays. In contrast, the old system allowed only some of the applications readers to read the personal essays.Although the article noted that African Americans comprised 9.8% of Los Angeles County, it did not note that that African Americans comprised only 4.6% of the applicants to UCLA.Only 31% of the students expected to enroll at UCLA in 2006 were white, just short of a record low. (Although Trounson did not mention this fact in the text of her article, a careful reader would learn this from a pie chart that accompanied the article.)[From Left Turn by Tim Groseclose, PhD. Copyright © 2011 by the author and reprinted by kind permission of St. Martin's Press, LLC. All rights reserved.]
$60,000 Damages for Blogging the Truth About Someone, Intending to Get the Person Fired
I blogged about the Johnny Northside case (Allen v. Hoff) when the verdict came down, but there's now a moderately detailed trial court opinion refusing to set the verdict aside. Here's an excerpt from a Minneapolis Star-Tribune article about this latest development:
The jury ruled last March that [John] Hoff's scathing blog post amounted to actively interfering with [Jerry] Moore's job at the U, even though Hoff's statements were true when he linked Moore to high-profile mortgage fraud.
The jury awarded Moore $35,000 for lost wages and $25,000 for emotional distress....
Moore, former executive director of the Jordan Area Community Council, was hired in early 2009 at the U's Urban Research and Outreach/Engagement Center to study mortgage foreclosures.
When Hoff found out about the hire, he wrote a post accusing Moore of being involved in a "high-profile fraudulent mortgage" that was one of several resulting in a 16-year prison sentence for former real estate agent Larry Maxwell. Moore was not charged in that case.
Hoff took partial credit for Moore's firing in a later blog post, to which Moore responded with his suit.
As I wrote in March, people are constitutionally entitled to speak the truth about others, even with the goal of trying to get them fired. (The tort actually requires either knowledge that such a result is practically certain or a purpose of producing such a result, but I take it that here the allegation is that Hoff wanted Moore to get fired.) The First Amendment constrains the interference with business relations tort, just as it constrains the infliction of emotional distress and other torts. See NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co. (1982); Blatty v. New York Times Co. (Cal. 1986) (speech constitutionally protected against a libel claim is also protected against an interference with business relations claim); Paradise Hills Assocs. (Cal. Ct. App. 1991) (same); Delloma v. Consolidated Coal Co. (7th Cir. 1993) ("permitting recovery for tortious interference based on truthful statements would seem to raise significant First Amendment problems"); Jefferson Cty. Sch. Dist. No. R-1 v. Moody's Investor's Services (10th Cir. 1999) (holding that interference with business relations and interference with contract claims can't be based on expressions of opinion). The same should apply to the closely related interference with contract tort. See, e.g., Jefferson Cty. Sch. Dist.
Perhaps because of this, the Restatement (Second) of Torts § 772(a) provides that, "One who intentionally causes a third person not to perform a contract or not to enter into a prospective contractual relation with another does not interfere improperly with the other's contractual relation, by giving the third person ... truthful information." See also, among many other cases, Walnut Street Assocs., Inc. v. Brokerage Concepts, Inc. (Pa. Super. 2009) (so holding); Recio v. Evers (Neb. 2009) (likewise). Minnesota seems to have accepted § 772(a) as well, see Glass Service Co. v. State Farm Ins. Co. (Minn. Ct. App. 1995); Fox Sports Net North, LLC v. Minnesota Twins Partnership (8th Cir. 2003). But even if Minnesota courts take the opposite view as a matter of state law, such a view would be preempted by the First Amendment.
But the trial court's opinion doesn't discuss either of these arguments, even though Hoff's lawyer raised both in his motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict. (I'm told that the arguments were indeed raised at trial, and thus haven't been waived; and the judge's opinion doesn't mention them at all, even to say that they had been waived.) I'm told that an appeal is forthcoming, and I hope the decision is reversed on appeal. In any case, here's the heart of the trial court opinion:
Plaintiff Jerry L. Moore[ brought suit] for defamation, interference with contractual relationships, and interference with prospective advantage against Defendant John Hoff. A jury trial was held ... [and] the jury ... returned a verdict in favor of Defendant on Plaintiff's defamation claim, and in favor of Plaintiff on the remaining two claims. Specifically, the jury found Defendant intentionally interfered with Plaintiff's employment contract and interfered with Plaintiffs prospective employment advantage.... Defendant filed a notice of motion and motion for judgment as a matter of law or for a new trial....
