Category: Lies and Untruths

Piling On

Journalist Scum, Lies and Untruths, Two-Minute Hate

There are many times when I wonder (as do many of you) why I bother with the Daily Mail, which is a truly horrible publication.  (It’s difficult to call it a “newspaper” because so much of it is utter rubbish.)

However, I can deal with “rubbish”.  It’s when they publish outright misleading falsehoods that I get upset.  Here’s an example:

Never mind “correlation” not being related to “causation”;  the difference between “causation” and “coincidence” is even greater.

As we read this silly article, only in paragraph eleventy-hundred do we come across this embarrassing factoid:

Progressive Furniture, a division of Sauder Woodworking based in Claremont, North Carolina, announced its plans to close down and fire all 30 of its employees by the end of the year. 

The firm grew to be the seventh largest furniture manufacturing company in the world – and was a much-loved brand, selling high-quality traditional and modern homeware at Walmart, Target and Home Depot. 

Uhhhh Lauder may be large — and it is — but its tiny 30-employee subsidiary?  Much less so.  But it gets worse.  You see:

Although it is an American company, its main supplier was based in Rosarito, Mexico. That manufacturer, Baja Wood, was responsible for more than 60 percent of Progressive’s inventory.

So Progressive is really just an assembly- and shipping operation?  (That would account for its tiny workforce.)  But what about this Baja Wood?  In fact…

…the Mexican supplier’s internal dilemmas resulted in [Progressive’s] demise.  Problems began back in January, when about 60 of Baja Wood’s 320 employees rallied in front of the factory in protest of reduced hours.  Government labor investigators were called upon to evaluate the situation and production halted.  However, once the investigation was closed, Baja Wood never reopened. 

So that’s why Progressive failed:  its major supplier went tits-up.

Trump’s tariffs, despite the screaming headline, had sweet fuck-all to do with it.

In future I think I’ll just stick with the Mail’s T&A content.

Caveat lector.

Sick Of The Exaggeration

Lies and Untruths, Numbers & Statistics

From Stephen Green (and a veritable host of others):

“The Democrats have a destructive addiction to the 20% side of a whole host of 80/20 issues.”

I can’t remember who first uttered the “80/20 issues” trope, but I’ll bet it was a Democrat like James Carville or Bill Maher.

With all things, scale matters.

Are you telling me that 20% of voters — that’s one in every five voters — supports:

  • men competing in women’s sports
  • gender-reversal surgery on minor children without parental notification (let alone consent)
  • not expelling criminal illegal aliens
  • not ending the flood of illegal immigrants who draw money from public health- and education services, at the expense of U.S. citizens
  • deficit spending and a ballooning national debt
  • a voting system that enables voter fraud and crooked elections (in guess who’s favor)
  • Hamas-sponsored riots and
  • anti-Semitic attacks on Jews in college campuses
  • eco-terrorism and obstructive demonstrations
  • violent demonstrations against public officials (e.g. Supreme Court justices) who dare to oppose their agenda
  • waste, abuse and outright fraud in the federal government budget
  • sending foreign aid money — by the billion — to sponsor overt anti-American activities abroad
  • siphoning “foreign aid” money — by the tens of millions — to line the pockets of executives running Washington D.C. non-profit organizations
  • a military weakened by woke DEI policies and regulations
  • a foreign policy that supports enemies of the U.S. (e.g. Iran) rather than chastises them
  • over-regulation of industry which chokes off economic progress
  • schools which have failed our children, and the government department that is responsible for that failure
  • a mandate that all cars sold in the U.S. be EVs, by 2030 — i.e. five years’ time — with no supporting infrastructure to sustain them
  • [insert your favorite issues here]

Seriously?  One in every five voters supports all the above?

Let me tell you right now:  it’s not 20%, but more like 5%.  In other words, the Democrats are supporting splinter issues that may find favor with only five in every hundred U.S. citizens — and even 5% may be too high.

So let’s quit this exaggeration of their support, please.  Most of their positions are deeply unpopular with almost all voters, and an “80/20” apportionment gives a misleading impression.  Numbers matter, so let’s start using the more-correct one.

Speaking of numbers, here’s a recent poll highlight:

When asked in an open-ended question to name the Democratic leader they feel “best reflects the core values” of the party, “10% of Democratic-aligned adults name New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 9% former vice president Kamala Harris, 8% Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and 6% House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Another 4% each name former president Barack Obama and Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett, with Schumer joining a handful of others at 2%.”

