07
Sep
2011
Funny Graphic on Ron Paul from MSNBC
[UPDATE below.]
Someone who knows how the Intertubes work, please get a screenshot of this. Check out how the poll results are graphed here. Notice anything funny, that might set off a paranoid Ron Paul fan? (I’ll update this post if someone can get me the screen shot.)
UPDATE: Thanks to Isaac for sending me these:
The size of Ron Paul’s bar doesn’t look like it holds almost twice the amount of votes as Romney?
It looks like the programmer set out to make 1% equal to a specific bar length and put a limit on how long the bars could be so it doesn’t stretch out the screen. He probably wasn’t expecting anyone to get such a large portion of the vote or was too incompetent (or lazy) to implement a system where scaling was perfect with the allotted space given. There’s two ways in which this could be a conspiracy. First, the NWO overlords must have anticipated Ron Paul getting a large portion of the vote and told the NBC poll programmers to set those bar length parameters in such a way that that it won’t look like Ron Paul is leading by much Second, the bar length parameters could have been changed midway when the NWO overlords saw what was going on.
>leading by much. Second (missed the period)
DJ, are you using “NWO overlords” to suggest that it’s implausible that MSNBC has anything to do with the graphics that show up on its site?
If so, check out this kookball theory: Just because of the different images given to Ron Paul and Mitt Romney, those tinfoil hatters in the Paul camp think there is bias. But I mean, that’s kind of silly. Either the guy doing the Ron Paul sketch was incompetent, or the NWO Overlords at National Review commissioned him to make Paul look bad. I can’t buy such a farfetched theory.
I do think news media is capable of favoring one candidate over others and a lot of time is very obvious like the National Review covers. But this poll incident is so minor and insignificant that I think making a conspiracy out of it ridiculous. Thus I use the “NWO overlords” to over dramatize the sheer ridiculousness I find in this. This is one of those times when Occam’s razor becomes very useful.
out of it is*
Well, 42 = 21 when you are in a liquidity trap.
like 🙂
The results must be in nominal votes, not real votes, and clearly the graphic is adjusting for the hyperinflation of online Ron Paul votes.
And here I thought 22% was a little over half of 42%.
I can see how doubling the width of the graph could be reasonably inconvenient – but come on! There are standard methods of dealing with that like a somewhat longer bar with a jagged bar break.
After checking this morning, Paul is in first at 49% with almost 50k votes. Romney is a distant second with just shy of 18%. Very nice.
I’m surprised he did so well. I didn’t watch the debate, but all the call-ins on the radio this morning were saying Perry and Paul did pretty bad and Romney and Huntsman did well. This was C-Span, which usually isn’t lacking in Tea Party or libertarian call-ins!
I’m guessing the fact that this is an internet poll has something to do with his performance. Paul supporters are of course much more likely to be online. It’s like reading Wikipedia articles about economic topics. If you didn’t know any better you’d swear one out of four economists was an Austrian!
That’s not meant to be a slight on Ron Paul – this is of course much higher than he typically polls anywhere. There’s got to be a reason for that.
Did you also know, that just as Ron Paul supporters are likely to be online, that voters are much more likely to vote, than non-voters? Therefore, the votes of voters should probably not count.
That makes no sense.
The point is that you should not interpret an online vote as a sign of Republican support for Ron Paul. You should interpret it as the online community’s support for Ron Paul.
I’m not saying it doesn’t count. Of course it counts. The question is – what does it count for?
This is an amazing Fox interview with Ron Paul by O’Reilly hack Jesse Watters from last night. Watters and O’Reilly then explain gold, silver and the constitution to Ron Paul who is a loon and clearly does not understand.
http://www.newshounds.us/2011/09/08/bill_oreilly_ambushes_ron_paul.php
I had to laugh at the part where Ron Paul said Bill O’Reilly has trouble understanding economics.
Good times. Good times.
OK Daniel, but that’s like me posting on your blog, “I had to laugh when Obama proposed another round of government spending to boost GDP. What a joker. High five!”
Sure. I’m aware you think he doesn’t understand economics. I’m not even sure he does.
What was funny about Paul is that not only doesn’t he understand economics (not surprising – most politicos don’t), but that he thinks he has a firm enough grasp of it that he’ll call out others on their alleged ignorance.
Anyway – the real difference between you and me is that I wouldn’t append a dorky “high five!” at the end
🙂
I had to laugh when DK said Ron Paul doesn’t understand economics.
Good times. Good times.
I actually never SAID it. It would loose some of its punch if I had to make that explicit.
Well… I guess I just said it to Bob… but you know what I mean – I never said it initially.
But, Dan wasn’t responding to your initial post, he was responding to your reply to Bob where you said Ron Paul didn’t understand economics.
(Man, nitpicking blog posts, I need to get a life)
True, you never explicitly say it, but you implied it. That’s the lawyer in you.
That Kuehn, always the slippery fellow…
😉
What is the likelyhood that O’Reilly has a leg up on RPaul as far as economic understanding? Wouldn’t you place your bets with Paul rather than with the nationalist?
I really don’t know which of the two understands it better – I wouldn’t go to either of them.
As for the nationalism reference… while I disagree with Paul on a lot of foreign policy I would probably prefer him to O’Reilly. That’s an area where Paul’s errors of omission would be less bad than O’Reilly’s errors of commission.
But O’Reilly can be a surprisingly reasonable guy relative to some of the Fox folks.
Anyway – I don’t have to make this choice. It’s not clear to me which of those two understands economics best, and thankfully I don’t have to go to either for my economics.
The Austrians have won. The best the dark side can throw at us are DK with his brilliant doubletalk, jive and hair splitting and Jesse Watters.
We can also throw some spell at you. Does anyone have a spare hair from Krugman’s beard that I could borrow?
How dumb did Perry sound on global warming? If I was a presidential candidate and there was somewhat of an important issue that I might be ask about, I sure as heck would have some credible knowledge in my back pocket on it.
Crazed neo-cons sic FEC on “foreign” money supporting Ron Paul:
http://www.politico.com/blogs/onmedia/0811/Ron_Paul_boosters_show_cancelled_after_FEC_complaint.html
See this for a corrected graph http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2011/09/truth-versus-msnbc-about-ron-paul.html
It looks like they’ve fixed the graph now.
You mean the NWO overlords? I didn’t think they had any influence on it.
At 2:29 CDT the graph is better but still not to scale. Ron Paul has over 50%.
I don’t see anything wrong with this chart. “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.”
I don’t see anything wrong with this graph. “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.”
MSNBC at its best.
Mr. Kuehn:
FYI, this poll is not “higher than Ron Paul typically polls, but very typical of how he polls. Do your research and discover that Ron Paul wins nearly EVERY after-debate poll. That this fact is downplayed by the “controlled” media doesn’t alter the fact.