Monthly Archives: September 2008

Friday McCain/McSame Bashing

There's more out there, but I'm traveling…

Thurs

Wed

[there were 5(!) more days here, but something seems to have eaten them — I fear I have lost the data unless it's lurking in some cache on my home computer]

Update (11/21): To see the full text, with the missing parts restored, please go to Friday McCain/McSame Bashing (Repaired)

Posted in Politics: McCain | 6 Comments

In the Interests of (Social) Science

According to a very polite email I got today, a research team from the Psychology Department at New York University, headed by Professor Yaacov Trope and supported by the National Science Foundation, is investigating the cognitive causes of voting behavior, political preferences, and candidate evaluations throughout the course of the 2008 U.S. Presidential election.

They're doing a study and in the hope of getting politically aware respondents are asking bloggers to pass on their request to fill out their survey. The study will, they hope, “shed light on the information people use to inform evaluations during the last few weeks before the election”. They “seek respondents of all political leanings from all over the country (and from the rest of the world)” to complete a 15-minute questionnaire, the responses to which they promise will be completely anonymous.

It looks legit.

One interesting aspect of the request is that I turn off comments on this item: “a necessary precaution we have to take in order to avoid the bias that is likely to result when new respondents see comments about the survey before taking it.” That sounds sensible, so I've complied with the request.

Another is that they want time series data:

…we would like to have respondents complete the survey throughout the days leading up to the Election. To this end, if would be ideal if you were willing to have the link appear (i.e., repost it) four times, in equally spaced out intervals (about every two weeks), with the first running asap and the last running several days prior to Election Day. Of course, if you would be willing to post it even once, it would already be a great help to us.

So, what the heck, I've queued it up for science. Excuse the repeats.

[slightly edited since the original posting]

Posted in Politics: US | Comments Off on In the Interests of (Social) Science

Obama to Visit UM

Barack Obama will be visiting the campus on Friday.

I'm going to miss it, because I will be in New York. On Friday I'll be at Fordham Law for a seminar; on Monday I'll be at Brooklyn Law giving a paper. Over the weekend, TKTS willing, I hope to catch a play. Suggestions for other cultural highlights welcomed.

Posted in Talks & Conferences, U.Miami | 6 Comments

The Bigger They Are, The Harder They Fall (If We Let Them)

Nate Oman has an interesting, if somewhat sobering, poist at Concurring Opinions which begins as follows:

One of my students sent me the pages from Lehman's filings listing the 30 top unsecured creditors. It's a simple column of figures that makes sobering reading, even for a let-the-market-punish-them enthusiast such as myself. First past the post is CitiBank with $138 billion in unsecured bonds. Just for fun, I tried to find out what $138 billion will get you in today's world.

The comparative numbers he offers are so big as to nearly defy comprehension.

I understand the Schumpaterian arguments for size and global competitiveness, but isn't there still some virtue to keeping firms from getting too enormous?

OK, Lehman wasn't too big to fail. But two or three Lehmans might be.

And we just socialized AIG (Fed to lend $85 billion to AIG, take 80 percent stake). Did FDR do anything on this scale?

Posted in Econ & Money | 2 Comments

Watch Editing Happen

Before and after versions of an article; some of the changes I get, others I don't.

Before:

Ann Bartow, Why Hollywood Does Not Require 'Saving' From the Recordkeeping Requirements Imposed by 18 U.S.C. Section 2257 (Feminist Law Profs Blog).

After:

Ann Bartow, Why Hollywood Does Not Require 'Saving' From the Recordkeeping Requirements Imposed by 18 U.S.C. Section 2257, 118 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 43 (2008).

Is this parallel publishing the wave of the future? And which one becomes the canonical version?

Posted in Readings | 3 Comments

New Email Making the Rounds

So far this election, my parents have been great bellwethers: if they forward me an email it either is viral, or goes viral in no time.

So here's today's:

I'm a little confused. Let me see if I have this straight…..

  • If you grow up in Hawaii, raised by your grandparents, you're “exotic, different.”
  • Grow up in Alaska eating moose burgers, it's a quintessential American story.
  • If your name is Barack you're a radical, unpatriotic Muslim.
  • Name your kids Willow, Trig and Track, you're a maverick.
  • Graduate from Harvard Law School and you are unstable.
  • Attend 5 different small colleges before graduating, you're well grounded.
  • If you spend 3 years as a brilliant community organizer, become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend 12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, spend 8 years as a State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people, become chairman of the state Senate's Health and Human Services committee, spend 4 years in the United States Senate representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131 bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran's Affairs committees, you don't have any real leadership experience.
  • If your total resume is: local weather girl, 4 years on the city council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7, 000 people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000 people, then you're qualified to become the country's second highest ranking executive.
  • If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years while raising 2 beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches, you're not a real Christian.
  • If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress, and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you're a Christian.
  • If you teach responsible, age appropriate sex education, including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of society.
  • If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence only, with no other option in sex education in your state's school system while your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant, you're very responsible.
  • If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a position in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner city community, then gave that up to raise a family, your family's values don't represent America's.
  • If you're husband is nicknamed “First Dude”, with at least one DWI conviction and no college education, who didn't register to vote until age 25 and once was a member of a group that advocated the secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely admirable.

OK, much clearer now.

Posted in Politics: US: 2008 Elections | 4 Comments