When AOC is your standard-bearer (and the rest are equally dire)…

Weather Vain

Lies and Untruths, Science!, Trumpism

Here’s a consequence of being entrusted to collect critical data, then using that data to peddle a false narrative:

The US government’s weather agency has been dismantled by the Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) after it was accused of peddling “misinformation”.

Hundreds of weather forecasters at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) were fired last week as part of Donald Trump’s plans to slash the federal workforce.

In total, at least 800 civil servants are thought to have lost their jobs, including meteorologists, radar specialists and crews of hurricane hunters, who fly aircraft into storms to help forecasters, according to CBS.

Of course, out come the apocalyptic doomsayers:

The job cuts have triggered protests at the agency’s headquarters in Maryland, with some scientists and lawmakers warning that removing staff involved in predicting natural disasters will “endanger American lives going forward”.

No, they won’t — at least, no more than they ever did before.  There are several other avenues of getting such warnings — from private enterprise — and not from some Gummint malignancy.

But here’s the critical part, from someone who’s been doing the hard work of tracking this nonsense for a decade and a half:

Prof Roger Pielke, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who focuses on the politicization of science, said that the agency is “reaping the whirlwind” for “cutting corners on science”.

“By not upholding the highest standards of scientific integrity, we’ve opened the door to politicians meddling,” he said.

According to experts, studies and former NOAA officials, the chart proves little about the effects of climate change, and instead shows that disasters are becoming more expensive because Americans choose to build in hazard-prone areas.

“The problem is you can’t use economic data to say anything about climate change,” said Prof Pielke.

Quite right.  Collecting data to forewarn of disaster, then using that data incorrectly and unethically to further a boutique (and flawed) worldview — that would be Global Warming Climate Cooling Change©, of course — deserves censure of the second-highest order.  (“First-order” censure would be imprisonment and so on.)

So of course this little clique of taxpayer-funded climate alarmists deserves to be shut up and disbanded.

MOAR DOGE like this, please.

Unbelievable

Anti-Gun Nannies, Lies and Untruths

Not that we should believe anything that Josh Sugarman’s Violence Policy Center ever says, but even for them, this is egregiously terrible:

“More Than 2,500 Non-Self Defense Deaths Involving Concealed Carry Killers Since 2007, Latest Violence Policy Center Research Shows”

Yeah, except that the data shows no such thing — unless you lie, twist and conceal data which negates your premise, that us.

When you discount all of the categories that don’t match VPC’s horrid headline—suicide, murder/suicide victim, cases still pending, accidents and cases still under investigation—the final total is 625 over a 17-year period. Do the math, and it equals 36 a year, equal to about two holiday weekends in Chicago.  (Of course, this assumes that VPC’s figures are even close to being correct.)

And they pretty much aren’t.  Considering that only a (shamefully) small percentage of gun owners carry concealed, I wouldn’t even believe that annual number of three dozen.

The only problem with bullshit like this — Sugarman would call it a feature, not a bug — is that the numbers will be uncritically used by The Usual Hoplophobic Suspects — media, Congress, etc. — to bolster their demands that All Guns Should Be Confiscated, Right Now.

Uh huh.  Dream on, assholes.

Old Times There Am Not Forgotten

Legal Stuff, Lies and Untruths

Here’s a little bit of rank injustice:

Harrods could be forced to pay out tens of millions of pounds to female employees sexually abused by Mohamed Al-Fayed because of ‘systemic wrongdoing’ at store, lawyers say.

The Egypytian businessman has been accused of raping five women during his 25-year tenure at the luxury retail outlet, with at least 15 other women saying they were sexually assaulted by him.

Lawyers have warned that Al-Fayed’s offences could range beyond the allegations made in a BBC documentary, with his other former business interests, including Fulham Football Club, now under scrutiny.

Okay, you may be asking about this “systemic wrongdoing” — i.e. that Harrods had a system in place which either encouraged or else allowed the old goat to molest his female emplyees.

Of course, Harrods doesn’t or didn’t have any such system.  But the lawyers have to argue that they did, because:

Al Fayed, who died last year aged 94…

They can’t very well go after him now, you see, so they have to go after the company because, well, because that’s where the bucks are.  And it’s really conveeeeenient that the old fart isn’t around to refute the claims now crawling, like their claimants, from the woodwork.

In the reign of Emperor Kim, of course, bullshit like this would be stopped in its tracks because, duh, it’s bullshit.  And of course some feeeemales stand to get a lot of money out of these unsubstantiated accusations, as do their lawyers, which is how this creative nonsense ever came to see the light of day.

