Are Election Polls Oversampling Democrats? Not Really.

As of right now, Obama leads Romney by 2.9 points nationally, according to RealClearPolitics. And his lead among swing states is even higher. Thanks to Fox News and NBC/WSJ/Marist, Obama leads by 4.8 points in Ohio, possibly the most important swing state in the election. His lead is also at 4.7 points in Virginia, and 2.0 points in Florida. Thanks to polling like this, Intrade has Obama's chances of winning at 67.4%.

However, some Republicans are skeptical of this lead, arguing these polls tend to oversample Democrats in order to make it look as though Obama's lead is actually much smaller than it appears. Attempts to "unskew" these polls have resulted in Romney leads of 9%! So it is a legitimate question to ask, have these polls been oversampling Democrats in order to make Obama look stronger than Romney, perhaps in order to create some kind of self-fulfilled prophecy?

No doubt conservative "skeptics" of the mainstream media would be quick to answer with a resounding "YES!" Could you have any more proof of a liberal media bias? Of course, the truly skeptical mind would probably see a few red flags first.

Jim Geraghty at the National Review's Number-Cruncher raises one such red flag:

Starting in 1992, EVERY Pew poll appears to lean to one direction — always towards the Democrat, and by an average of more than 5 percentage points. Worse this is a reflection of the “final” poll which even the Democratic firm, Public Policy Polling, usually gets right." (emphasis not mine)

After listing the final polls for Pew for the 1988-2008 presidential elections, the Number-Cruncher wonders why Pew doesn't try to adjust their numbers? Actually, the answer to this is rather simple. The numbers he used were for Registered Voters (RV), not Likely Voters (LV). In fact, LV models are actually used to better predict the outcome of an election since not all registered voters actually vote. Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight points out that, when choosing between polls of LVs verses RVs, always go with the former. This may not necessarily be the case early on, before the conventions. But it is definitely the case now. As a result, out of the 7 polls included in the RCP average, 6 are LV polls.  In fact, if we are to look at Pew's results for their final LV polls, they actually are quite accurate:

• 2008 error: D-1 (Republican numbers were accurate but Democrat numbers off by 1)
• 2004 error: 0
• 2000 error: R+2
• 1996 error: D+6

Other than 1996, their recent track record has been very good, with only small errors of 0-2 points favoring Republicans. 

In fact, many of the most heavily criticized polls do extremely well at predicting the vote. This prompts the obvious question: so why are people saying there is a problem?

Despite the fact that many of these critiques point to RV polls, LV polls often show a stronger Democrat presence than Republican:

• 9/13-17/12 AP/GfK: Democrats+1
• 9/12-16/12 Pew: Democrats+7 (unweighted, so likely less for the actual results)
• 9/12-16/12 NBC/WSJ: Democrats+5
• 9/13-16/12 Monmouth/SurveyUSA/Braun: Democrats+4

 Note: I did not Include Rasmussen because I do not have access to their numbers

In recent elections, party turnout has swung from a tie between Democrats and Republicans in 2004 and 2010, to a 7 point lead for Democrats in 2008, which was an unprecedented year for Democrat voter turnout. So it may be a stretch to assume Democrats will turnout in numbers like the Pew poll suggests.

So why is this the case? Some conservatives have speculated pollsters may be oversampling to try and replicate the unusual 2008 voter turnout among Democrats.  However Emily Perkins of reason.com finds there is little support for this theory:

It is hard to say whether pollsters are in fact relying too heavily on 2008 partisan turnout, because it is extraordinarily difficult to track down how these pollsters define likely voters.

According to Chris Jackson at Ipsos-Reuters, “most research organizations use a combination of prior voting behavior, interest in the election and self-report likelihood to vote to categorize likely voters. ...Some pollsters also use ‘voter lists’ or commercial lists of people who voted in the last election instead of screening these individuals from the population.”

Rasmussen gives a vague explanation here, “The questions involve voting history, interest in the current campaign, and likely voting intentions. Rasmussen Reports determines its partisan weighting targets through a dynamic weighting system that takes into account the state’s voting history, national trends, and recent polling in a particular state or geographic area.”

ABC News explains, they “develop a range of ‘likely voter’ models, employing elements such as self-reported voter registration, intention to vote, attention to the race, past voting, age, respondents’ knowledge of their polling places, and political party identification.”

As Huffington Post’s Mark Blumenthal reports, “CNN has published no explanation of how they select likely voters.” (emphasis mine)

In addition, there is little reason for polls to adjust their samples to fit 2008 at all. Pew explains:

"While all of our surveys are statistically adjusted to represent the proper proportion of Americans in different regions of the country; younger and older Americans; whites, African Americans and Hispanics; and even the correct share of adults who rely on cell phones as opposed to landline phones, these are all known, and relatively stable, characteristics of the population that can be verified off of U.S. Census Bureau data or other high quality government data sources."

"Party identification is another thing entirely. Most fundamentally, it is an attitude, not a demographic. To put it simply, party identification is one of the aspects of public opinion that our surveys are trying to measure, not something that we know ahead of time like the share of adults who are African American, female, or who live in the South"

...

In effect, standardizing, smoothing, or otherwise tinkering with the balance of party identification in a survey is tantamount to saying we know how well each candidate is doing before the survey is conducted."