When considering a motion for judgment as a matter of law, the district court must take into account all of the evidence in the case, view that evidence in a light most favorable to the jury verdict, and not weigh the evidence or judge the credibility of the witnesses.... [J]udgment as a matter of law under Rule 50 may only be granted "when a jury verdict has no reasonable support in fact or is contrary to law." ...
Plaintiff's Complaint alleged that Defendant intentionally interfered with his contractual rights by actively working to get Plaintiff fired from his position at the University of Minnesota by, among other things, contacting individuals at the University of Minnesota, making disparaging remarks about Plaintiff, and encouraging others to do the same. To establish a claim for tortious interference of contract, a plaintiff must show: (1) the existence of a contract; (2) knowledge of the contract; (3) intentional procurement of the contract's breach; (4) absence of justification; and (5) damages caused by the breach. Similarly, a claim for tortious interference with prospective advantage requires a showing that: (l) the defendant intentionally and improperly interfered with the prospective contractual relation, (2) causing pecuniary harm resulting from loss of the benefits of the relation, and (3) the interference either induced or otherwise caused a third person not to enter into or continue the prospective relation or prevented the continuance of the prospective relation....
[T]he Court heard direct testimony regarding Defendant's active involvement in getting Plaintiff fired by contacting leaders at the University of Minnesota and threatening to launch a negative public relations campaign if Plaintiff remained in their employment. By way of example, Don Allen testified that he sent an email to the University of Minnesota, at Defendant's behest, threatening negative publicity and lobbying to get Plaintiff fired. In addition to Mr. Allen's direct testimony, the jury also heard circumstantial evidence supporting the jury's verdict. The Court heard testimony that Plaintiff was terminated from his position at the University of Minnesota one day after transmission of the email from Mr. Allen. Furthermore, during this same time period, Defendant acknowledged that it was his goal to get Plaintiff fired and that he was working "behind the scenes" to do so. After the fact, Defendant took personal responsibility for Plaintiff s termination and announced his ongoing, active involvement in the University's actions. The direct evidence, combined with the inferences drawn from the circumstantial evidence presented, supports the jury's verdict....
During the course of the trial, the jury was asked to consider whether a particular statement ["Repeated and specific evidence in Hennepin County District Court shows that Jerry Moore was involved in a high-profile fraudulent mortgage at 1564 Hillside Ave. N."] was true or false for the purposes of assessing Plaintiffs defamation c1aim. The jury determined that the statement was not false. With his current motion, Defendant argues that the jury's award in favor of Plaintiff on the tortious interference claims were premised solely upon the same statement that formed the basis of Plaintiff's defamation claim. Defendant does not present any evidence in support of this argument, nor does the Court find it necessary to invade the province of the jury.
It is not the Court's function to determine on what theory the jury arrived at its verdict. Instead, it is the Court's responsibility to interpret the special verdict form "and harmonize the jury's responses where possible." Thus, the Court must sustain the verdict "on any reasonable theory of evidence." By special verdict, the jury found Defendant's statement was not false, but that his conduct, taken as a whole, amounted to an intentional interference with Plaintiff's employment contract and prospective employment advantage....
Why Do Politicians Cite Think Tanks?: A Reply to Groseclove
Many thanks to Timothy Groseclove for confirming that I understand the basic methodology of the paper underlying his book. Here's my follow-up question, if I may: Am I right that the paper assumes that politicians cite think tanks for the same basic reasons that journalists cite think tanks? Put another way, am I right that the paper assumes that you can compare journalist-citations and politician-citations because they measure the same thing?
If I'm right, that assumption seems problematic to me. Here's why. Journalists see their goal as informing their audiences. They cite think tanks to inform their audiences about what is happening. They want to get the reasonable range of views on a topic, so they cite think tanks that reflect what they see as the reasonable range of views.
Politicians cite think tanks for a different reason. Politicians make speeches and issue press releases to persuade rather than to inform. As a rule, politicians will cite think tanks if and only if they can find a think tank that said something that supports the politician's view. To maximize the persuasiveness of the argument, the politician will cite the think tank that is the most respectable source that said something echoing their view. And of course think tanks occasionally exist to fill that role: If a powerful person or group needs someone respectable-sounding to say X, they will fund a person who sits in an office as the Executive Director of The Center for American Goodness to reliably say X to whoever will listen.
