From: Spike Jones (spike66@ibm.net)
Date: Tue Nov 14 2000 - 21:25:10 MST
CurtAdams@aol.com wrote:
> If you've got a better estimator, I'm sure you could find an poly sci
> academic who's open to suggestions; quite possible the author of
> the paper would look at other estimators as it would improve the
> quality of the paper.
Since my home state has become an unwilling subject of
media scrutiny, I suggest extropians take a vacation down
there some time. If you do, you may find that Palm Beach
County is an anomaly in itself. It is a huuuuge retirement
community. I dont have statistics handy but I suspect the
average age in Palm Beach County is probably
the highest in the state, perhaps among the highest in the
nation. Anyone have the numbers?
If you do vacation in Florida, go do the Disney World/
EPCOT thing if you must, then drive across the BeeLine
and hit Interstate 95. Drive south. You will pass thru
countless acres of "wetlands", which is a greeny euphemism
for vermin infested swamp. At one time, most of Florida
consisted of these vermin infested swamps, but in the last
century, much of that land was drained, much to the
harm of the wetlands creatures, such as disease-carrying
mosquitoes and venomous snakes. Many of these vile pests
have now been identified as endangered species. If you happen
to own a vermin infested swamp and you try to drain it,
good chance you will be thrown into prison, and for your
trouble you will be forced to spend untold money to defeat
the drainage and restore the habitat for the disease carrying
vermin. Then of course if trespassers on your swamp fall
victim to one of these wretched menaces, you are liable.
Nowthen, this has become a blank check for the greens.
As far as I can tell, there is no real limit to how far the
litigants can carry the endangered species act. It has
already been successfully used to protect insects. Bugs,
fer cryin out loud! Dont we have enough of these?
Political campaigns are often reduced to sound bytes.
Algore manged to get Bush's sound byte to be:
Bush = end of social security checks and subsequent
starvation for seniors, etc.
Perhaps in Palm Beach County the sound byte was
Nader = fewer golf courses, more vermin infested swamp.
Consequently he got few votes, making the Buchanan
vote {sound byte: Buchanan = standing up for god and
country} seem anomalously high by comparison. My
conclusion is that Nader and Buchanan should not be
legitimately compared, and that doing so in a county
where there is strong anti-Naderism will make Buchanan
appear anomalously favored. Better to simply compare
the Buchanan vote in each county, compare the Nader
vote in each county, etc. Please forgive my lengthy
epistle. {8-] spike
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