In other words, while pollsters may adjust party identification in LV models to reflect the fact that not all registered voters actually vote, there is little they may do to adjust party turnout for surveys in general (RV, All), other than assign weights due to census factors. Since the appearance of Democrat oversampling is stronger in other surveys than LVs, there is little reason to think the LV adjustments would be responsible for the appearance of Democrat oversampling. This means that the appearance of Democrat oversampling may only exist because more voters actually consider themselves Democrats at the time the polls are conducted.

Now it is highly unlikely we will have the same composition of voters once election time comes around. However this is not all that much of a problem since party identification, unlike registration, changes during the election season. Pew explains:

"Particularly in an election cycle, the balance of party identification in surveys will ebb and flow with candidate fortunes, as it should, since the candidates themselves are the defining figureheads of those partisan labels."

This "ebb and flow" can be drastic. Rasmussen measured party identification in July 2012 with a 1 point advantage for Republicans and again in August 2012 with a 4 point advantage for Republicans. Gallup saw an even larger bounce from Nov 7-9 2008, where Democrats outnumbered Republicans by 5 points, to Nov 13-16 2008, where Democrats outnumbered Republicans by 13 points. That is an 8 point change in a few weeks! From Aug 20-22 2012, Gallup measured a 3 point lead for Democrats. A few weeks later, from Sep 6-9, that lead extended to 8 points. So there is even less reason to try and adjust polling since it will adjust itself if necessary anyway. Pollsters that do try and adjust based on party identification risk skewing the results to show a situation not reflective of the country as a whole.

So we are left with one more question: Why do the results of party identification differ so much between polls? Other than sampling error, this can be explained by differences in methodology. Nate Silver explains one such difference:

"Although there are exceptions on either side, like the Gallup national tracking poll, for the most part Mr. Obama seems to be getting stronger results in polls that use live interviewers and that include cellphones in their samples — enough to suggest that he has a clear advantage in the race.

In the polls that use an automated dialing method (“robopolls”) or which exclude cellphones, Mr. Obama’s bounce has been much harder to discern, and the race looks considerably closer."

And there is good reason why this is the case:

"These results are consistent with some past research. Roughly one third of American households rely solely on mobile phones and do not have landlines, meaning they will simply be excluded by polls that call landlines only. Potential voters who rely on cellphones belong to more Democratic-leaning demographic groups than those which don’t, and there is reasonably strong empirical evidence that the failure to include them in polls can bias the results against Democrats, even after demographic weightings are applied."

PEW has confirmed this trend in the past. And Nate Silver has confirmed this is the case for the 2012 election as well:

Since Rasmussen uses only landlines, and others like Fox News, NBC, WSJ, and Quinnipac use a mixture of landlines and cellphones, it is easy to see why Rasmussen tends to poll a larger sample of Republicans than Democrats, and thus also tends to poll to the right of other polls as well. This effect has become more pronounced over the last few years, leading to a decline in Rasmussen's ability to predict election results.

So, to answer the question originally posed in this article, any appearance of party oversampling is likely caused by one party being better represented in the population at a given time than another. And since these polls look at party identification, not registration,  we should expect this to change over time, meaning we don't necessarily expect to see the exact same party identification distribution on election day. However, poor sampling methodology that may bias one party over another, such as ignoring cellphones when sampling, is likely a better explanation for the appearance of bias in one poll or another.

Why Are The Washington Post Wonkbloggers Repeating A Romney Campaign Falsehood About Medicare?

The Washington Post’s WONKBLOG has been repeating the Romney Campaign's falsehood about Obamacare and Medicare. From their fact check of Bill Clinton's 2012 DNC Speech:

FALSE: [Clinton:]“Both Governor Romney and Congressman Ryan attacked the president for allegedly robbing Medicare of $716 billion. That’s the same attack they leveled against the Congress in 2010, and they got a lot of votes on it. But it’s not true.”

The Affordable Care Act did indeed cut Medicare spending by $716 billion, as the Congressional Budget Office wrote in a July 24 report. It does that by reducing payments to Medicare hospitals and doctors, essentially ratcheting down the amount they receive when they see a patient.

...these Medicare cuts do indeed exist.

However, all three major fact checkers have come to pretty much the opposite conclusion:

• FactCheck.org (here, here, and here) 
• Washington Post Fact Checker (here and here)
• Politifact.com (here, here, here, and here):

In my post on Ryan’s Medicare claim, I explained why this is the case using the findings of both FactCheck and The Washington Post Fact Checker (PolitiFact did an exceptionally poor job explaining the problem):

"Medicare payroll taxes go to pay for Medicare Part A. What revenue is left over goes into the Medicare Hospital Insurance trust fund. And that fund goes to finance shortfalls in Medicare Part A. As of late, there is not enough revenue coming from payroll taxes to cover hospital insurance for medicare beneficiaries. As a result, the trust fund is being drained and will eventually be empty, meaning Medicare Part A will become insolvent. To help mitigate the problem, the Affordable Coverage Act slows the amount of money coming out of the trust fund via reduced payments to hospitals. Obama can get away with those reduced payments to hospitals largely without causing them to drop out of the program because of a deal he stuck with hospitals, promising new patients through the ACA, more than making up for the lost revenue. This saved money stays in the trust fund (although it can be loaned out, more on that later). It does not go to cover the uninsured not currently in Medicare. In addition, Obama increases the revenue coming into the trust fund via a 0.9 percent tax "on earnings above $200,000 for single taxpayers or $250,000 for married couples."

The savings from Medicare that actually go into Obamacare come from Medicare Parts B, C, and D, and only from funds that come from congress (income taxes, corporate taxes, etc...) to cover outlays. This accounts for approximately 2/3 of $716 Billion in slowed medicare growth. Obama decreases the growth of money congress spends on Medicare from general revenue using the Independent Payment Advisory Board, which is incredibly limited in what it can target."