If I'm right about these differences, then comparing journalist-citations and politician-citations seems a bit like comparing apples and oranges. Of course, I would imagine the two correlate somewhat. It's easy to see why. If a journalist has very liberal views, they will probably see the range of reasonable opinion as tilting to the left; and if a politician is very liberal, they will probably only find liberal think tanks to support their views. So a correlation makes sense. But as I understand it, the paper is not assuming that the two correlate. Rather, the paper assumes that the two measure exactly the same thing, and then seeks to show that that the media is biased because journalist-citations don't exactly match the citation practices of a centrist politician. That seems like a weak assumption given the very different reasons journalists and politicians cite think tanks.
Of course, none of this means that the media isn't biased. But unless I'm missing something — which is certainly possible! — the different reasons journalists and politicians cite think tanks leaves me unconvinced that comparing the citation practices generates "scientific proof" of media bias.
My Reply to Orin Kerr
Professor Kerr: Everything you said is exactly right. Except, technically that was the methodology of my QJE paper with Milyo, not necessarily the methodology of my book.
My book uses three (and if you count Ch. 14, four) methodologies. Only one of those is the QJE-article methodology.
Here is a copy of the QJE paper. In case anyone has a copy of my book, I describe that methodology in Ch. 13.
For readers who want a less technical description of the methodology of the QJE article, here is a critique by Geoffrey Nunberg. And here is a response by Milyo and me.
Trying to Understand the Methodology of "Left Turn"
As a welcome to our guest-blogger Tim Groseclose, I'm hoping he won't mind my effort to try to understand the methodology of the study behind his book Left Turn. As I understand the methodology, the main idea is to compare citations to think tanks by two groups, politicians and journalists. The study begins by looking at what think tanks politicians cite as authority, and uses that to get a sense of the ideology of different think tanks. It then looks at what think tanks are cited as authority by journalists at different media sources. A newspaper or TV channel is liberal if it tends to cite think tanks that are cited by liberal politicians — liberal as judged by their votes in a series of chosen legislative matters — and it's conservative if it tends to cite think tanks that are cited by conservative politicians. So the basic conclusion of the book, that the media has a liberal bias, is rooted in the finding that most journalists cite more liberal think tank and fewer conservative think tanks than does a centrist politician. Put another way, the media is biased because when it looks for experts to quote as authority, it tends to favor liberal experts over conservative experts more than does a centrist politician.
Am I right about that, or even close? Sorry to ask such a basic question, but I don't feel I can comment on Groseclose's argument before I understand the methodology of the study he conducted.
Non-Extremist American Muslims Worried About Extremism Among American Muslims
The Pew Center has an interesting new report on Muslim Americans. Some items from it:
1. The report estimates the Muslim population of the U.S., at 2.75 million, rather below the 5-to-7 million estimates that some have given and consistent with the "high-side estimates" from the 2001 National Opinion Research Center survey.
2. The overwhelming majority of American Muslims rejects political violence against civilians (81% say "Suicide bombing/other violence against civilians is [never] justified to defend Islam from its enemies," compared to only 19% in the Palestinian territories, 38% in Egypt, and 60% in Turkey), and have very unfavorable views of al Qaeda (70%).
3. The rejection of al Qaeda actually seems to be considerably higher among foreign-born Muslims than among black native-born Muslims, who I assume have very little connection to the Middle East. (I take it the great bulk of black native-born Muslims come from families who have been in America for a long time, though a few might be the children of African immigrants, from instance from Nigeria or Somalia.)
Among the foreign-born, 75% have very unfavorable views of al Qaeda (9% have somewhat unfavorable, 3% have favorable, and 14% say "don't know" or refuse to answer). Among black native-born Muslims, only 56% have very unfavorable views of al Qaeda (21% have somewhat unfavorable, 11% have favorable, and 12% say "don't know"). The difference seems statistically significant at the 95% level, despite the high margins of error for these subgroups. Non-black native-born Muslims are in-between, at 62% very unfavorable (15% somewhat unfavorable, 10% favorable, 13% "don't know"), though I don't think that those differences are statistically significant.