‘It seems from the information received from those who have contacted us, and the information brought to light in the BBC documentary, that the abuse of young women at Harrods should properly be described as human sex trafficking,’ said Richard Meeran, a partner at the London law firm Leigh Day.

Ah yes, the old bogeyman “sex trafficking” — where would we be without this handy little catch-all expression?  And the BBC… hardly an unimpeachable source.

‘This is because the recruitment of young women for the alleged purpose of sexual exploitation entailed and depended on systemic wrongdoing by the company, its senior managers and security personnel, as well as the ultimate perpetrator.’

So these women were hired for the express purpose of being the Harrods owner’s sex toys?  And all the senior management of Harrods were aware of this and did nothing to stop it? 

And it’s not just one woman, but a hundred and fifty (always be suspicious of nice round numbers).  And all of them have kept their mouths shut for all this time, because…?

I report you decide;  but I’ve decided that this — all of it — is arrant bullshit and an attempt to wring money from a wealthy company, just because its erstwhile owner and the “alleged’ perpetrator is dead and can’t defend himself.

Just to be clear on this:  Al Fayed probably was a loathsome old bastard who deserved a good hard flogging / ball-kicking for oh-so many reasons.  But even given that, it doesn’t mean that this pussymail can be justified.

Big Fat Duh

Lies and Untruths, Numbers & Statistics

There’s a great deal I know only a little about, still more about which I know nothing, and a terrifyingly-small number of things I know quite a lot about. [/Donald Rumsfeld]

But one of the things which fall into the latter category is that of statistical sampling, because my very first real job was in the Statistics Department of what was then the largest marketing research company in the world (the Great Big Research Company, or A.C. Nielsen).  And my specific area of expertise was in sample selection:  the methodology of creating a sample, the data drawn from which would accurately represent reality.  A single anecdote will suffice.

One of our major clients was the yogurt-producing subsidiary of a large dairy corporation (think: Yoplait).  Our data was always being questioned by this company, because in some cases we would show their market share as being too small (the sales numbers didn’t jibe with their actual deliveries to stores, for example —  a known quantity), or else, paradoxically, far too large, for exactly the same reason:  all dependent on which geographical area we were reporting on.

My job was to investigate this phenomenon, and some months later I discovered the reason.  The various smaller dairies’ yogurts were not being delivered to all the stores in the area, but in stores where they did have fridge space, they sold extremely well.  Using a simple picture shows the problem:

Our sample of stores may have been representative of say, total grocery sales in the area (and it was), but when Yogurt sales were carved out, the sample simply sucked because of how the dairies’ distribution worked.

It’s a very complex problem, and it applies to just about any sample selection.  In this case, there was no solution other than to broaden the sample, which would have cost too much.  So unless the client was prepared to pay a much higher fee to get better data, they’d either have to live with suspect data or cancel their account altogether.  (The end result was that they stopped looking at specific markets, and only bought data at the national level, which was acceptably accurate, but less useful to the local sales teams.)

I told you all that so I could talk about this.

Harris’ So-Called ‘Surge’ Is Thanks To Oversampling: Pollsters

In the meta data from the call centers college educated Dems are 3-4x more likely to answer than non-college. While weighting can help minimize the bias if done correctly it won’t totally eliminate the problem.
— Mark Davin Harris (@markdharris) August 16, 2024

Critics point out that many polls have been sampling a disproportionately smaller share of Republican voters compared to exit poll data from the 2020 presidential election. The result, they say, is a misleading “phantom advantage” for Ms. Harris. According to them, this skewed sampling could be a strategic move to boost enthusiasm and fundraising for Ms. Harris’ campaign.

Usually, when I talk about situations like this, I use a shorthand expression like:  “They must have drawn their sample from the Harvard Faculty Lounge.”

Unscrupulous polling companies can (and do) draw their samples to show exactly what the clients want to see — tailoring the samples to produce the desired results.  We used to call this the “K factor”:  that number which when applied to the data will provide the result most favorable to the client.  It’s more commonly known within the research community as “bullshit”, but it’s bullshit that will generate headlines — so ten guesses as to whether the mainstream media will accept such data uncritically, either because it favors their own bias/opinion or because they are completely incapable of analyzing the data properly.  (If you answered “or both” to the above, go to the head of the class.)

So is the “Kamala Surge” real, or not?  Given all the players in this particular piece of theater… oh please, it’s patent bullshit.