...a bill can both reduce the deficit and not be "paid for." This is because some of the revenue that comes in goes "into savings" instead of being used to pay the bills. And just like a bank uses savings accounts to make loans, so too can this Medicare money "in savings" be loaned out to pay for other programs. FactCheck explains:

"What happens in government accounting is that after Treasury issues a bond that it will have to pay later, it can spend the money it received on other things. And it often does, whether that’s coverage expansion, as called for in the health care law, or any number of things. The Romney spokesman said it was “a shell game.”"

But that doesn’t mean that the Medicare trust fund will be slashed or its “piggy bank” “robbed” or “raided,” or any other claim we’d put firmly in the category of “senior scare.” (emphasis mine)

Romney does have a point in essentially calling this an accounting trick. And he could spend time making that claim instead of a demonstrably false one. You can argue over whether or not the CBO was therefore wrong to say the ACA cuts the deficit. But you cannot say payroll taxes are going toward the ACA anymore than you can say your personal savings in the bank are going toward someone else's loan. Just like those savings are still legally yours, so are the trust funds still legally Medicare's. Any money that is borrowed from the fund has to be paid back.

I am not quite sure why the Wonkbloggers are doing this. And I can find no explanation as to why they keep coming to the exact opposite conclusion as these major independent fact checkers, including the Washington Post’s own Glenn Kessler. Could It be the double counting? Romney could certainly say Obamacare isn’t paid for, or that it adds to the debt (but not deficit). However, as Glenn Kessler has noted, that would open Republicans (including his own VP Pick) to criticisms of hypocrisy since those claims can be leveled at nearly any deficit reduction plan, including many of the GOP's own.

No Paul Ryan, Payroll Taxes Are NOT Going Towards ObamaCare

Paul Ryan has been LYING about Obamacare and payroll taxes.

During a campaign stop at Miami University in Ohio, Paul Ryan made the claim that payroll taxes will now be used to fund the Affordable Care Act:

"Ryan slightly reframed the attack by arguing that Obamacare is effectively taking hundreds of billions from payroll taxes. “Take a look at your paycheck next time. Look at that line on your paycheck that [reads] payroll taxes," Ryan said. "You see our payroll taxes from our paychecks are supposed to go to two programs--Social Security and Medicare period. Now because of Obamacare they’re also going to pay for Obamacare." The crowd booed." (emphasis mine)

One problem with this: It is completely false. And the Romney campaign knows it.

Earlier this week, FactCheck.org released probably the best article on Mediscare claims since they began resurfacing after the Ryan VP pick. This article is an absolute must read for anyone wanting to understand how Medicare works, as well as what Romney, Ryan, and Obama each plan to do about Medicare's fiscal problems. The article begins with explaining the troubles Medicare faces down the road, mainly focusing on insolvency (which is different from bankruptcy). The article then summarizes the history of Medicare, as well as the different "Parts" of Medicare (A,B,C, and D). Understanding this is crucial for understanding the Ryan, Romney, and Obama Medicare plans (Obama has already passed his plan as part of the ACA). Here is a basic summary of what each Part of Medicare covers:

• Medicare Part A: Hospital insurance
• Medicare Part B: Insurance for doctor visits
• Medicare Part C (Medicare Advnatage): Combines both Part A and B but uses a private insurer.
• Medicare Part D: Prescription Drugs

The article also debunks the claims from both the Obama and Romney campaigns about how each candidate plans to cut benefits and push the cost of healthcare further onto seniors. I will not spend any time in this post talking about whether or not either campaign's arguments hold water (See my previous post and Roundup from last week for that). This post will be dedicated to understanding why Paul Ryan is lying about payroll taxes going to fund the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare, PPACA, ACA).

One area where FactCheck's article falls a bit short is on explaining why Paul Ryan's claim mentioned above is wrong. The article is a bit vague and inconclusive. However, a campaign speech by Paul Ryan finally motivated FactCheck to get more detailed and help explain specifically why Paul Ryan's claim is wrong (the article also debunks Medicare bankruptcy claims). This article is another absolute must read. I will summarize and expand here:

Medicare payroll taxes go to pay for Medicare Part A. What revenue is left over goes into the Medicare Hospital Insurance trust fund. And that fund goes to finance shortfalls in Medicare Part A. As of late, there is not enough revenue coming from payroll taxes to cover hospital insurance for medicare beneficiaries. As a result, the trust fund is being drained and will eventually be empty, meaning Medicare Part A will become insolvent. To help mitigate the problem, the Affordable Coverage Act slows the amount of money coming out of the trust fund via reduced payments to hospitals. Obama can get away with those reduced payments to hospitals largely without causing them to drop out of the program because of a deal he stuck with hospitals, promising new patients through the ACA, more than making up for the lost revenue. This saved money stays in the trust fund (although it can be loaned out, more on that later).³ It does not go to cover the uninsured not currently in Medicare. In addition, Obama increases the revenue coming into the trust fund via a 0.9 percent tax "on earnings above $200,000 for single taxpayers or $250,000 for married couples."

The savings from Medicare that actually go into Obamacare come from Medicare Parts B, C, and D, and only from funds that come from congress (income taxes, corporate taxes, etc...) to cover outlays. This accounts for approximately 2/3 of $716 Billion in slowed medicare growth. Obama decreases the growth of money congress spends on Medicare from general revenue using the Independent Payment Advisory Board, which is incredibly limited¹ in what it can target.