4. The overwhelming majority of American Muslims also supports women's participation in business life and political life. When asked whether they agree with "women should be able to work outside the home," 72% completely agreed and 18% mostly agreed (for the American public at large, the numbers are 81% and 16%, and for Muslims in many Muslim countries, such as Egypt, Indonesia, and Pakistan, the numbers are generally much lower). When asked "who do you think make better political leaders?" — men or women — 68% said there's no difference, 4% said women, and 27% said men; the numbers for the American public at large were 72%, 12%, and 13%, and the numbers in other Muslim countries were much less supportive of women on this question.
5. And most American Muslims view Israel's existence as compatible with what they see as the rights of Palestinians: When asked which comes closest to their opinion, 62% said that "A way can be found for the state of Israel to exist so that the rights and needs of the Palestinian people are taken care of," and 20% said "The rights and needs of the Palestinian people cannot be taken care of as long as the state of Israel exists." By comparison, the numbers for the general American public were 67% and 12%, and the numbers in the Muslim countries listed in the report were far more anti-Israel (the least anti-Israel were Lebanon, with 40% and 59%, and Indonesia, with 37% and 43%; for Pakistan, for instance, the numbers were 13% and 47%).
6. All this having been said, American Muslims are worried about extremism among American Muslims, doubtless because even a modest percentage of extremists can reflect a high number of extremists. Among all Muslims, 60% are "very" or "somewhat" concerned "about possible rise of Islamic extremism in the U.S." (the percentages are 78% for black native-born Muslims, and 52–53% for foreign-born Muslims).
7. Likewise, 21% believe there is "a fair amount" (15%) or "a great deal" (6%) of "support for extremism ... among Muslims living in the U.S.," only 34% believe there is "none at all"; 30% say "not too much," and 15% say "don't know" or refuse to answer.
8. And 48% of American Muslims say that "Muslim leaders in the U.S. ... have ... not done enough to speak out against Islamic extremists"; 34% say that the leaders have "done as much as they should" (1% volunteered the answer "done too much," and 17% said they didn't know, or refused to answer).
So it seems to me that this survey suggests that extremists make up only a small percentage of American Muslims, but still make up a sufficient number that other American Muslims are worried about them. (Indeed, the worry of most American Muslims likely reflects both most American Muslims' not being extremists — presumably, extremists generally aren't worried about extremism — and their recognition that some are extremists.) I express no opinion in this post about what is to be done about that (e.g., to what extent this justifies surveillance of mosques and the like); but it struck me as worth noting.
Thanks to Prof. Howard Friedman (Religion Clause) for the pointer.
An Unplanned Response to Comments about my book, Left Turn
If I had followed my plan for guest blogging, my second post would have discussed (i) my resignation from the UCLA admissions committee, (ii) when I resigned, why I suspected that UCLA—in violation of Prop. 209—was using race as a factor in admissions, and (iii) how an L.A. Times article distorted the truth about UCLA, race, and admissions. I'll discuss those topics later, maybe this afternoon.
Except here is one detail I want to give now. Before resigning, I attended the Martin Luther King Day celebration at my daughter's elementary school. At the celebration, Mrs. Baker, my daughter's teacher explained: "Just as we shouldn't judge a book by it's cover, we shouldn't judge people by the color of their skin."
My post yesterday, as well as my book in general, seems to have touched a few nerves. I'm now ready to respond to some of the comments about that post. Here goes.
Ted says:Uh. Does anyone expect a book titled Left Turn: How Liberal Media Bias Distorts the American Mind is going to contain legitimate and honest research? I mean, it might, but I don't think any one would expect it to do so, and more often than not, they would be correct.
If you were serious about the issue, and wanted to actually prove a point via research and analysis, you title the book Media Influence: How Media Bias Affects Consumers' Beliefs and Actions. That's something I might read if I wanted to learn something, but judging from the comments so far, that's not the book that Prof. Groseclose wrote.
Mrs. Baker's comments, I think, were wise not just in regard to race, but also literally in regard to how one should judge a book.
As for judging the book by the comments of VC readers, I'm certain that very few, if any, of them have actually read the book. I provide some evidence below.
Dilan Esper says:I'd be curious where Groseclose gets his funding from and how much it was.
