Whoever examines with attention the history of the dearths and famines … will find, I believe, that a dearth never has arisen from any combination among the inland dealers in corn, nor from any other cause but a real scarcity, occasioned sometimes perhaps, and in some particular places, by the waste of war, but in by far the greatest number of cases by the fault of the seasons; and that a famine has never arisen from any other cause but the violence of government attempting, by improper means, to remedy the inconveniences of a dearth. (Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations IV.5.44)
In the Wall Street Journal's reporting on the US Senate races, it was interesting to note a small tick entitled "60 Seat Majority" placed underneath a colored band of various Senate race likelihoods. See graphic below or online:
What the WSJ really means by a "60 Seat Majority" is of course a "Democratic 60 Seat Majority" as the tick is placed at the position to include 60 Democratic Senators. Noticeably absent was a corresponding "60 Seat Majority" tick drawn towards the blue side of the color band to represent the equivalent Republicans would need.
Democrats currently hold 57 seats plus 2 Independents who caucus with the Democrats. No political reporter is talking about anything close to the Democrats retaining seats; the big question is whether the Republicans can stretch to the 50-seat halfway mark (or perhaps beyond) with consensus building around a projection of 7 or 8 GOP pickups.
The position of the "60 Seat Majority" tick demonstrates biased Democratic thought by the WSJ in terms of measuring the 2010 Senate elections up to a irrelevant 60-seat Democratic Majority.
Bernie Goldberg in his Monday blog--highlighted on an interview with Bill O'Reilly--points out the ineptitude of the current accepted use of term "Mainstream Media" or MSM. In Nacilbupera's view the true "main stream" is now Fox News. Fox, with by far the largest viewership, breaks the stories such as the Van Jones and the current ACORN scandals. If you are in the news business and don't cover these stories, you are not reporting on the issues important to Americans as we keep our country safe from corruption.
Nacilbupera doesn't really care about ABC, CBS, or NBC because the stories they break are irrelevant. They are biased Democratic cheerleaders in media decay. We had to depend on the National Enquirer to tell us of a Presidental candidate (John Edwards) lying about an affair and an out-of-wedlock child.
We have pointed out on this blog some of the biases that exist on the media and find these progressive, liberal, and sometimes socialistic views outside of main stream America. As Goldberg points out how can you possibly call that branch of the media MSM? Goldberg with good reason called for a renaming of MSM.
We have noticed other commentators using alternative terms to describe the liberal likes of MSNBC, ABC, CBS, and many newspapers like the NY Times. Bill O'Reilly often uses the term "establishment media" while Rush Limbaugh likes "drive-by media."
Commentators on Goldberg's blog had all good ideas, perhaps the closest to our sentiment was a proposal by Steven Friday to use the term "legacy media." We like the term because it conveys the sense of the outdatedness of those medium: newspapers and pre-cable television both of which have experienced tremendous declines in followership. We don't like the term however because the word "legacy" often conveys a positive residual, such as when one leaves a legacy for their posterity. These leftist media organizations are currently leaving little in the way of positive residual for us to be proud of.
So thus it is we have decided for the purposes of this blog to use a phrase we coined--"old school media"--to describe the out-of-mode leftist media that has fallen out of fashion with most everyone except the progressive elitists. And yes MSNBC, you are so old school.
Nacilbupera collected three points mostly overlooked in mass media about Obamas speech yesterday to the schoolchildren.
(1) Parents of concerned children--afraid of indoctrination from a President who unapologetically appoints a radical Communist to his leadership--are mocked for their worry. This is unfair because what the parents were most afraid of was the content of the followup/discussion questions such as, "What can I do to help the President?" It was only AFTER concerned parents spoke up that the controversial discussion materials were removed. Nacilbupera feels these parents are paying attention to their child's education and praises them.
(2) In a story highlighted by Greta Van Susteren, Greta points out the unfair standards of the previous speech by Bush 41 to children: the Washington Post front page after Bush's speech front page story suggested the speech was staged for the president's political benefit. This turned into a Democratic witch hunt and an investigation was conducted to examine why $26K (read here $26K not $26M not $26B not $26T) was spent by the Bush administration "in an era of scarce resources" (Gephardt).
In contrast, today's front page Washington Post (see image, left) no such accusations of political malfeasance are made. Nacilbupera condemns such outrageous media hypocrisy.
(3) Final point: it is not the role of federal government to intervene in state affairs. The President could have addressed both parents and children using the internet, radio, or television; the point is he had other options. Nacilbupera feels that pending an immediate catastrophic national emergency (IE nukes from North Korea or Iran are on their way) really, an address to the schoolchildren of the state should be done by the state's chief executive, the governor. Obama's speech to the children is a mis-education in the proper separation of powers between our state and federal government.