So it should be pretty clear Paul Ryan's claim is false. But remember I accused Ryan of more than just telling him a falsehood. I accused him of lying, meaning he knew what he was saying was false. What is my evidence? Besides Ryan's work on the medicare program (meaning he should know this Medicare 101 knowledge) and acceptance of Obama's ACA Medicare savings (he should know what he is accepting), when FactCheck asked Romney's campaign about their claims, the campaign responded this way:

"When we asked the campaign how it could argue that Obama’s spending reductions didn’t extend the life of the trust fund, a spokesman replied that it didn’t extend the fund “unless the administration is ready to admit their law blows a huge hole in our deficit.”"

So essentially they are accusing Obama of double counting the savings from hospital insurance. If that money has to be put into the trust fund, it can't also cover the non-Medicare related Obamacare expenses. Fact Check explains (from their original article):

"The fact is that CBO and the guardians of the hospital trust fund say Obama’s health care law does both extend the life of the trust fund and reduce the deficit, but can’t be also counted as paying for the law’s added spending."

This may sound a bit confusing. It essentially comes from the fact that a bill can both reduce the deficit and not be "paid for." This is because some of the revenue that comes in goes "into savings" instead of being used to pay the bills. And just like a bank uses savings accounts to make loans, so too can this Medicare money "in savings" be loaned out to pay for other programs.² FactCheck explains:

"What happens in government accounting is that after Treasury issues a bond that it will have to pay later, it can spend the money it received on other things. And it often does, whether that’s coverage expansion, as called for in the health care law, or any number of things. The Romney spokesman said it was “a shell game.”"

But that doesn’t mean that the Medicare trust fund will be slashed or its “piggy bank” “robbed” or “raided,” or any other claim we’d put firmly in the category of “senior scare.” (emphasis mine)

Romney does have a point in essentially calling this an accounting trick. And he could spend time making that claim instead of a demonstrably false one. You can argue over whether or not the CBO was therefore wrong to say the ACA cuts the deficit (see Update 8/28/12). But you cannot say payroll taxes are going toward the ACA anymore than you can say your personal savings in the bank are going toward someone else's loan. Just like those savings are still legally yours, so are the trust funds still legally Medicare's. Any money that is borrowed from the fund has to be paid back. The Romney campaign knows this and it is reasonable to assume Ryan does as well. So he knows payroll taxes will not fund the ACA, yet he still makes that claim. It is a lie.

¹ Most of what the IPAB targets is the extra money paid into Medicare Advantage (Part C,except for hospital insurance), making costs from the expensive program fall into line with traditional Medicare. You can argue this will indirectly affect benefits, but the program is forbidden from directly cutting benefits. Romney and Ryan, on the other hand, give congress practically unlimited power to save money however they desire, including through benefits (and we all trust congress, don't we). As Ezra Klein and others have repeatedly noted, ObamaCare and Ryan's plan call for approximately the same-sized reductions in future medicare growth. The difference is in how it is implemented. Without a doubt though, Romney's plan to avoid the $716 in slowed growth is the worst. It will actually hasten insolvency.


Update 8/28/12:

For the last few weeks, the Washington Post Fact Checker has been on vacation. So he as not been posting fact checks on this issue since the Ryan VP pick. Today he finally posted a response to readers' questions on Medicare Cuts, bankruptcy, and cost shifting. Overall, the post was not all that impressive compared to FactCheck's posts. However, he did link to an old article talking about the "double counting" issue mentioned above. This article is another absolute must read for anyone interested in this issue. It turns out double counting has been an acceptable practice for both parties for the last few decades. That's right, Republicans use this as well:

"When President Bill Clinton signed the Balanced Budget Act of 1997, then House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) was one of the speakers. “On Medicare, we came together and we saved the system for at least a decade,” he declared. How could he make this claim? Through the same double-counting that Republican now decry. The

Fact Checker especially frowns on hypocrisy, and Republicans should acknowledge that they have gladly played this game before, including under President George W. Bush." (emphasis mine)

However, playing the "you did it too" game is not a good excuse for doing something potentially harmful. But it does turn out this practice isn't really that bad, since it increases gross debt without increasing public debt. The Fact Checker explains:

"Some argue that the increase in the gross debt is evidence of double-counting but the CBO has said that focusing on the health care law’s impact on the gross debt is not very illuminating: “That measure of debt conveys little information about the federal government’s future financial burdens and has little economic meaning.” (emphasis mine)

This may explain why the Romney campaign has avoided this line of argument and instead chosen a demonstrably false line of argument. He would be open to criticisms that both parties do this and could put the reputation Reputation of congressional Republicans in 1997 in jeopardy. It is much easier to tell a simple lie.

Note: Just to head off a potential criticism, Ryan cannot say that he was talking about Medicare funds being loaned Obamacare when he said payroll taxes were being used to fund Obamacare. If he had meant it in this way, he would have to admit payroll taxes also fund national defense, congressional pay, the war on drugs, and most any program funded by congress through general revenue. However, his statement started by claiming that payroll taxes only fund Medicare and Social Security. So either way, he was lying.

² I reworded this to make it clearer. It used to say "However, as with any "savings account", that money is available for other uses when it's not being spent"

³ I added the qualifier in parenthesis to make it clear that this money can still be loaned out, even if it still belongs to the trust fund. It has to be paid back.