As a general rule, conservative books that have polemical titles with a short catchphrase followed by a colon and which are put out by publishing houses with a long history of publishing conservative titles are generally well-funded and have a function of serving the interests of movement conservativism, not a truth-seeking function. I'd especially be interested in knowing whether, if his "study" had found that there was actually right-wing media bias or that left-wing bias had no effect or was overstated, his financiers would have gone ahead and supported the book.
Generally, if you don't want to look like a hack, this isn't the way you go about publishing a study. A peer-reviewed academic journal is a better way to go.
Again, Mrs. Baker, I believe, gives some wise advice.
I hope readers will do a quick search on Amazon. St. Martin's Press is not a publishing house like the ones the commenter describes above. I'm pretty sure that no employee at St. Martin's has a PQ below 40.
While researching and writing the book, all of the research money and salary that I received came only from the universities that employed me, Stanford and University of California.
The Introduction of the book, as well as many other parts, explain how the book extends a peer-reviewed article by me and Jeff Milyo, an economics professor at the University of Missouri.
Chapter 4 explains how PQ scores are based on a separate peer-reviewed article by Steve Levitt, Jim Snyder, and me.
Lots and lots of the other findings are based upon peer-reviewed research by others.
The Introduction explains my belief that the left tend to be more vicious than the right. The main reason, as I explain, is that they worship "the god of Equality." The above commenter, I believe, illustrates the point beautifully. If he or she had read the Introduction—and therefore understood how well he or she illustrates the point—then I don't believe he or she would have written the above comment.
Powerlineblog reprinted the Introduction. I encourage readers to read it and determine for themselves if the commenter really does illustrate my point so beautifully. I hope readers will also notice how his or her tactic—to claim, without any evidence, that an author is rigging his conclusions to appease a conservative benefactor—can backfire. That is, please note (i) how Eric Alterman did that very thing, (ii) how angry it made one of my liberal colleagues, and (iii) how it inspired the colleague to write a long email to Alterman explaining how inappropriate his actions were.
(Also, see this video, where Steve Doocy, of Fox & Friends, interviews me about the incident.)
Randy says:Chapter 16 examines two facts, both equally true, about George W. Bush's tax-cut proposal. One fact was critical of Bush's policy. The other was complimentary. As p. 185 notes, Fox News' Special Report noted the critical fact 59 times and noted the complimentary fact 28 times. As p. 186 notes, the Washington Times noted the critical fact 44 times and noted the complimentary fact 18 times. I'm willing to bet that the above commenter, like the other commenters, did not read the book.Additionally, I would note that either the Times or Fox News has rarely, if ever, criticized a Republican President, unless it was to complaint he wasn't conservative enough.
Marcus says:
I also found it odd that there were a number of 60–0 votes on behalf of Democrats in the Senate, but do not recall the Democrats having 60 seats in the Senate. Obviously, the professor thinks of independents as closeted Democrats.
On p. 12, just after I first report the Republican and Democratic vote totals on a roll call vote, I list footnote 2. It says, "For the vote totals on each issue, I count Vermont senator Bernard Sanders and Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman as Democrats. Both are considered officially as Independents; however, both caucus with the Senate Democrats, and are treated as Democrats for the purposes of committee assignments. On p. 16 I note that Joe Lieberman's PQ as a Democrat was 74.7 On the same page I also note that his PQ, once he became an independent had hardly changed. Namely, it dropped only to 74.0.
Marcus says:
It very well may have been easier for him to just decide to call them Democrats. However, I don't believe it speaks well of his work if shorthand trumps accuracy. What else did he cut corners on?
Well, I was very upfront about what I did. (See previous answer.) I was trying to minimize words that people would have to read (partly because I had a word limit in my contract with St. Martin's). I promise I wasn't trying to fool anybody.
Drew says:
The problem is that it appears to assume any deviation from the baseline is considered "bias.". This brings to mind Colbert's point — "reality has a left-wing bias."
Presumably, on a given policy question ("was welfare reform a success?") or factual dispute ("is Obama a secret Muslim?") there is a correct answer. Reported truthfully, Some of those questions will produce a right-wing answer, some of those questions a left wing answer. So to me the best way to judge these things isn't left/right, but true/false.
In Part II of the book (Chapters 6, 7, 8), I go into great detail to address this criticism. Here again, I'm certain that the commenter has not read the book.
