Reich-Wing Blogosphere Reacts to OWS Protests

[Brainster]

Communists? New York Magazine, that conservative bastion, polled 100 Occupy Wall Streeters, and found that:

37% said capitalism can't be saved; it's inherently immoral.
Only 3% said they were liberal but mainstream, while
12% said they were strongly liberal and
41% said they were more than strongly liberal (i.e., Ralph Nader) and
34% said the US government was no better than Al Qaeda

 

[Gazpacho]

Nice entertainment, just don't treat it like a serious poll.

 

[RandFan]

Communists? New York Magazine, that conservative bastion, polled 100 Occupy Wall Streeters, and found that:

37% said capitalism can't be saved; it's inherently immoral.
Only 3% said they were liberal but mainstream, while
12% said they were strongly liberal and
41% said they were more than strongly liberal (i.e., Ralph Nader) and
34% said the US government was no better than Al Qaeda

And? "strongly liberal"? Is that still an epithet? 100? That's an optimum sampling size? Not being conservative is a guarantee of proper methodology? In any event, I don't see anything earth shattering. Not sure why you bothered to post it?

 

[Brainster]

And? "strongly liberal"? Is that still an epithet? 100? That's an optimum sampling size? Not being conservative is a guarantee of proper methodology? In any event, I don't see anything earth shattering. Not sure why you bothered to post it?

75% aligned themselves politically with Noam Chomsky or Ralph Nader; only 12% were strongly liberal (i.e., aligned themselves with Paul Krugman), and a scant 3% aligned themselves with Obama.

Yes, 100 is a reasonable sample size considering:

Only a few hundred activists showed up, but those who did have been a hardy bunch. They’re still camped in the open air in Zuccotti Park (near the WTC site)—and just got some big labor groups to promise to join their cause. We polled 100 protesters who are in it for the long haul.

Let's be generous and say that there were actually 1000 protestors there. That would mean that the New Yorker polled one in ten of the group. The most recent Gallup poll of Obama's job approval rating came from 1500 adults; assuming there are about 200 million adults in the country, that's one in 133,333.

Yes, I am sure the margin of error is greater in the OWS poll, and there are sampling problems such as non-random response rates. But the poll still has some validity, and the results are so skewed that it seems obvious that the OWS crowd is drawn very heavily from the left-most end of the political spectrum. If it consoles you at all, I am sure that the Tea Party movement was drawn heavily from the right wing. The idea that either of these movements are representative of the country as a whole is, quite frankly, a joke.

 

[Gazpacho]

75% aligned themselves politically with Noam Chomsky or Ralph Nader; only 12% were strongly liberal (i.e., aligned themselves with Paul Krugman), and a scant 3% aligned themselves with Obama.

They were told to rank themselves on a scale of surveyor-written characterizations of supposed "liberal" individuals, which start off arguable and end up just silly. Do you not see a bit of a wording problem here? They might as well have thrown in a Planet X option.

 

[RandFan]

But the poll still has some validity...

No. Not impressed with your discussion of sampling size but let's set that aside for sake of argument. You still have not resolved any of the other problems. What were the controls? Methodology? Objectivity? C'mon, this is a skeptics site, right? And I still don't understand this nonsense about "liberal". What point was there for you to note how many were "liberal"? Again, poisionig the well? Ad hominem?

 

[NoZed Avenger]

No. Not impressed with your discussion of sampling size but let's set that aside for sake of argument. You still have not resolved any of the other problems. What were the controls? Methodology? Objectivity? C'mon, this is a skeptics site, right? And I still don't understand this nonsense about "liberal". What point was there for you to note how many were "liberal"? Again, poisionig the well? Ad hominem?

I guess that's what the reich wing does.

 

[RandFan]

I guess that's what the reich wing does.

When I woke up from my 45 year stupor one of the things I had to wonder about myself is why I hated liberals so much? I can't tell you. I guess I thought they were godless communists who wanted to take away my freedom to become a billionaire and pray in church. Who knows?

 

[NoZed Avenger]

When I woke up from my 45 year stupor one of the things I had to wonder about myself is why I hated liberals so much? I can't tell you. I guess I thought they were godless communists who wanted to take away my freedom to become a billionaire and pray in church. Who knows?

Your more recent posts, however, remind me of an ex-smoker who now seeks to do battle with all of cigarette kind, or of a person converted to a new religion (or lack of one) who must now show the others languishing in the position he used to be in the "Truth."

Which brings us back to the ad hominem and poisoning the well point: The initial article - from the Village voice - lists a few blog posts from people I have never heard of. Those people are implicitly listed as some kind of typical person from the right, and then collectively named in the OP as "reich wing."

While your points to Brainster are valid, I do think that a little of the same type of questions about poisoning the well, ad hominems, and represenative samples might be asked of the original article, but even "reich wing" seems to be allowable.

You've always been a thoughtful poster; I put this out for your consideration -- are you trying to bring the other beggars to the bread? Or are you merely looking to hit us over the head with the loaf?

 

[Bill Thompson]

What is wrong with being a Marxist anyway?

 

[bikerdruid]

What is wrong with being a Marxist anyway?

nothing.

 

[RandFan]

Your more recent posts, however, remind me of an ex-smoker who now seeks to do battle with all of cigarette kind, or of a person converted to a new religion (or lack of one) who must now show the others languishing in the position he used to be in the "Truth."

Which brings us back to the ad hominem and poisoning the well point: The initial article - from the Village voice - lists a few blog posts from people I have never heard of. Those people are implicitly listed as some kind of typical person from the right, and then collectively named in the OP as "reich wing."

While your points to Brainster are valid, I do think that a little of the same type of questions about poisoning the well, ad hominems, and represenative samples might be asked of the original article, but even "reich wing" seems to be allowable.

You've always been a thoughtful poster; I put this out for your consideration -- are you trying to bring the other beggars to the bread? Or are you merely looking to hit us over the head with the loaf?

Thanks. I actually think about these things. My posts often don't really represent completely my POV. Truth is I don't consider myself a Liberal or Democrat. I'm still a registered Republican but plan on registering as an Independent. I don't for a moment think the world would be a better place if the GOP vanished nor do I think those on the left are somehow pure. So yeah, we need to be skeptical of all perspectives. There's a lot of crap out there on both sides.

 

[Tricky]

It's not just about communist people Travis, it's about communist puppets!

You mean like Evil Bert?

 

[jj]

How typical to pile on the lies and lies and more lies.

That's all the radical right has left to them, in their rush to support ppro-ultra-rich policies.

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

I love how people accuse each other of being "communists". It's so retro!

They are just nostalgic for the original Star Wars.