The Roundup

Best Thing to Happen to The Internet Since Al Gore! ... Here is a cat singing the theme from Game of Thrones (Thanks to The Washington Post):

Yet another reason to subscribe to Ezra Klein's RSS...

Steven Novella: Nocebo Nonsense

"Chopra’s article was inspired by a New York Times article by researchers into nocebo effects. The researchers, however, make very different points from Chopra. They review the scientific evidence, which is pretty clear. People will report negative side effects even when taking placebos. If they are warned about a particular side effect, they are more likely to report that one. Again – there is no reason to think this is anything other than subjective reporting. Stress is the one factor that can cause real physiological consequences, and therefore illnesses that significantly respond to stress (like heart disease) can be affected by anxiety or hopefulness. This is not true, however, of most diseases." (emhpasis mine)

The Solyndra Standard
A MUST READ on the GOP's hypocrisy in the Solyndra case. Stephen Lacey puts the case in context:

"And here’s the really astonishing disconnect: While supporting tens of thousands of jobs, the loan guarantee program is expected to cost $2 billion less than Congress budgeted for, according to an analysis from Herb Allison, John McCain’s former National Finance Chairman.

Meanwhile, amidst the Solyndra saga, we casually accept a $300 million aircraft failure without batting an eye. No outrage. No sustained political campaign. It’s just another day testing our military toys.

Why? Because we don’t often see programs like this as a “failure” in the political arena. We would never use one failure as an excuse to abandon investment in new technologies. Most politicians accept losses in military R&D expenditures because the long-term gains are potentially so important for national defense and for eventually developing technologies for civilian use.

We should always strive to make programs as efficient and cost-effective as possible. But a few bankrupt clean energy companies representing a fraction of the program’s budgeted cost is no excuse for abandoning federal investments in clean energy — a strategically important sector that is becoming one of the largest drivers of business this century." (emphasis mine)

Will the Fed’s efforts to boost the economy only benefit the wealthiest?
Thanks to the inaction of congress, quantitative easing may be one of the last options to help stimulate the economy. It effectively lowers the value of debt using inflation, which could help tackle the crippling deleveraging that is keeping consumer demand down and slowing the recovery (particularly in the housing market). But there is a price. That price is increased income inequality.

Great hyperinflation episodes in history — and what they tell us about the Fed
A MUST READ:
A look at historical cases of hyperinflation point to why it is absurd to suggest it will happen in the US any time soon:

"none of the most severe instances of hyperinflation appear to be triggered by a central bank simply trying to inject money into a basically intact economy in order to reduce the unemployment rate." (emphasis mine)

Conservative Group Plans to Push Republicans Toward Action on Climate, Cleaner Energy

"Leading members of the Christian Coalition and the Young Republicans on Monday will launch nationwide the Young Conservatives for Energy Reform, a grassroots group aimed at engaging Republicans on the goals of cutting oil use, backing alternative energy and clean-air regulations, and fighting climate change."

Can these groups pull the GOP away from the propaganda of the fossil fuel industry?

The politics and philosophy of racism
Two points:

1. Turns out racists aren't necessarily more likely to be republican than democrat. 
2.  Libertarianism will not sure racism for essentially the same reason free markets work: individual cases of racism are "spontaneous orders—of phenomena that are the product of human action, but not of human design" 

2013 may be the year of Austerity. Isn't that what the GOP wanted so badly back in 2010?

Poll: Republicans Really Aren't Big Fans of Arabs or Muslims

Brutal Attack On Palestinian Met With Near-Universal Rebuke among Israelis

On the Progressive Consumption Tax and What it means for people like Romney.

Very good story about the debate over the minimum wage.

Quote of the Day: Early Voting a Bad Idea Because it Makes it Easier for Blacks to Vote

NPR debunks the myth of the "independent voter".

The Roundup: Abortion Edition

Todd Akin is taking the GOP down with him.

Yes, Plenty of Republicans Want to Ban All Abortions, Full Stop
The Todd Akin incident reminds us that this election could easily decide the future of a woman's right to choose. Multiple states have attempted to pass bills that could effectively ban all abortions if Roe v Wade was overturned (thanks to a conservative appointee from a Romney administration and the inevitable GOP controlled senate).

PolitiFact: Women's group says Paul Ryan would "outlaw in vitro fertilization”

"UltraViolet has a point that the bill Ryan backed could significantly alter the way in vitro fertilization is practiced. However, the group exaggerates when it says the bill in question would "outlaw in vitro fertilization." The bill doesn ’t outlaw the procedure directly -- whatever impact it has would likely require action by states, which many states may be unwilling to undertake. And while the bill likely outlaws specific practices that have historically been considered important for practicing in vitro fertilization, it would not ban the procedure itself."

FactCheck: Another Abortion Falsehood from Obama’s ‘Truth Team’
Some clarification on the 2012 GOP platform on abortion:

"It’s true that Romney has voiced support for the 2008 platform’s call for an unspecified “Human Life Amendment” to the Constitution, and the language approved by the party’s platfor m committee for 2012 is identical. But that’s a far cry from advocating an abortion ban that would apply in cases of rape or incest."

And it turns out that we have been to careless over speculation that these Human Life Amendments will ban abortions in the cases of rape and incest:

"As we’ve said before, there have been numerous versions of human life amendments proposed over the years, some of which include exceptions for rape and incest and some of which don’t. For details, see our July 31 item, “Falsifying Romney’s Abortion Stance, Again.” Most of these amendments didn’t get out of committee."