(I also address the criticism on a blog post, entitled "Media Bias: A Response to Stephen Colbert.")
Martinned says:
That said, this has to be the weirdest survey I've ever taken. What's up with asking my opinion about certain bills twice? And why all that attention for abortion?
As I explain on p. 39, I let a liberal interest group, the Americans for Democratic Action, choose the questions for me. Some of the bills they considered were considered in the House and the Senate. For that reason they are listed twice.
Simon P. says:
I'm disappointed that Eugene has seen fit to promote this guy's work. You don't even need to look into the methodology to smell something rotten here — "How Liberal Media Bias Distorts the American Mind"? The very way the title is phrased suggests a flattened perspective that assumes that there's no "right answer" to political or policy questions, just equally-valid opinions on the right and the left that ought, in the normal course, be equally represented in our "media."
Like all social scientists who understand the terms, I believe that there are right and wrong answers to positive questions, but not normative questions. The latter, at least partially, always depend on a value judgment.
Once again, Part 2 of the book addresses the above comment. My method examines sets of true statements. However, some of the true statements were ones that liberals would want you to learn. Others were true statements that conservatives would want you to learn. See especially the points above regarding Chapter 16 and the Bush tax cuts.
Finally, the commenter notes, "The very way the title is phrased suggests a flattened perspective."
Once again, I think Mrs. Baker has some wise advice. To learn the truth about what I do, one needs to read the text of the book, not just the title.
Boom! says:
Let me guess, the 'left' is defined by the statements/positions of Congressional Democrats, ignoring the 1/4 of the nation that falls to the left of that? It's not hard to find 'slant', when you redefine the center-left as the left.
I spend at least nine pages (36–44) discussing how I define "left" and "liberal." This includes a long discussion of a heated argument with my leftwing friend, Hollywood producer Loucas George. (Yes, there really exists a producer with that name.) Perhaps most important to the above question, as I note on p. 39, liberal and left are defined by the positions of the Americans for Democratic Action.
I think the commenter is mistaken about how many Americans place themselves to the left of the Democratic party. As I note in footnote 8 of Chapter 10: "As I have observed, members of the far left are often guilty of seriously overestimating their numbers. Especially within elite intellectual circles, far-left individuals often believe that a majority of Americans share their view: that the Democratic Party is not left-wing enough. A recent Gallup poll, however, refutes this. It found that 46 percent of Americans think the Democratic Party is to liberal, and 42 percent think it is "about right." Only 8 percent think the party is too conservative. In contrast, members of the far right would be more justified in holding the mirror view about the Republican Party. As Gallup found, 17 percent of Americans think the Republican party is too liberal. (See Jeffrey M. Jones, "More Americans See Democratic Party as 'Too Liberal.'" June 30, 2009, available at www.gallup.com/poll/121307/More-Ameri....)
Elliott says:
Doesn't Groseclose assume that the American public's PQ is the same as the PQ of Members of Congress? I think that's a pretty questionable assumption (see, e.g., recent polls re: taxing the rich).
In one sense, yes. But not exactly. I devote an entire chapter, "Chapter 5: Defining the Center," toward explaining this, as well as defending my assumptions.
SecurityGeek says:
From the Weekly Standard review:
In calculating American centrism, Groseclose has made small adjustments to account for the small-state-favoring composition of the Senate and other factors.
Considering that Wyoming has two Senators representing a smaller population than the suburban California county where I live, I think "small adjustments" are not going to cut it.
On p. 49 I note: "I calculated a weighted average of Senate PQs, where the weights were proportional to the population of the state. (That is, for instance, California's weight is approximately sixty times that of North Dakota.)
Mike says:
Professor Groseclose — What steps have you taken to ensure that your political views don't interfere with or unduly affect your research and work?
I devote an entire chapter, "Chapter 3: But I've Been to Oklahoma," to that question.
Finally, let me address two comments that I do not already address in the book.
frankcross says:
It may not matter a great deal to results, but I think it's a bad violation of research protocol to put the legislator's votes on the PQ questions. What possible reason could there be for this?
