Posted on 03/11/2009 11:05:35 AM PDT by Selkirk
Remember Mitch Snyder? For those of you who don't, he was a tireless advocate of the homeless who had his 15 minutes in the '80's for going on hunger strikes to raise the national level of attention to the plight of the homeless. He ran the Community for Creative Non-Violence, which operated a shelter that catered to the needs of a great number of homeless persons in the District of Columbia. For a time, he was very popular for the principled stand that he took on behalf of the homeless.
Unfortunately, that's not the only thing he was known for. For all the things he did that benefited the cause, he also undermined it considerably by creating statistics designed to illustrate his purpose but could not withstand even the slightest scrutiny. One of his best-known instances of hyperbole occurred when he stated that 45 homeless people die every second in the U.S. While he may very have simply misspoke (although he never backed down from the statement), even when you analyze the possibility that he meant that a single homeless person dies every 45 seconds, the position doesn't withstand scrutiny. You see, at that death rate, the problem of homelessness is no longer a problem in just a few months.
So now what are Mitch Snyder's successors doing? Making up their own statistics. Yesterday's headline said, "Report: 1 in 50 U.S. Children Face Homelessness."
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.politicalcastaway.com ...
Wow — that’s over 31 million homeless dying every year in the United States. If that were true, the problem of homeless in America would be solved in a year or two. (And we would need to get a whole new population for this country by the time the 2020 census rolled around.)
When even CNN tears apart a study (I saw this yesterday getting snickers-no joke) you know its BS.
40 out of 50 liberals don’t understand anything.
5/4ths of high school students can’t do fractions:)
Six out of five coeds is a victim of date rape.
4/3rds or americans don’t understand fractions!
And 78.7% of statistics are made up on the spot.
50 Out of 49 Liberals Don’t Understand Statistics
lol, I hit the 0 not the 9. Your reply would have been funnier - yes.
The other one is using statistics to lie.
We need to stop breathing in order to live forever.
Since they cannot game, spin or have “nuance” for concrete fields such as accounting, they tend to stay away from these fields. Where they do, you'll see misrepresentation by omission and selection. This can be seen in the statistical analysis of “climate change” to justify Global Warming.
LOL, some of that stuff is pretty good!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.