However, the speculation is not entirely unfounded:

"Furthermore, Romney’s chosen running mate, Paul Ryan, opposes exceptions for rape or incest. And it would be accurate to say that the GOP platform calls for a constitutional amendment that would leave states free to adopt abortion bans without exceptions."

So Red States would be screwed still....

However, as Suzy Khimm of The Washington Post finds, it may also be the case that none of this matters.

"But do party platforms even matter? Much of the political science research suggests not — at least when it comes to the candidates’ own views and actions. “The nominee is not necessarily constrained by the formal platform. They can agree with whatever bits and pieces and ignore the rest,” says John Sides, a political science professor at George Washington University."

Imagine You Were Raped. Got Pregnant. Then Your Rapist Sought Custody.

"The debate over Rep. Todd Akin's widely condemned comments on "legitimate rape" has largely centered on abortion and Republican efforts to outlaw the procedure, even in cases of rape. But the controversy has also uncovered a little-discuss ed issue: When some rape victims do choose to give birth to a child conceived through sexual assault, they find that the legal door is left wide open for their victimization to continue. It sounds unfathomable, but in many states the law makes it possible for rapists to assert their parental rights and use custody proceedings as a weapon against their victims."

The Doctor behind Akin's offensive unscientific statements

Update 8/27/12:

The Weekly Standard Defends Ryan on Redefining Rape

"More broadly, the "they only intended to exclude statutory rape" defense misses the point. Most serious abortion foes oppose the rape exception—full stop. It's no surprise that the abortion rights opponents who wrote H.R. 3 didn't foresee that simply narrowing the rape exception—a move far short of their preferred position—might provoke more controversy than opposing the rape exception itself."

...

"While I was reporting out the forcible rape story last year, one of the sources I called, a very accomplished woman, told me she had been a victim of statutory rape as a young teenager. Decades later, she nearly broke down about it on the phone while talking to a stranger. Should she have been denied the option of a Medicaid-funded abortion because her rape wasn't rapey enough?" (emphasis mine)

The Roundup: Failed Criticisms of Obama Edition

A Full Fact-Check of Niall Ferguson's Very Bad Argument Against Obama
A MUST READ:
Matthew O'Brien's EPIC takedown on Niall Ferguson's fact-challenged criticisms of Obama, as well as Fergusen's doubling down of those same fact-challenged criticisms.

"In the world as Ferguson describes it, Obama is a big-spending, weak-kneed liberal who can't get the economy turned around. Think Jimmy Carter on steroids. But the world is not as Ferguson describes it. A fact-checked version of the world Ferguson describes reveals a completely different narrative -- a muddy picture of the past four years, where Obama has sometimes cast himself as a stimulator, a deficit hawk, a health care liberal and conservative reformer all at once. And it's a world where the economy is getting better, albeit slowly.

It would have been worthwhile for Ferguson to explain why Obama doesn't deserve re-election in this real world we actually live in. Instead, we got an exercise in Ferguson's specialty -- counterfactual history."

More on this article here, here, here, and here.

Paul Krugman: Kinds Of Wrong
Within this analysis lies an important point about different types of wrongness in terms of discourse. The diagnosis may be related to subjective claims. It may be related to objective claims too far above the head of the average person. Finally, it could be the kind of easily verifiable wrongness common in Niall Ferguson's column. It is this last one that is the most troubling. It is also where Paul Krugman directs his attention in this post.

Ezra Klein: The worst case against the Obama administration
A MUST READ on the failure of predictions made by Ferguson/WSJ/Ryan:

"Whatever you believe about Obama’s policies, the Ferguson/WSJ/Ryan theory has clearly failed in its main predictions, and it’s worrying to see that this hasn’t led to a more serious effort to rethink its premises. After all, Romney and Ryan might well win this election, and it would be nice if the people they were listening to were pushing them to fix what’s actually gone wrong rather than what they wish had gone wrong." (emphasis mine)

Debates don’t lead to deals
The sad truth about this election is that this big "debate" is trivial. This election will come down to a small number of minimally informed swing voters in a few battleground states. If Obama wins, we will look forward to two years of nothing happening since congress will be GOP controlled. If Romney wins, we may face disaster as the GOP pushes its ideology through and makes many of this country's worst problems even worse. An Obama win is about avoiding that kind of catastrophe and avoiding a dangerous change to the supreme court.

Paul Krugman: Saving Serious Ryan

"So Ryan gamed the system: he got CBO to produce a report which looks to those who don’t actually read it like a validation of his numbers, when in fact he prevented any actual scoring of his proposals. If you think otherwise, you’ve been snookered."

What Would Romney-Ryan Mean for FEMA?

"Just as Ryan's proposed Medicare expenditure would fail to keep up with rising medical costs, the GOP ticket's likely cuts to disaster management and weather forecasting budgets would come at a time in which, fueled by climate change, natu ral disasters are becoming increasingly more potent and expensive. There were 14 billion-dollar disasters in the United States in 2011—the most on record. For the GOP in Tampa, Hurricane Isaac isn't just a nuisance; it's the elephant in the room."