I wanted readers, as best as possible, to have the same information that legislators had when they cast their votes. For the typical roll call, the legislators have at least 15 minutes to vote. But after the 15 minutes expire, the Speaker or the Senate Pro Tempore usually allows several more minutes. And usually (in fact, I'm aware of only two violations of this), before ending the time for voting, the Speaker or President Pro Tempore asks, "Is there anyone in the chamber who has not voted or who wishes to change his or her vote?" Accordingly, at that moment—which is the moment legislators make their final decision, they can see the votes of all their fellow legislators. Thus, legislators have that information—the way the two parties have voted—when they make their final choice.
Another reason involved the summarizing of the bills on which the legislators voted. Often, if I listed only a few-sentence summary, a reader would naturally think, "Of course everyone would favor that bill." The problem would be that the summary would not contain several riders that might cause legislators to vote against the bill. I listed party vote totals to show that at least some people would not feel that way—that there were reasons that reasonable people might oppose the measure, even if the summary might suggest otherwise. Of course, maybe a better way would be to summarize all the riders, as well as the main part of the bill. However, if I did that some of the summaries would be several pages. That, I believe, would be too taxing on the quiz taker – I wouldn't have many people finish my quiz.
Marcus says:
Oh yeah, this should be a hoot. And I love the "That's right, I nailed you libs good" look on the professor's face on the banner book advertisement.
I promise that thought wasn't going through my head when the picture was taken. Here again, I think Mrs. Baker has some wise advice.
August 29, 2011
New York City Bars Dogs from Bars
In New York, dogs can take the witness stand at a criminal trial. But at least in New York City, they're not allowed to go into bars.
NYC regulators recently banned dogs from bars, even those with outdoor seating areas and those that serve only beverages:
[I]t has always been a violation of the city's health code to allow a dog anywhere near a beer tap. But for years, this has been one of the most widely — and gleefully — violated rules in the city.
Not any more.
Since the health department adopted a letter grade system for bars and restaurants last year, bar owners say, health inspectors are allowing no wiggle room for four-legged patrons....
During inspections, many owners said they were surprised to learn that dogs were not allowed even in outdoor seating areas. Neither does a bar's dearth of actual food products provide any cover. "Beer, wine and spirits have always been classified as food," a department spokeswoman wrote in an e-mail. Only service dogs are permitted in spaces that serve food or drink of any kind.
As Thom Lambert points out, this is a ridiculous regulation. Dogs near food service areas do pose some risks. But as anyone who has a dog and a kitchen at home knows, they are fairly easy to minimize. More fundamentally, most people can readily understand the (very small) risks involved and decide for themselves whether they want to patronize a dog-friendly bar or not. Market incentives can and do supply plenty of dog-free watering holes for those who don't want to take the risk of guzzling beer near canines, or simply don't like dogs.
One of the major advantages of of private property rights is that they provide outlets for people with a wide range of different preferences. Dog-lovers can patronize one set of establishments and dog-haters another. As Thom emphasizes, this kind of diversity also enables communities to flourish, as well as individuals:
We classical liberals are often criticized for undermining communitarian values by emphasizing individual liberties. In reality, though, a liberal society (in the classical sense, not the welfare-state sense) fosters community by allowing people to associate in ways they find most meaningful. Indeed, one of the great things about a liberal, live-and-let-live city is that it can accommodate so many communities that cater to different preferences and values. Orthodox Jews, devout Muslims, evangelical Protestants, gays and lesbians, and various ethnic groups can create their own little communities to foster shared values.....
I was reminded of this point yesterday when I read that the Bloomberg administration, in the name of "public health," is cracking down on bars that allow dogs.... How sad for New York City. Nothing builds community better than a collection of spaces — bars, coffeshops, diners, etc. — where neighbors can go to relax, converse, and share their lives. And nothing is more likely to keep people coming back and to get them talking to each other than to allow them to bring their dogs. If you don't believe me, head down to your local dog park and watch people interact. Nobody's a stranger at the dog park.
Thom's point is well-taken. I didn't know most of my current neighbors until we got a golden retriever and people started coming up to pet Willow whenever I took her for a walk. A space where people can bring dogs has a lot more community interaction than one where they can't.
Property rights are particularly important for protecting unpopular people and groups against persecution. In this case, however, New York City has undermined property rights in a way that harms a much wider range of people for little or no benefit. Dog ownership is extremely widespread and even many non-dog owners enjoy interacting with man's best furry friends.
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