Hard, Cold Data

Digby, Atrios and virtually the entire liberal blogosphere have been having some fun with one of Atrios's "wankers of the day". In this case, the issue is a column written by Melinda Henneberger lecturing Democrats on why their stance on abortion is killing the party. Others have written why what Henneberger has to say is B.S. and properly labeling her a "concern troll", so I'm not going there. Rather, this statement by Digby struck me:

Give me cold poll numbers any day --- and if somebody wants to follow up with interviews of a sample of that sample for an article in the paper, then fine. But the notion that DC pundits have some special way of talking to strangers that translates into something meaningful about the population at large is ridiculous.

It is ridiculous.

I don't watch much of the teevee in the way of punditry anymore. But on Sundays, if the timing is right, I'll sometimes watch a bit of "This Week". Today I noticed that Tori Clarke said on more than one occasion "what I'm hearing is" and "people are getting tired of" and "voters will never" kind of language. And she wasn't alone in doing this. I was thinking, who said that? What people? Where?

Because Walter Cronkite (who is now ignored btw) was considered the most credible person in the country at one time, an entire industry has been developed in his wake. Punditry has been living off the legacy of credible reporters from the 50's and 60's for a long long time. But real data, real studies, real research, have shown over and over again (just go visit Media Matters for a wealth of data) that punditry ..... all punditry .... is mostly a bunch of ordinary people with supposed "connections" who are talking through their rear-ends. The is never more true than when pundits pretend to understand the American citizen, the "people", the "heartland" or "voters".

I don't want censorship. I just wish that enough viewers would complain and enough pressure brought to bear to force some sort of accountability for a stations punditry. Other industries do it, i.e. on financial channels who interview market "pundits", market observers are often tracked on performance of the stocks they've recommended. If a political pundit says "xyz", let there be a scorecard that shows whether xyz prediction/opinion came true, is backed by solid data, or is just BS. And obviously, if someone is usually wrong (which are most of the current crop), then they should not be rewarded with the admiration of viewers simply because they are likeable, have a familiar name and face, and we like what they are saying.

I'm not so naive as to think that anything will materially change in the near future. But maybe, just maybe, with the internets and bloggers (on both sides) doing fact checking and gaining readership, such accountability is evolving and will largely come to pass. Certainly ratings for many of these shows are suffering. Maybe the teevee execs will get a clue. I hope.

*sigh* Update:

Here we have a poster-child example of what I said above:

"Well, the Democrats have taken the position that they now will do with the nation's business. And if they're not doing that business, and clearly the immigration issue is very much on people's mind, I think they will suffer the same consequences that the Republicans suffered a year ago. People are fed up with seeing Washington bickering, fighting, infighting and never dealing with the issue."

That's the "dean" of the Washington Press Corpse David Broder on Press the Meat today. How many ways is this statement ridiculous?

1) What evidence does Broder have that "immigration is on people's mind"? I haven't seen a single person mention it personally. Do the voters really care about this issue at this point as compared to, oh, say the Iraq war, or health care, the economy, or gasoline prices, or or or or or ..... ?

2) Why would the Democrats suffer? A full 85% of Senate Dems voted for the immigration compromise while 80% of Republicans voted against it. It's not Harry Reid holding things up, it's numbskulls like Jeff Sessions. To the degree that voters give a rip, they're likely paying close attention to the roadblocks. And they're likely Rush Limbaugh listeners in Alabama who are cheering Jeff Sessions and would never support Democrats no matter what they did.

3) Who says "people are fed up with seeing Washington bickering, fighting, infighting and never dealing with the issue". The polls show low approval ratings, and being "fed up", with everyone because the Iraq war continues and continues and ...... Again, please tell me ole' dean David, why is it continuing?

4) People want it "fixed". Oh yeah? Fixed how? Broder seems to be saying "do anything" and it's a "fix". Except of course that what Jeff Sessions wants for a fix is dramatically different than what I might want. But nevermind, let's just spew out a vapid (I love that term, h/t Josh Marshall) analysis of the immigration "situation. Sheesh.

Broder, a self-labeled moderate, seems to feel he has the pulse of Amurika. The evidence suggests he's waaaay off. Yet will he be held accountable, or continue to be paid mucho dinero and respect to spew out his garbage logic, prejudices and 1960's musings?