Update 8/27/12:

The Age of Niallism: Ferguson and the Post-Fact World
Nial Ferguson continues to defend his reality-free article criticizing Obama:

"Let's try a counterfactual. Say Ferguson hadn't made his big errors about Obamacare. Then his smaller errors of omission would not seem quite so serious -- or deliberate. But Ferguson did make his big errors. And he defends these omissions with more elisions. It makes it impossible not to read his entire piece as an effort to deceive. Ferguson should consider what kind of grade he would give an undergraduate who turned in a paper that treated facts and counter-arguments so cavalierly." (emphasis mine)

The Roundup: Election Edition

Greg Sargent: The Morning Plum: No, Romney and Ryan don’t really want a `great debate’

"Romney wants to repeal the unpopular Obamacare, and promises he’d do something for some people with preexisting conditions — because replacing it with nothing would be even more unpopular. Romney says he’d get rid of Wall Street reform, and vows to replace it with unspecified “common sense” regulations — because replacing reform with nothing is also a political nonstarter. Romney says he’d cut whole agencies to make government more efficient and cost-effective, but won’t say which ones; and Ryan won’t explain in meaningful detail how he’d achieve the draconian spending cuts necessary to make his numbers work — because when the talk turns to specifics, suddenly cutting government is politically very difficult indeed, and gutting social programs would be very unpopular. Romney and Ryan won’t say how they’d pay for their tax cuts — because they must be paid for by hiking the middle class’s tax burden or exploding the deficit, neither of which is politically palatable." (emphasis mine)

When asked about cutting the size of government, most people are conservatives. When you get into asking about the specifics, the leftward shift is incredible!


Ezra Klein: Obama’s money gap: Incompetence, incumbency or meaningless?
Romney is currently outspending Obama 2 to 1, partly because of Obama's negative attitude toward wall street. However, there seems to be little if any effect on the polls. The country already largely feels like they know Obama. So negative a advertising will only do so much to hurt him. Romney would theoretically be better off running on his own strengths rather than attack Obama. But those strengths in the most important areas (jobs, budget) are quite suspect to say the least.

Ezra Klein: The real Romney-Ryan budgets cuts aren’t to Medicare. They’re to programs for the poor.

"And so, if you look at Ryan’s specific cuts, most of them are programs for poor people. In fact, the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that more than six of every 10 dollars Ryan cuts from the federal budget is coming from programs for the poor" (emphasis mine)

And Romney's is MUCH worse!

No, Republicans Have Not Suddenly Developed a Love of Policy Wonkery

"Conservatives are excited about Ryan because he's a true believer, not because they've developed a sudden love of budget wonkery. They would have been equally ecstatic about Bobby Jindal or Marco Rubio, and they're breathing a sigh of rel ief that Romney didn't pick Rob Portman or Tim Pawlenty, both of whom are plenty serious policy wonks but don't have quite the right-wing fire in their eyes that the other guys do."

Desperate Measures: Paul Ryan Tries To Revive the “Death Panel” Canard
Spreading malicious lies about ObamaCare in 2010 helped bolster Republicans to take over the house in 2011. Only problem, Obama is campaigning now and, even though he is behind in spending (for the last month or so), he has money in the cof fers to help keep him from falling too far behind. And he has the incmbant advantage, meaning attacks against him are much less effective. So he has the means to dispel this misinformation campaign (and the sad truth: start some of his own)

"But even if seniors like the first Gen Xer on a presidential ticket personally, the Pew poll shows that they dislike Ryan’s plan even more than their younger counterparts.

This points to an information vacuum, which is why death panels are back, and why this campaign is only going to get uglier from here."

Republicans Wanted a Culture War, Now They're Getting It

"If conservatives do indeed want a "truce" on issues like abortion, that's fine with me: let them start observing one. Leave Planned Parenthood the hell alone. Stop pushing for laws that challenge Roe v. Wade. Shut down all your ultrasounds . Tell Bob Vander Plaats to stop trying to run pro-marriage-equality judges off the Iowa Supreme Court. Take all those dog whistles about "respect for life" and "constitutional originalism" out of your platforms and speeches. Promise us you won't put unholy pressure on a President Romney to ensure the next new member of the Supreme Court will vote to turn abortion policy back to the states or even protect zygotes under the 14th Amendment."

Paul Krugman: Nobody Cares About the Deficit

"If the right was at all consistent, it would be denouncing the CBO report for failing to take into account the impact of a lower deficit in deterring the invisible bond vigilantes and encouraging the confidence fairy."

Five things to know about Mitt Romney’s energy plan 
Five points on Romney's energy plan:

1. North American energy independence is already expected to largely happen by 2020, regardless of who is in the white house 
2. Romney's refusal to accept Obama's fuel-efficiency standards will make his plan more difficult. 
3. Energy independence will not significantly lower prices since oil is still traded in world markets (exhibit A: Canada) 
4. Although energy independence may have gross job gains (likely much smaller than what Romney has predicted), the net effect will likely be insignificant. 
5. Romney does not tackle environmental concerns (global warming, fracking, oil spills), which may mean "public concern over fracking could stymie gas development."

Why the Weak Economy Doesn't Doom Obama

"So think of it this way. In 1980, Jimmy Carter didn't have an argument for re-election that appealed very far beyond the Democratic base. Similarly, in 1984, Walter Mondale simply didn't have much of an argument for getting rid of Ronald Reagan. The Republicans didn't have a good argument for holding on to power in 2006, nor did the Democrats in 2010. The elections reflect that.

This year, Barack Obama has an argument -- he didn't inherit the mess, and the economy is slowly expanding. That's an argument that is probably good enough to get him to 46 or 47 percent of the vote. Similarly, Mitt Romney has a pretty good argument for electing a new president, one that will shore up his base and Republican-leaning independents. Thus, we should probably expect what we're presently seeing in the polls: a close race, to be decided by a relatively small slice of the electorate." (emphasis mine)

Ezra Klein: The GOP has picked the wrong time to rediscover gold
When people think of returning to the gold standard, they think of it as a way of controlling inflation. However, it actually does precisely the opposite. Gold prices are tied to demand across global markets, meaning inflation would be tied to the whims of gold buyers and the fed would lose its ability to control it.