In the above broadcast segment this week Rachel Maddow of MSNBC reports:
"...New government provisional statistics show that in 2008 Massachusetts had the lowest divorce rate in the country. Ta-Da! The rate of divorces in Massachusetts was 2.2 per thousand when gay people started getting married in Massachusetts. The rate of divorces per thousand is now down even further to 2.0 per thousand. That's the lowest divorce rate in the county. In fact Massachusetts divorce rates are now down to pre-WWII levels--1940. So awkwardly, turns out gay marriage is a Defense of Marriage Act."
Maddow's conclusion that gay marriage stifles divorce didn't maks much sense to us so we broke it down to see if she were correct and came up with the following four points with which we take issue:
Point #1: Maddow's conclusion that the MA divorce rate is 2.0 per thousand is false.
As Maddow premises without pause or caution for the listener, the 2008 Massachusetts divorce statistics are provisional. These statistics are published by the CDC and are found here. The graphic below is taken directly from table 2b near the bottom of the link page:
From this table, we gather that Massachusetts had 12,992 provisional divorces in 2008. The divorce rate is calculated by dividing that number into the population of MA from the 2000 census 6.3M and multiplying by 1000. The resulting divorce rate figure (12992/6.3M x 1000) is 2.o46 or rounded down to the "2.0 per 1000" as Maddow quotes.
The footnote #1 cautions: "Figures based on monthly counts and may be underreported." Indeed it cautions:
There is considerable variability among the states in the procedures that are used to submit the counts of marriages and divorces to NCHS and in the extent to which the states update their counts of marriages and divorces as new information is received. Therefore, counts vary in their completeness. Marriage and divorce counts, unlike other provisional data, may be updated after the end of a data year if final counts are provided by the state.
Thus the CDC, unlike Maddow's glaring omission, cautions in saying that the number could be larger, but that is the count they have so far. What is concerning is the huge disparity in MA divorces between the provisional December 2008 figure of 147 and the actual December 2007 figure of 1006--a difference of 859 divorces or reduction of 85% versus the prior year. No other state figures such a prominent decline for December year-over-year (check for yourself!) begging the questions:
Are the Massachusetts provisional divorces for December 2008 underreported? If so, could the impact of underreported divorces impact the entire year?
Although we don't know for sure the answer to the first question, the second is answered with a resounding "yes." If the actual December 2008 divorces were, for example, equal to December 2007, the total number of divorces in MA would climb to 13, 851 (12,992+859) the MA divorce rate for the entire year would equal 2.2 per 1000--which is coincidentally, the same exact MA divorce rate Maddow correctly cites as the divorce rate before legalized MA same-sex marriage.
Point #1 concludes that although Maddow correctly cites the word "provisional" in her premise, her conclusion is flawed because the condition is dropped. Maddow could have correctly concluded "If the provisional statistics--which the CDC notes may be understated--are correct, the divorce rate in MA will drop to 2.0 per 1000."
Point #2: Divorce is slightly on the decline nationally
Let's examine the national divorce rate:
2004 = 3.7 (see CDC report here for 2004-2006 figures) 2005 = 3.6 2006 = 3.6 or 3.7 (measured two ways) 2007 = 3.6 (see table A2 here) 2008 = 3.5 (provisional)
A logical conclusion from this data is that divorce nationally has been on a small decline during the time since MA legalized same-sex marriage. All things equal, MA should realize a decline as well. In order to support Maddow's conclusion that MA same-sex marriage contributes to the decline of divorce rates, additional data would needed to show how MA declined more than other states.
Point #3: Massachusetts historically has the lowest divorce rate in the nation.
Maddow's "Ta-Da" fact that Massachusetts had the lowest divorce rate in the country for 2008 is trite news. In fact, it would be noteworthy "Ta-Da" if Massachusetts didn't have the lowest divorce rate. By examining historical statistics, MA is clearly stingy on divorces compared to any other state perhaps foremost due to the massive numbers of Catholics in the state. Legalized same-sex marriage has nothing to do with Massachusetts' 2008 divorce rate viz-a-viz other states.
Point #4: Massachusetts divorce rate actually increased after passage of same-sex marriage.
Again, by examining the CDC's historical statistics on Massachusetts' divorce rates we find the following divorce rates per 1000 population:
2004 = 2.2 2005 = 2.2 2006 = 2.3 2007 = 2.3
Thus we see that the divorce rate actually increased in 2006 and 2007 from its 2.2 level Maddow cites. But Maddow neglects to mention this increase and focus only on the 2008 number which is, as we stated (point #1 above), provisional. The latest non-provisional--and therefore wholly accurate--numbers is for year 2007 and indicate that while the country is seeing modest decreases in the divorce rate (point #2 above), Massachusetts is experiencing modest increases in the divorce rate!
In conclusion, could it be that Maddow, herself openly gay (wikipedia), has misrepresented the facts to support the gay agenda of legalized same-sex marriage? Is in reality the exact opposite happening that same-sex marriage isn't defending or preserving marriage but contributing to divorce? Because of blatant misrepresentations of fact such as this by Maddow, Nacilbupera does not rely on Maddow nor the MSNBC network for accurate reporting. But what say you?