"Unlike 1981, in other words, when the gold standard made a kind of superficial sense as a response to our problems, 2012 is a moment when a gold standard would clearly have worsened our problems. Dramatically. As Eichengreen concludes, the idea’s “proponents paint the gold standard as a guarantee of financial stability; in practice, it would be precisely the opposite.”

Not reimbursing towns for expenses dealing with presidential incumbent campaigns is common for BOTH PARTIES.

Healthcare for Freedom Lovers

Socialized healthcare in the Heritage Foundation's Index of Economic Freedom Top 10.

Amidst the abundant rhetoric surrounding the passage of the Affordable Care Act, one message seems to be incredibly popular among those on the right, socialized healthcare is unsustainable socialism. Indeed this idea is not new. Ronald Reagan once claimed socialized medicine was a "short step to all the rest of socialism." The bottom line is simple: If America wants to continue being a free nation, it must reject the idea of socialized healthcare.

Yet today, nearly all wealthy nations provide some form of socialized healthcare. Are all these countries on their way to socialism? Are they even close? To answer this question, I decided to take a look at the top countries on the conservative Heritage Foundation's 2012 Index of Economic Freedom. The United States currently ranks number 10. It has fluctuated since the creation of the index in 1995, once achieving a rank as high as 4. At least some of this fall has been attributed to the ACA:

"A 2010 health care bill that greatly expanded the central government’s reach has been under challenge in the courts"

Naturally, since the United States was dinged for government involvement in healthcare (its socialized healthcare program), I was curious just how the 9 countries above fared on the issue of government involvement in the healthcare system. 

Indeed every country listed in the top 10 contains some form of socialized medicine (except for the United States, until recently). However, their methods of implementation are different. Singapore has compulsory savings and price controls resulting in a largely private system. Canada has a hybrid system of public and private insurance and hospitals. New Zealand is almost completely public. One of the best ways to gauge government involvement in healthcare is to find out just how much of the total healthcare spending in a given country comes from the government: 

1. Hong Kong:¹ The overwhelming majority of Hospitals in Hong Kong are public, managed by the Hospital Authority. In 2007, the government accounted for 49.9% of all healthcare spending.
2. Singapore: In 2010, the government accounted for 36.3% of all healthcare spending. Since 1995, this number has been as low as 29.8 in 2007 and as high as 54.1 in 1998.
3. Australia: In 2010, the government accounted for 68% of all healthcare spending. This number has stayed fairly constant, never dipping below 65% GDP since 1995.
4. New Zealand: In 2010 the government accounted for 83.2% of all healthcare spending.This number has stayed fairly constant, never dipping below 77% GDP since 1995.
5. Switzerland: In 2010 the government accounted for 59% of all healthcare spending. This number has stayed fairly constant, never dipping below 53% GDP since 1995.
6. Canada: In 2010 the government accounted for 70.5% of all healthcare spending. This number has stayed fairly constant, never dipping below 69% GDP since 1995.
7. Chile: In 2010 the government accounted for 48.2% of all healthcare spending. Since 1995, this number has been as low as 36.6 in 1996. 2010 is the highest year since then.
8. Mauritius: In 2010 the government accounted for 41.7% of all healthcare spending. Since 1995, this number has been as low as 33.9 in 2007 and as high as 54.7 in 1995, 1998, and 2004.
9. Ireland: In 2010 the government accounted for 69.2% of all healthcare spending. That year was the lowest on record. Between the years of 1995 and 2009, this number has been as low as 71.5% in 1996 and as high as 77.4 in 2004.
10. United States: In 2010 the government accounted for 53.1% of all healthcare spending. That year was the highest on record. Between the years of 1995 and 2010, this number has been as low as 43.1% in 1999 and as high as 47.7% in 2004. In addition, separate estimates predict a 3.8 percentage point increase² by 2015 as a result of the ACA and future Medicare beneficiaries.  

¹ I could not find the standard WHO format statistics on healthcare spending for Hong Kong. I instead used an available WHO profile with data from 2007. 

² Remember that all these numbers are statistics and are thus subject to a margin of error. As a result, some estimates are going to be slightly different from others. The 3.8 percentage point number comes from a study with slightly different estimates for government healthcare contributions.

And which of these countries appeared to have been dinged by Heritage Foundation for having too much government involvement in healthcare? Other than the US, just two: Singapore and Canada. Nothing on Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, or Ireland, four countries where the government contributed significantly more to healthcare than the US. Nothing on Hong Kong or Chile either, two countries that contributed approximately the same amount as the US to healthcare. In fact, the country with the lowest government contribution to healthcare was one of the few dinged for it.

Of the 9 countries that ranked above the United States, only two countries' governments contributed significantly less to healthcare than the US. And of the countries that contributed as much or more, only one was dinged for that fact. So it sounds like the government's role in healthcare is much less a factor for measuring freedom than many conservatives like to imagine. In general, this index is very subjective in nature (is the recent excess in government spending really a sign of a lack of freedom, or the automatic reaction to the recession that was a product of pre-existing programs), so there is only so much that one can conclude from this analysis. However, there is one thing that can be concluded: Socialized healthcare does not keep these countries from being free, even in the eyes of conservatives. So why can't they say the same for the United States?

UPDATE 1/12/2013: Think Progress expands on this a bit.